I didn’t realize that many of the names in Green Grass Running Water were allusions or play-on-words until I was considerably well into the novel. At some point my eyes glossed over “Hovaugh” on the page, my brain connected it with Joe, and I smacked my hand against my forehead for messing the reference. Joe Hovaugh. Jehovah.

Of course, if this was a story told out loud I would have gotten the reference straight away. Thomas King blends oral and written storytelling in a way that requires some extra effort on the part of the reader to find every hidden detail.

I used the search function on my Kindle to scroll back through the novel and find all references of Mr. Hovaugh. I found this paragraph, from when we first meet the character:

“Dr. Hovaugh sat in his chair behind his desk and looked out at the wall and the trees and the flowers and the swans on the blue-green pond in the garden, and he was pleased.” (King, 13).

Genesis 1:4-14. God was pleased with what he saw.

King uses historical and religious references for many of his characters. Off the top of my head I count Hovaugh, Eli Stands Alone, and Bill Bursom and Clifford Sifton. There are many more, but I will focus on these characters.

I’ll admit I had to do some Googling to understand the reference to Eli Stands Alone. King appears to be referencing Elijah Harper, who played an instrumental role in rejecting the Meech Lake Accord. Eli stands up, and alone, against greater powers in the novel who wish to build a dam near his home.

Eli is up against Clifford Sifton. The real life Sifton was a politician whose “pro-immigration policies for white Europeans through the ‘Prairie West’ movement also came at an enormous expense to First Nations peoples, who were displaced in large numbers.”

The real life Bill Bursum was a proponent of the Bursum Bill, which threatened the land of the Pueblo people.

Unless you happen to be a reader well-versed in First Nations history or perhaps a biblical scholar, many of these references will pass you by. Some, like Hovaugh, might be realized if you read out loud, combining orality with traditional reading.

Why does King include these references and allusions? I think his intent here is to get readers to think for themselves and to seek out knowledge. King allows curious readers to make connections and find the answers.

Works Cited