Patty L. Harjo

I like the few poems Voices of the Rainbow selected from Patty, probably because they're short and aren't typed all over the place. She wrote one called Death, which, to me, describes someone dying in a room as Death watches them. The poem didn't require a lot of insight and seemed to be strait forward. Patty's poems all seemed pretty forward and went on to describe her titles in a short concise manner.

The Coyote

The Coyote is a poem written by Carter Revard and it's the first poem from Voices of the Rainbow that I actually like. I liked the description surroundings and I felt like I was there with the Coyote pup. I don't know if there is any hidden meaning in the poem but it seems like a strait forward short story about a coyote pup and how he sees things through a storm.

Poetry

Voices of the rainbow has been a really tough read for me. I don't understand a whole lot of what's going on. Poetry or any kind of in depth reading has always been a weak spot for me. Some of the poems have weird line breaks or are tabbed in a couple times which makes reading a little more trouble.

Starting The Lone Ranger and Tonto

I picked up the 20th anniversary edition of this book and it had a really nice prologue where Sherman Alexie describes how his stories reflect his life and how he started as a writer. It gave me a little history behind the story that I think will help with my understanding of the chapters.

The first chapter centers on a young boy living on a reservation trying to go to sleep while there's a party going on upstairs. Alexie equates the party to a hurricane and severe weather. He goes on, through the thoughts of the character, to explain how life has it highs and lows and it's bad weather and good weather. He equates the bad parts of his life with storms and rain.

I like the style of writing right away and am looking forward to reading more.

Waterlily Ceremonies

Ceremonies also seem to play a large part in the Dakota peoples lives. Waterlily has a ceremony dedicated to her by Rainbow which helps elevate her standing in the tribe and Rainbow gets acknowledged as well. Again, social standing in the book is a huge part of this book and factors into the thoughts of everyone in the tribe. The Buffalo Ceremony was a huge event for the both of them in regards to their community.

My wife is really into social standing and following family practices and I am not. It's hard for me to understand why social standing and family is such a big role in peoples lives because I don't place much thought on what other people think or say about me and would rather do things myself. Natasha, my wife, does worry about those things and likes big social circles and worries about what other people say or think about her. This book, Waterlily, is a little hard for me to understand at the moment.

Water Lily

I think it's interesting how the structure of the family is so different than what I'm used to. In the book family members are called by their title like Uncle, Aunt, Brother, and Sister, where I call my siblings and family by name with the exception of Mom, Dad, and grandparents. So far the book keeps going back to the structure of their family and everyone's different role in the family circle. Family plays a huge part in the social circle and that was evidenced by when Blue Bird and her grandmother got separated from their tribe and were welcomed by another tribe where they were welcomed but didn't exactly fit in. When they eventually made it back to their tribe the atmosphere of the book changed. Blue Bird was by herself for the birth of her firest born and she was surrounded by family with the birth of her second. Dakota society ,especially in this book, rely heavily on family and the support that is given.

The Way to Rainy Mountain continued

What appear to be Momaday's purposes for writing Rainy Mountain?

I think Momaday's purpose for writing Rainy Mountain is to show that sometimes myths and legends have more depth to them than what people give them credit for. The way Momaday tells a myth and then backs the myth with a little bit of history along with some personal experience lets me know that, hey, myths come from somewhere and have a purpose. They teach lessons and have a little bit of historical truth to them.

How would you describe Momaday's concepts of history and mythand their interrelationship?

Like I stated above, I believe that myths and history go hand in hand. Myths give a little look into the background of the past and they try to explain events that couldn't be reasonably explained at the time. You can learn from history and you can learn from myths.

A Man Made of Words

In the video A Man Made of Words, N. Scott Momaday talks about Devils Tower in Wyoming, which is sacred to the Kiowa people. I have recently been there for the first time and it truly is an amazing sight.

It is said that the Kiowas became plains people after living around Yellowstone and the Rockies. They migrated across the plains through Colorado, Nebraska, Kansas and ended their migration in Oklahoma near Rainy Mountain, which was the hub of their civilization, where they fought and later allied with the Comanche's.

