Literacy is the power of the elite.

Colonial New England during the period of King Philip's War seems like a setting from Orwell's "Nineteen Eighty-Four." In a society where the educated elite hold positions of power, the marginalized illiterate English and Natives are given little control over their own historical placement. The elite Englishman control the account of the war; how it is presented not only to those across the pond, but to the common populous among the colonies. The divide created by literacy created an advantage in favor of the elite as they sought to "Christianize" the Natives.

Lepore addresses the differences between an oral culture and a literate one, and how the advantage is often given to the literate party. She writes:

"People who communicate orally can understand the past only in terms of their present-day, face-to-face relationships; thus they create "myths" that emphasize continuity between past and present."

"Many scholars continue to labor under the assumption that the acquisition of literacy inevitable leads to the recording of history or, if it doesn't, that this is the result of the persistent power of myth for non-Western peoples"

The accounts of the war written by the English, portrayed the English in contrast to the "savage," but the "real" accounts, such as Gookin's, were pushed to the background and poorly circulated. Not only is this a shame for the Native, as they did not have the advantage of literacy, but it is a shame for the illiterate colonists who only understood English as it was spoken to them. These "popular"written accounts, probably read publicly or circulated orally through conversation, were the only account the illiterate had access to. Even Sassamon allegedly used the power of literacy to cheat Philip out of land. The advantage of language is a powerful tool for a historian especially in this setting. The lack of opposing bias creates the perfect environment for propaganda and a monopoly on history.