Tag Archives: ggrw

Write a blog that hyper-links your research on the characters in GGRW according to the pages assigned to you. Be sure to make use of  Jane Flicks’ GGRW reading notes on your reading list.

PAGES 217 – 229, 1993 Edition / Pages 259  – 274, 2007 Edition

Elijah Harper

Eli Stands Alone
“… Elijah had come to enjoy the small pleasures of resistance, knowing that each time Duplessis opened the gates a little too much or turned on the light a little too late, it was because he was there.” (King 260)

Within the novel, Eli is the main opponent of the Balene Dam’s construction and completion. His real-life counterpart is Elijah Harper, an Oji-Cree politician who fought against the Meech Lake Constitutional Accord of 1990 with the softest of “no”s. With a lifted eagle feather, he initiated a filibuster by voting against “a debate that did not allow full consultation with the First Nations” (Flick 150).

Flick also believes that the name may have come from the Pete Standing Alone, narrator of Circle of the Sun (150). This documentary is the first recording of a Southern Albertan Aboriginal tribe’s Sun Dance which allowed by the tribal leaders out of fear for the potential extinction of their tradition.

The novel’s Eli echoes both figures. His opposition towards the “damn thing” (King 259) alludes to Elijah Harper’s solitary stance against the Meech Lake Accord. The reference to Pete Standing Alone and the documentary he narrates fits with the tensions in the novel regarding the dam’s threatening of the Blackfoot traditions which include the natural course of the waterway and the Sun Dance.

Maurice Duplessis

Duplessis International Associates
“Along with the injunction that forbade Duplessis from raising or lowering the level of the river beyond a certain point…” (King 260)

Although the “Duplessis International Associates” is not a character, but a construction firm, the characters and narrator of King’s novel refer to the organization as if it were a living, breathing person. Eli refers to Duplessis as “[turning] on the [floodlight] a little too late” (King 260), and Bursum refers to Duplessis having provided the topographical map for Parliament Lake to him, personifying the company’s actions. The elimination of the latter part of the firm’s title leaves “Duplessis,” which creates the effect of being a character’s name.

King’s selective cutting is intentional. According to Flick, Duplessis “invokes both duplicity and the political corruption of the Duplessis régime in Québec” (151).

Sir Clifford Sifton

Clifford Sifton
“… Sifton told [Eli] that they were going to tear the cabin down.” (King 262)

Eli discusses the floodlights with the dam’s engineer Sifton, whose name alludes to Sir Clifford Sifton (1861-1929). Under Prime Minister Wilfrid Laurier’s government, Sifton assumed the position of Federal minister of the Interior as well as Superintendent of Indian Affairs from 1896 (Flick 150). He was responsible for the Prarie West movement, specifically encouraging immigrants from east-central European countries to adapt the lands into agrarian plots. This came at the expense of categorizing immigrants who did not fit those moulds (such as Asians, Jews and Blacks) as undesirable. More pertinent to the tension of Eli’s potential deracination within the novel, the real-life counterpart to Sifton’s character was also responsible for the mass displacement of First Nations populations in the prairie west.

Holm O. Bursum

Bill Bursum
“… Bursum had looked at the topgraphical map that Duplessis provided and picked out the best piece of property on the lake.” (King 266)

Flick writes that Bursum is a combination of “two men famous for their hostility to Indians” (148).

The first of which is Holm O. Bursum, a senator from New Mexico who proposed the Bursum Bill of 1921 which was seen as a furtive attempt to seize Pueblo lands. This calculating maneuver resonates in the GGRW Bursum’s purchase of Parliament Lake land. Bursum’s acquisition of the lakefront property is a covert attempt to take advantage of the financial benefits of owning such a lot. The description of the land, coloured by Bursum’s greed demonstrates his concealed intentions: “Secluded. Exclusive. Valuable” (266).

The second part to his name refers to William R. Cody who manipulated Indians for the purposes of entertainment. The Buffalo Bill Cody’s Wild West Show exploited the white settler’s romantic notions of conquest, and tragically took advantage of the Aboriginal peoples of Nebraska.

Thought Woman
“Thought Woman floats around in that ocean for a long time…” (King 269)

Thought Woman becomes the main subject of discussion between the narrator and Coyote, and is part of a creation story that aims to elaborate upon the abundance of water—an apt theme in regards to the novel’s main conflict. Flick writes that she is a creation figure of Navajo mythology who, like her namesake, thinks the world into existence (159).

