Write a blog that hyper-links your research on the characters in GGRW (Pages 162-177). Be sure to make use of Jane Flick’s reference guide on your reading list.

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When I read read my section I was shocked to note how many allusions and historical references were included in just a few short pages. The more research I do, it seems the more references I find, it seems impossible to discover all of King’s hidden allusions but I’ll do my best.

I’d like to first discuss the story of Eli and Karen, Eli seems to be a character based on Elijah Harper, Harper is best known for voting against the Meech Lake Accord, Harper prevented the accord from being passed based on the grounds that there had been no consultation with First Nations groups and that their rights were not being recognized.  Harper was voted Newsmaker of the year in 1990 because of his part in preventing the Meech Lake Accord.  Considering the strength behind Eli”s character I feel that the story of him and Karen does not portray him as being particularly strong willed or determined.

The story begins with how they met and discusses the relationship that develops through a sharing of novels.  Karen generally passes on books based on the lives of Indians although Eli prefers westerns. A part of this particular story revolves around a novel that Eli is reading in which a stagecoach is attacked by a notorious Indian named Iron Eyes who takes pity on a beautiful young woman and spares her life to show her the ways of his people.  The Indian in the novel is based on Iron Eyes Cody who was a well known actor who appeared in over 200 flims, he acted predominantly in westerns beginning in the silent film era.  Although he worked in Hollywood he retained his pride for his Native roots and he was a great supporter of many Indian affairs. This connection between Eli and Iron Eyes Cody is very interesting because in the story, Eli moves in with Karen who’s family is wealthy and the way in which Eli describes the home they share gives the impression that he does not really belong.  This is similar to the connection of Iron Eyes Cody who although he embraced his Indian heritage, lived outside of it. Although this only touches on this particular story I feel that these are the most interesting connections and if I wasn’t going to cut some details this post would be incredibly long.

The second story includes the Lone Ranger, Ishmael, Robinson Crusoe, and Hawkeye. These characters pop up regularly throughout the novel and according to Flick, “King purposefully plays with expectations about naming and gender.” (Flick 1) All of these names are very clearly referring to white characters, either from old television series or the bible.  By creating Indian characters with names that are clearly based on white characters it accentuates the importance of overlap between Native traditional stories and real life events.  Not only are the stories involving the old indians representative of traditional stories, by giving them white names it allows the reader to better understand the challenge of maintaining these traditional stories in a world where First Nations must constantly fight for their rights.

The third story that I would like to discuss in my section is that of Lionel and Alberta.  These characters seem to constantly be on different pages throughout the novel. Lionel seems to have had some bad luck throughout his life and although he generally means well he just cant seem to make anything of himself.  In this section of the novel Lionel seems to have made the decision that Alberta is the woman for him and his actions are those of a man who seems to know what he wants but just simply cant make it happen.  This is probably partly to do with the fact that although Lionel has decided that Alberta is the one, Alberta is still dating both him and Charlie but in her heart she knows that neither one of them is marriage material.  Flick states that Alberta Frank is herself, frank. (Flick 5) I would disagree. Although Alberta is frank with herself, she cant seem to simply be honest and tell both Lionel and Charlie that she is uninterested in marriage to either of them.  The result of this is situations such as this scene where she has been invited to dinner at Lionel’s parents’ house.  Lionel had prepared a romantic weekend and in the end because she had simply not been frank about the situation, rather than discussing is she made the excuse that she had forgotten about a meeting and had to return home.

Overall I found the connections related to Eli the most interesting. The links between his roots and his reality corresponded so well to the stories of Iron Eyes Cody.  Had I not done my research I would have likely missed this connection and it is truly amazing how many connections there are throughout this novel.

Works Cited:

Flick, Jane. “Reading Notes for Thomas King’s Green Grass, Running Water.” Canadian Literature, 1999. 140-172. http://canlit.ca/pdfs/articles/canlit161-162-Reading(Flick).pdf

King, Thomas. Green Grass, Running Water. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1993. Print.

What are the major differences or similarities between the ethos of the creation story you are familiar with and the story King tells in The Truth About Stories ?

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Anyone who reads my blog responses regularly has probably noticed that I tend to answer the questions that are a little bit more simple.  This is not because I’m lazy but because I find that it is the simple questions who’s answers are often overlooked.  King brings up so many basic topics and yet he approaches them with a complexity that makes you question how simple they really are.

Take this question for example, at first glance I jumped to the creation story of Adam (or Ahdamn, which I find hilarious!) and Eve.  Then I realized that just because I know the story of Adam and Eve does not mean that it fits within my belief system, and it seemed unfair to chose a story that I feel has no place in my own life.  At this point in my consideration I had to think about which story I accept.  I decided fairly easily that I would discuss the story of the Big Bang.  This led me to an article titled “The Big Bang is Hard Science. It is also a creation story.” This article discusses that while the Big Bang Theory is based on empirical data and quantitative reasoning, it shares the same unobtainable thoughts as other creation stories.  It is, and will likely always be, that we will not know what came before us, all we are able to understand pertains directly to how we live now.  We live, we die, we change matter and create new life.  This is a formula which we all know, even as a child you understand birth and as you age you discover more and more about death.  All of the stories that we tell ourselves are to explain the unknown, what happened to start this process.

I feel that it is more relevant to discuss the similarities of the Big Bang Theory and King’s story of creation because it is much simpler to point out the differences.  Yet another example of something simple that is in reality much more complicated. One of the most noticeable similarities is the use of the sky and the ocean.  The basic principle of the Big Bang Theory is that there was a speck smaller than an atom which was incredibly hot and dense.  This speck exploded and our universe was created in a fraction of second.  As this new universe expanded it cooled, first creating matter and antimatter followed by protons and neutrons which came together to create hydrogen and helium nuclei which after 300,000 years had cooled enough to capture electrons and create atoms allowing the universe to be filled with hydrogen and helium gasses.  While this is incredibly scientific and likely not without its own flaws it does create an image of the sky as where everything began. This is very much like how in King’s story Charm falls from the sky and is the start of humans on earth.  Many scientists believe that life started in the ocean and that our planet was mostly covered in water to begin with.  This is another way that the big bang theory and King’s story are alike.  Charm falls into the ocean where all of the animals live and only when she gives birth to her children and they need more space than the back of the turtle do they create land.

As you can see these two stories really could not be any more different however there are shared ethos between them that create an equal acceptance of beliefs and the unknown.

Works Cited

King, The Truth About Stories, Chapter One: You’ll Never Believe What Happened Is Always a Great Way to Start.

The Oxford English Dictionary Online. The Oxford University Press. 2015. 8 Mar 2015.