Momaday goes on to talk about being brought to Devils Tower as an infant for a week by his parents and how when they returned from to Rainy Mountain an man named Old Wolf came to visit. Old Wolf sat and told Momaday the stories of their people, both the good and the bad, and gave Momaday the name of Tsoai-talee which means Rock Tree Boy to commemorate his trip to Devils Tower.

The poem Momaday wrote about his name is called The Delight Song of Tsoai-talee and can be read here. He starts every line with "I am..." and it gives a sense of how his name, given to him by Old Wolf, helps him relate to the earth and everything that goes on around him. I can feel the pride he has for his people and his name coming from the words he wrote down. Momaday obviously loves his people and the history that follows them.

The Way to Rainy Mountain

N. Scott Momaday starts the book out by talking about his grandma and what she had lived through. I had to look up how old Momaday was in order to get a better understanding of about how old his grandmother was and teh years she might have lived through. Looking at the history of the United States in the 1880's through 1900 there was a lot of adversity against the races living here. Native American resistance to the changes were being quelled by the United States Army and men like Geronimo and Sitting Bull were still alive. To be alive and to witness the ending of a way of life that had been going on for centuries must have been terrible.

The end of ceremony

How does Tayo’s status as a half-breed influence his choices, his thinking, and the way he is perceived by other characters in the novel? 

Being a half breed certainly brings hardships on Tayo In his childhood. He was seen as an outsider on the reservation by his family and his peers. His aunt sees him as an unwanted burden and a shame to the family. She treats him different than Rocky and kept things like toys and extra food away from him. 

What tensions and conflicts does his mixed ancestry contribute to Silko’s story?

Tayos mixed ancestry makes it so he is not really connected with the Indians or the white people. He became an outsider looking in and because of that he had a different perspective on what was going on around him. 

Ceremony

Tayo went on a journey to go find the cattle that have "run away". He goes by himself and on his way he thinks about the past, the war, his family and the white man. Tayo comes to the realization that he didn't believe that white men would be thieves and his first thought when he was trying to find his cattle was that some Mexican or Indian had stolen them and traded them to white people. Deep down he knows that white people are just as thieving and deceitful as everyone else, maybe even more so. White people came and took the land from the Indians and devoured their land and took the minerals from the earth.

I think it's interesting to have a differing perspective on Western education and practices. Tayo was raised going to a white school where science and math was taught and believing that white people where kind of superior in intellect and practices and then he realizes that white people were no different than everyone else. White people cheated and took advantage of things when they could just like everyone else and Tayo was just now realizing it.

Ceremony follows the same style of writing as Love Medicine as in the chapters kind of jump around. I don't know if it's a Native American style of story telling or coincidence. The jumping to the past and then again to the present took me a couple chapters to get used to but I caught on quite quick and the story flows pretty well in my head.

Leslie did a really good job of letting us get to know Tayo. The war has made a mess of Tayo's head and he keeps reflecting back on the past and sorting through what has happened to him and that has given him a lot of depth as a character. Tayo was an outsider to his peers because his dad was white and that caused distance between, not only the other Natives on the reservation but to his guardian aunt. Tayo's cousin, Rocky, had been his only support for the majority of his life was killed in Japan during World War II and it happened right next to Tayo. Needless to say in addition to Tayo's PTSD he feels responsible for his "brother"s death but is isolated from those around him.

Ceremony

Reading Ceremony, the first couple of pages didn't really interest me. Had I not had to read it for class I would have put it down and I would have missed out on a really interesting book. The story follows Tayo, a veteran of World War II and his dealing with PTSD. He's made reference a couple times so far about being "White Smoke" or being invisible. Things are kind of passing him by as he deals with what happened in the pacific and his dead comrade Rocky. Tayo feels like he is the cause of Rockys death and also the drought where he lives. PTSD has messed with his head and fragmented the realities of what happened and then mixed in some hallucinations on top of that. I know people who have suffered from PTSD from being in the Iraq/Afghanistan war and due to their experiences in combat or from IED's the events can really mess with their heads and it takes some time and therapy to get their minds "unstuck" from it.