Furthermore, Thought Woman also appears in Ceremony, a novel by Leslie Marmon Silko that explores the oral cultures of the Navajo and the Pueblo people.

A. A. Gabriel, Canadian Security and Intelligence Service
“Thought Woman, says Thought Woman. Mary, says A. A. Gabriel. And he writes that down.” (King 270)

A. Gabriel refers to the biblical figure of Archangel Gabriel who announces to Virgin Mary that she will conceive the Son of God. King’s character is a bureaucrat of the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service. His refusal to recognize Thought Woman’s Indian name by renaming her as Mary. Historically, First Nations had their names changed, with the majority of them being baptismal names.

A. Gabriel shouts to Thought Woman as she departs: “We can always find another [Mary], you know” (King 272), perhaps implying that he will simply force the name upon someone else.

The Motif of Geography and Land Ownership

In this passage, many of these characters (both within the novel and in historical contexts) appear to be linked and grounded by the underlying motif of geography land ownership. Eli is awakened by the invasive floodlight of the dam and the unnatural ebb and flow of the contained water within his solitary cabin by the Balene Dam. Duplessis International Associates, referred to by only as “Duplessis,” looms ominously over Eli’s existence, taunting him with the petty play of the floodlights as they attempt to enforce dominion over Parliament Lake’s waters and surrounding lands. Sifton, the dam’s engineer says to Eli that the safety of the dam is not for him, but “ours” (259), referring to the security of his workers. This selfish quip echoes Sir Clifford Sifton’s ignorance of the land’s original owners and traditions present within his Prairie West movement. Bursum uses a Duplessis map—a symbol of the white settler’s false claims onto Aboriginal property—and seizes land for financial gain as elaborated above.

Thought Woman and A. A. Gabriel have their connections to “geography” less apparent than the others I have discussed, yet we can discover the themes of ownership and control within their first meeting and the card’s song. A. A. Gabriel shows to Thought Woman the side of his business card that details his affiliation to a security service which prompts her to ask whether his line of work deals with insurance or burglar alarms (King 269). “Insurance” and “burglar alarms” introduces the concepts of government, money and policing with land, and the potential authority—no matter how arbitrary it may be—that accompanies such elements. A. A. Gabriel seems to embody that authority, dressed in the attire of government officials. He flips the card to announce his status as Heavenly Host, and the card sings: “Hosanna da.” Coyote naturally believes the song to then be of biblical origins, but the unknown narrator corrects the trickster figure, and says the song goes “Hosanna da, our home on Natives’ land” (270) instead. A twist upon the Canadian national anthem, the lyrical change to the possessive evokes the themes of land ownership and perhaps criticizes the notion of the anthem. Anthems are meant to eulogize the country’s history, but the lack of the possessive and moreover, the lack in capitalization of “native” in the original verse seems to ignore the original owners of Canadian land.

Works Cited

Flick, Jane. “Reading Notes for Thomas King’s Green Grass, Running Water.” Canadian Literature 161-162 (1999): 140-172. Web. 28 March 2016.

King, Thomas. Green Grass Running Water. Toronto: Harper Collins, 2007. Print.

1. Find three examples of names that need to be spoken aloud in order to catch the allusion. Discuss the examples as well as the reading technique that requires you to read aloud in order to make connections. Why does King want us to read aloud?

Dr. Joseph Hovaugh — The doctor is introduced to us on page sixteen, his full name laid bare and unassumingly against the eggshell white of the page. At first, I skimmed past it, treating the man’s two names as separate, the jet of air we ‘express’ when pronouncing the strident ‘ph’ in our mindspace cutting cleanly between “Joseph” and “Hovaugh.” However, something seemed suspicious with the entrance of Mary and the reference to Dr. John on the next page. Biblical references and names filled these pages, but still, I did not realize the allusion of the doctor’s name. Only when I read the exchange between Dr. John Eliot and Dr. Joseph Hovaugh did the allusion become clear to me. In dialogue they say:

“Yellowstone,” said Dr. Hovaugh.
“Joe . . . Joe, we’ve talked about this.”
“It’s in the book,” said Dr. Hovaugh… (King 46)

