Thursday, April 21, 2011
Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee
I've been re-reading Dee Brown's Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee this week. Brown's great achievement was to envision a history of the West narrated by the Native Americans who were rubbed out by the advance of "Americans" westward. As those of you who love the book as much as I do know, Brown invites his readers to read the book facing East. When I do that, I immediately lose my sense of being "an American" and see myself as a European, invading and conquering the richest continent on earth. I can't tell you how much I detest seeing myself as a European.
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Interesting post for me. I can't find that channel in my writing to bypass the "Dances With Wolves" response that I think most people have about Indians. I'm guessing that if it comes down identification with an individual Palouse indian--if I can place a real person
trying to hold on to the last patch of earth that defines his sense of the world, looking up at Palouse Falls, I might get through. It may be impossible. I'm sure that if I could get someone up on the Falls, they would get it.
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