The Martian Chronicles

In The Martian Chronicles, by Ray Bradbury, Mars is colonized by humans from Planet Earth. In the beginning, the humans had much difficulty establishing a presence on Mars. This is similar to the Europeans when they attempted to colonize the Americas. When each group arrived, they were met by substantial native resistance. However, as they learned from their mistakes, they became more wary of the attackeres and figured out how they should go about taking over the land. In Bradbury's novel, the humans have no idea what the Martians are capable of, and that limits their capabilities. When the Europeans first came to the Americas, they did not know anything about the peple. They just assumed what they would be like based upon other colonizing efforts. However, in The Martian Chronicles, nobody could truly make an assumption of the people, because no one had ever met a creature from another planet before. The colonizing efforts of both the humans and the Europeans consisted of groups attempting to bring their culture with them-to become "transplants". The population grew slowly at first, but once the idea was out there, people flocked towards a place where there were new opportunities and less political influence. Although the colonizing groups had a very large advantage over the natives, each still had to adapt their customs to go along with their surroundings and their new neighbors. Each group actually ended up killing most of their "neighbors", which occured mostly through the spread of certain diseases to which the natives had no immunity, such as smallpox or chicken pox. Either way, the colonizing group conquered over the natives, winning land for themselves, but destroying ancient cultures along the way.