In the minds of ESL exam candidates, e ssay writing is one of the most daunting tasks they are required to complete, regardless of the level of the exam, the administering body or the ease with which they themselves use the language. The same applies to students who are asked to write an essay by their teachers at school. In the previous sample essays posted on the blog, the main point I stress is the need to become acquainted with this form of writing (as opposed to writing a letter, review or report, for instance), to get a feel of what authorial voice is and how to organize and progressively express the arguments you wish to make in a coherent manner. Unfortunately, the best way to prepare for exam writing or learn how to write good essays for school is to read as many essays from as many sources as possible, then write as
Fortunately for the world, those days are long past, and Native American writers have reclaimed their cultural heritage much in the same way as other writers from colonies struggling for independence successfully did whilst "writing back to the Empire" through works we now come to categorize under the term post-colonial literature.
Louise Erdrich has captured the torturous existence of individuals trapped within themselves and stripped of their very foundations in this story. To top it all, one of these characters is further stripped of his serenity as he is used by politicians and warmongers to fight in their stead, then cast aside to suffer the harrowing effects of modern-day warfare unassisted by a system willing to ship his remains back home in a body bag if need be.
What does living a non-existence mean for such an individual and his younger brother? And how is this further aggravated by the very nature of Native American family ties?
This is not a war story. This is a story about an inner war that rages and never truly transforms us into the proud successors of our ancestors. This is a story about seeking freedom in an era where reservations not open fields remind you of the treaties signed to contain and smother, a story about diligence and luck running out as life deals out a losing hand.
The notes that follow can be used by students and teachers alike to help with the reading and discussion of the story.
If you haven't read the story yet, you can find it here.
For explanations of key literary terms, press on the picture below.
Louise Erdrich - The Red Convertible
Life
- born 1954, American
- father: German-American
- mother: Chippewa/Ojibwe (half Ojibwe, half French)
- wrote novels, poetry, children's books
- part of the 2nd wave of Native American Renaissance (late 1960's on) whose aims were to:
- reclaim their heritage through their works
- find and re-examine early Native American texts
- express tribal, artistic characteristics
- her parents taught at a boarding school set up by the Bureau of Indian Affairs
- formed 1824
- earlier agencies had been set up to
- regulate (fur) trade relations with the Indians
- secure their neutrality during Revolutionary War (of Independence)
- late 19th-early 20th century: boarding schools policy put forward
- native children were taught in separate boarding schools
- aims: promote assimilation, prohibit native language and traditions, make them conform to European-American culture
Setting
- 1974
- memories of the late 1960's - early 1970's
- on a reservation (North Dakota)
- memories of road trip across northern USA, Canada, Alaska
- Vietnam War
- 2 brothers: Henry Jr. + Lyman Lamartine (Chippewa Indian)
- live on a reservation
- are close
- 1st paragraph doesn't become clear until you read the end of the story
- summer adventures of the brothers driving around in an old red convertible ("a red Olds")
- car bought in Portage
- Little Knife River
- Mandaree in Fort Berthold
- Wakpala
- Montana (pick up Susy who wants to go to Chicken, Alaska)
- Alaska
- Spokane
- Idaho
- Montana
- Canadian border through Columbus, Des Lacs, Bottineau County
- army calls up Henry ⇒ Marine
- (1970) sends letter from Vietnam
- stationed in northern hill country
- is caught by Vietnamese soldiers
- comes back 3 years later changed, broken = PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder)
- is jumpy, mean
- never changes the worn-in clothes and field jacket he came back with
- can hardly string 6 words together at once
- sits watching TV, gripping armchair tightly
- one time, bites through his lip while watching TV; when Lyman goes to switch it off, he pushes him against the wall
- Lyman tries to bring Henry out of his gloom
- destroys car enough so Henry can become interested in fixing it
- Henry works on the car day and night in the cold; by spring he has fixed it
- Henry says he + Lyman should take the car for a spin
- their sister Bonita takes a picture of them before they set off
- Henry has one elbow on car, one on Lyman's shoulder
- now the picture has been put away by Lyman with his friend Ray's help
- couldn't stand to look at his brother though at first he had tacked it on wall to have his brother close to him
- Henry + Lyman drive towards Pembina + Red River
- river: full of winter trash + ready to go over its banks
- stop by the river late afternoon, make a fire
- Lyman to Henry: "Wake up, wake up..."
- Henry says he can't help it, it's no use
- Henry gives him the car (that's why he fixed it)
- Lyman refuses to take it; they fight, then laugh
- Henry starts crazy dance: "Got to cool me off!"
- jumps into the river
- Henry's last words: "My boots are filling."
- Lyman jumps in to save him; can't find him
- sends car into the water after his brother with the lights on
Point of View
- 1st person
- detached, factual tone (traumatized narrator): "Now Henry owns the whole car, and his younger brother Lyman (that's myself), Lyman walks everywhere he goes."
