Looking Deeper

I will explore and discuss pages 238 through 252 from Thomas King’s book Green Grass Running Water. Through examining this sections multiple times, the deeper meanings the characters represent came to light.

Lionel / John Wayne

In the first section, (pages 239 to 243) King describes an unsatisfied forty-year old who works at an “embarrassing” job and drives just as an “embarrassing” car. He wakes up on his 40th birthday  and is is determined to change his life around. There is a passage in this chapter that stood out for me, as Lionel contemplates possible job opportunities, he lists one as John Wayne,

“Not the actor, but the character. Not the man but the hero. The John Wayne who cleaned up cattle towns and made them safe for decent folk.The John Wayne who shot guns out of the hands of outlaws. The John Wayne who saved stagecoaches and wagon trains from Indian attacks.” (King 241)

As I did not know much about John Wayne, I did some research on the all american actor, and the types of characters he played. In my findings, the movies in which Wayne acted and directed with people of minorities, in particular, First Nations people and African Americans, were consistently depicted as villains and criminals.

Wayne’s quote below regarding the underrepresentation of minorities in the films he directed reveals his racist ideologies.

“I’ve directed two pictures and I gave the blacks their proper position. I had a black slave in The Alamo,” and I had a correct number of blacks in The Green Berets.”” (Levy)

 Wayne also refers to black people as “irresponsible” and “inexperienced” in a Playboy interview. I assume that John Wayne was included as a character because he represented a conservative, white , independent America.He was a white supremacist who demonstrated racism and discrimination against minorities (Play boy).

Wayne declares, “When we came to America, there were a few thousand(s ) Indians over millions of miles, and I don’t feel we did wrong in taking this great country away from these people, taking their happy hunting grounds away.” “There were great numbers of people who needed new land,” he explained, “and the Indians were selfishly trying to keep it for themselves” (Levy).

As this was a common way of thinking during colonization, I believe  King purposefully used John Wayne as a representation of these times, and the unfair treatment of First Nations people.

Latisha

The characters in the second story of my section (pages 244-250) are Latisha, her partner George and her children, Benjamin, Elizabeth and Christian.George, the father figure is unable to keep a steady job and suddenly decides to leave Latisha and the kids. The remainder of the story describing how Latisha deals with this abandonment.

The symbolism in this story was a little difficult to discern.

I assume King included these characters in the book as they portray a common first nations family dynamic (Statistics Canada).

As aboriginal children are less likely to live with both parents (79 %) in comparison to their non indigenous counterparts (76%)(Statistics Canada).

While some characters are more obvious than others, I feel King included each one in his book to serve a unique purpose, whether they symbolized a specific era,  common myth or stereotype. It was interesting to critically examine an excerpt in the text and attempt to understand the characters in the way King would have intended us to.

References; 

“2011 National Household Survey: Aboriginal Peoples in Canada: First Nations People, Métis and Inuit.” Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. N.p., n.d. Web. 1 Apr. 2014.

Paterson, Erika. ““ENGL 470 Canadian Studies ;Canadian Literary Genres.”University of British Columbia. UBC Blogs. 2014. Web. Web. 1 April. 2014.https://blogs.ubc.ca/engl470/unit-1/lesson-12/

“John Wayne: Playboy Interview / MAY 1971.” N.p., n.d. Web. 1 Apr. 2014.

Levy, Emanuel. “John Wayne: African American Community.” Emanuel Levey. N.p., 13 Nov. 2006. Web. 01 Apr. 2014.