The End of Love Medicine

I just finished Love Medicine by Louise Erdrich, It was an interesting book to say the least. The whole way through the book I wanted there to be some sort of happy ending or closure and what I got was disappointing. Leading up to the last chapter a number of characters died and not in pretty ways. Gordie died from poisoning, Henry drowns and Nector chokes on a heart. I wasn't looking for abrupt terrible deaths at the end of the book. The last chapters ended with positive notes, bonds were made and the book settles down. I wouldn't call the positive notes very high, Love Medicine has kind of a mellow ending, like nothing happened but everything happened, people died bur life goes on kind of thing, all of that was in the past. Overall, I don't think I will read Love Medicine again, it was just okay. Between being confusing at times and no real progress with the characters, not saying there wasn't development just it seemed no one amounted to anything or overcame a great obstacle, Love Medicine will stay on my bookshelf for a long time after this.

Holding it Together

I'm a couple chapters away from finishing the book and things are really headed south. The last two chapters I've read, Scales and Crown of Thorns, has someone being arrested and falling apart mentally. For example, Gordie is loosing his mind in alcohol all over June's death. He's mentally breaking down and believes he had some part in Junes death which, coupled with lots of alcohol causes him to hallucinate. I suppose for a book to be called Love Medicine it has to have something to fix and the whole family needs it right now. I'm looking forward to seeing the book wrapping up and hopefully having a kind of happy ending.

Continuing Love Medicine

I've really liked what the author has brought to the second quarter of this book. It helped me understand the backgrounds of all the characters that were presented early on. The first couple chapters threw me for a loop, I had a hard time understanding what time period I was in and who the main characters were and how they were related to each other. As I read on the book started making more sense to me, I was expecting a traditional book and storytelling format that's chronological but Love Medicine reads more like a series of different stories that put in an order that helps the reader understand the emotions and reactions for all these different characters. 

I think the structure of the book really helped paint a good picture of the relationship the women have. The style helped me at least see the interconnections and special moments they share. Had the book been chronological I don't think I would have understood the way the women react to each other in the first chapter. It's nice to see the "current" time and then have a kind of "flashback" into their early lives. One point I remember being a great example was when June was being hanged. At first the hanging happened in the past tense with the women remembering back on it and a couple chapters in the hanging is happening in real time. It's just a really neat writing style that I never would have thought of and I have enjoyed it quite a bit.

Love Medicine First Impressions

This first book in my Native American Literature class is called Love Medicine and it is written by Louise Erdrich. I'm not entirely sure on what I thought this book was going to be about but I figured with a title like Love Medicine it would be a book about strength and family values. The first two chapters I've read are far from my presumptions. 

The first chapter honestly reminded me of my in-laws, my wife is half Chippewa and has family in North Dakota and Montana. Recently, her great grandma died and we took a trip to Montana for the funeral. A couple of the nights we spent there could have been a live action play of the chapter "The World's Greatest Fisherman." Almost every piece of that chapter happened, the older women baked, the men drank and got into fights, and the house was very similar to the one described in the book, right down to the rusty car in the yard the kids played with. There was no "love medicine" or "fixing anything" going on at all from what I could tell, the chapter started and ended in shambles. It is the first chapter and things should will progress through the rest of the book but it seems bleak to me.

The second chapter "Saint Marie" had me questioning what I was even reading. The whole chapter seemed so surreal like it was made up or a daydream down to the very end. It was so confusing to me but it also left me wanting to know what happened after the end of it. It just seems so odd that Marie took up being "Holy" or a "Saint" so fast after being stabbed in the hand an knocked out; or why Leopolda decided to lie about Marie's vision and act as if it were true, even allowing herself to kneel before Marie.

The first 60 pages have me extremely invested in the rest of the book. It has me wanting to stay up all night reading so I can find a happy ending for these characters that are pretty damaged.

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