Characters
- Lyman Lamartine
- Henry's younger brother
- possibly half-brothers:
- they knew they had the same mother
- don't look alike
- loves his brother:
- they do everything together: are not just related by blood, but are buddies
- tries to bring him back (smashes car so Henry can focus on sth; sabotages TV)
- he and Henry are the "crazy Lamartine boys": they're a team (others see them as such and they themselves don't deny it)
- talent: making money
- this was what set him apart as different (from other Chippewa)
- industrious
- worked as a young boy:
- shining shoes in American Legion Hall
- selling spiritual bouquets door to door for mission (nuns let him keep a percentage of profits)
- (15 yrs old) hard work pays off
- washes dishes at the Joliet Cafe
- buses tables
- short-order cook
- manager
- part owner
- owner (the Joliet is in his mother's name)
- (16 yrs old)
- Joliet destroyed by tornado (Lyman got insurance money; that's how he was able to buy the car)
- family person / respect for relatives
- before Joliet is destroyed, had all his relatives and their relatives over for dinner
- adventurous / carefree / impulsive
- buys car without thinking
- goes off on a drive for months
- after Henry's death: is shattered, stoned, drunk
- Henry Lamartine
- like his younger brother until the war
- was never lucky like Lyman
- reason he had money to buy the car was because he had been laid off the Jewel Bearing Plant
- shares with his brother
- leaves the car to him when he goes off to Vietnam
- war destroys him
- torture by Viet Cong implied
- restless except when he is watching TV
- bites through his lip, blood dripping on food
- suicide = release for a Native American who roamed freely / is a crazy Lamartine boy
- his suicide could be seen as a triumph over the system or the result of a system that marginalizes Native Americans (summarized by the quote"Crazy Indians!" Henry cries out):
- he becomes himself before he jumps into the river (reverts to traditional Chippewa)
- he refuses to continue to live his life restricted, but becomes wild (Lyman's description: "He's wild.")
- mother
- cares about boys
- doesn't want to send Henry away to hospital
- "They don't fix them in those places ... they just give them drugs."
- doesn't take Henry to see doctor: no Indian doctors on reservation
- mother can't trust old man Moses Pillager (symbolic name?)⇒had courted her + was jealous of her husbands
- calm: turns off TV and tells the boys dinner's ready after Henry has bitten through his lip and shoved Lyman against the wall
- Bonita
- 11 yrs old
- only sister the boys have
- makes the boys stand for the picture before their final trip
- Ray
- Lyman's friend
- helps him take picture down + puts it away in a brown bag in a closet
Themes
- disregard for Native Americans + veterans
- locked away in a reservation without a Native American doctor
- seen as "crazy Indians"
- he was the only boy allowed into the American Legion Hall to shine shoes
- veterans left to deal with memories of war by themselves or are placed in hospitals and drugged for the rest of their lives
- warmth of Chippewa / Native Americans
- hospitable
- no questions asked
- Lyman glad he at least managed to invite relatives to the Joliet before it was destroyed
- disregard if true brothers or half-brothers (throughout the story, Lyman calls him his brother though he knows that they share a mother only)
- brotherly ties
- destructiveness of war
- politicians wage it, civilians suffer it
- imprisonment in a society which isn't part of your culture
- Lyman feels comfortable lying under the willows that bend down round him like a tent or stable
- Henry hold Susy on his shoulders with her long hair reaching down so he can experience what it would be like to have this Native American trait (see note below)
Symbols
- convertible
- car = freedom
- convertible = feel wind in your hair, so to speak; closer to nature; feel the elements
- shared bond brothers have
- escape from problems (Henry laid off; Lyman's cafe destroyed)
- hope for Henry (while he is fixing it)
- river / water
- water is sacred to Native Americans as it is a vital element which sustains life
- it symbolizes life, vitality, purity
- in many cultures, it is associated with spiritual rebirth (a form of baptism)
- running water = continuity of life, the flow of time
- the color red
- in the story there are many references to the color red
- car ("a red Olds")
- Blood Reserve
- Red Tomahawk: Henry has a nose like this Indian who killed Sitting Bull
- happiness + beauty, energy and strength but also violence, war, blood
- medicine wheels (found in Ojibwa territory, the areas the brothers drive through at the start of the story) are stone monuments used in ceremonies and symbolize the Circle of Life. The wheels are divided into 4 equal parts (red, white, black and yellow). Red symbolizes birth and spiritual life. For more on this, click on the link here.
- the red Olds = Oldsmobile car (iconic U.S. car company)
- Oldsmobile closed down in 2004: until that time, it was the oldest surviving American make
- Lyman's description of it: "... as if it was alive."
- the red convertible is a metaphor for
- Henry
- Native American life
Irony
- the American Legion Hall is an association chartered in 1919
- it is "a patriotic veterans organization devoted to mutual helpfulness" (see their mission statement here)
- its purpose is, among other things, to support veterans
- Lyman was allowed to shine shoes as a boy there
A final note on long hair
I came across the symbolism of long hair for Native Americans as I was searching for the meaning behind the story of Henry holding Susy up on his shoulders and imagining what it would be like for him to have long hair again.
This scene shows how Henry is consciously or subconsciously suffering in a world that has stripped him of his true Native American identity. When he is shipped off to Vietnam and returns a hollow shell of a man, his annihilation as a Chippewa and human being is complete.
For Henry and any Native American there are fundamental concepts related to long hair, though these may differ from one tribe to the next. Here are some key notions:
- long hair signifies power & strength
- it is a outward show of respect towards one's ancestors
- braiding long hair means unity with the infinite
- letting long hair down free represents the free flow of life
- long hair ties you to mother earth and nature (mother earth's long hair = long grasses)
- hair growth = spiritual growth
- cutting one's long hair as a result of a death in the family shows one's mourning and grief
- cutting one's hair could also mean a break from the old, from the past
- hair cut in Native American tradition is treated with great respect and is ceremoniously burned, buried or (mark the connection to Erdrich's story) placed in a running river
- during the Vietnam War, special envoys from the war department were sent to recruit young able men from Native American reservations. These men were viewed as having special tracking skills. When recruited however, these same men who seemed to have exceptional powers lost these powers. Tests were actually done and it was concluded that these new recruits failed to perform well because their military haircuts prevented them from doing so. Tests were then carried out on recruits who had been allowed to keep their long hair and these Native American recruits were able to sense an oncoming enemy as they lay sleeping.
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| photo by Slowking, |