Finding myself subconsciously mouthing their conversation and the subsequent dialogue tags, I discovered that the doctor’s name sounded similar to “Jehovah,” the name of God in the Hebrew Bible. The repetition of “Joe” juxtaposed against the doctor’s surname clarified the sound. Through my hushed utterances that soon scaled to firm declarations I found the connection. The character’s first name may also come from the name of the biblical Mary’s husband, but seems to be a red herring written within the bounds of the religious motif (although Dr. Joseph Hovaugh does interact with Mary first in the novel). And indeed, the doctor speaks to Mary about the garden, referring to the Edenic paradise of Genesis, and with an air of authority muses upon “[getting] a pair of peacocks” (King 17). The pairing of animals was never mentioned in the biblical creation story, but was a prominent feature of the great flood narrative. This borrowing from various places of the bible alongside the duality of references in the doctor’s first name indicates a thoughtful teasing and reimagining of the Christian mythos for the purposes of creating a new narrative.

Louie, Ray, and Al — Latisha takes orders from three men from Manitoba in the final section of the novel. Similar to the previous allusion I’ve found, when these characters are introduced, the names are divided. The introductions, peppered with both narrative and dialogical description, separate the names, but when Latisha brings them together and strings them cleanly by saying “Louie, Ray, Al” (King 334), the pun is summoned to life. Their names are a reference to Louis Riel, Métis leader and a controversial figure in Canadian history. The famous—or infamous—rebel of the Red River Colony (and here, King continues the allusion geographically, as this colony is situated in what is now called Manitoba and the men are from the same province) seems to come alive within Louie’s response to the prohibition on fishing on Parliament Lake. In a mocking tone, he prods fun at the court order, saying “boy, you guys really take your fishing serious out here” (336). Louis Riel’s distaste of the Canadian government seems to revive itself within the sarcastic jeer of this customer.

Polly Hantos — I’ve discussed Pocahontas in my previous blog entries and naturally, when I came across this name I made the connection to the daughter of Chief Powhatan with ease. Reciting the name affirmed the allusion, but it was the context that truly brought this allusion to life. Her name is catalogued with others such as “Sally Jo Weyha” (Sacagawea) to illustrate a “tight community of Mexicans, Italians, Greeks, along with a few Indians, some Asians and whites, all waiting in the shadows of the major studios, working as extras, fighting for bit parts in Westerns, playing Indians again and again and again” (King 182). Pocahontas in particular is infamous for being a romanticized figure, conjured into a Disney fantasy in the social consciousness of the white settler. In other words, she’s written as an ideal stereotype of the Indigenous people, and ultimately becomes a shallow depiction of the Indigenous culture. This is reflected in Polly Hontas’ inability to break into bigger parts, forever playing Indians—we do not even know if Polly Hontas is Indigenous or not and the misnamed role of ‘Indians’ highlights a tension between white settler perspectives and Indigenous identity—in Westerns which are infamous for their stereotypical depictions of the Indigenous. Furthermore, the passage ends with the repetition of “again,” perhaps referring to the vicious and relentless cycle of stereotyping that passes down from generation to generation, like a curse controlled by the “major studios” or the dominant force of the industry—of society.

King wants us to read aloud to collapse that troublesome distinction of written culture versus oral culture, to destroy the boundaries of written and spoken word. The novel makes great use of dialogue, colored with the voices of a myriad of characters that converse across the many pages of King’s tome. With so much dialogue, I can notice an interesting phenomenon while I read.  I am constantly perceiving these stories has written but simultaneously, I am constantly engaging with the language as something spoken. King’s courting of the language’s sound requires then, for us to participate with the orality of his text. To ignore such an element would mean a failure to access complete comprehension of King’s narrative. The referential discourse of Green Grass Running Water would lose its ties to the extratextual realm without that bridge of orality, and their meanings would lack completion, fullness, and ultimately effectiveness. Some may argue this potentiality for failure is a weakness on King’s part, but I disagree wholly. It shows a weakness on our part: our laziness and inability to bring those two realms of narration together.

Works Cited:

King, Thomas. Green Grass Running Water. Toronto: Harper Collins, 2007. Print.

“Louis Riel.” Louis Riel. Historica Canada, n.d. Web. 20 Mar. 2016.

“Oral Traditions.” Oral Traditions. First Nations Studies Program, 2009. Web. 20 Mar. 2016. <http://indigenousfoundations.arts.ubc.ca/home/culture/oral-traditions.html>.

“The Riel Rebellion: Background.” The Riel Rebellion: Background. Goldi Productions Ltd, 2007. Web. 21 Mar. 2016. <http://firstpeoplesofcanada.com/fp_metis/fp_metis_background.html>.