Shadow Distance: A Gerald Vizenor Reader PDF
Preview Shadow Distance: A Gerald Vizenor Reader
SHADOW DISTANCE This page intentionally left blank G E R A LD V I Z E N O R SHADOW DISTANCE A Gerald Vizenor Reader Wesleyan University Press PUBLISHED BY UNIVERSITY PRESS OF NEW ENGLAND . HANOVER AND LONDON Wesleyan University Press Published by University Press of New England, Hanover, NH 03755 This collection © 1994 by Gerald Vizenor All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America 5 4 3 2 1 CIP data appear at the end of the book ACKNOWLEDGMENTS “Thank You, George Raft,” “Measuring My Blood,” “Haiku in the Attic,” and “Avengers at Wounded Knee" are reprinted from Interior Landscapes: Autobiographical Myths and Metaphors. Copyright © 1990 by Gerald Vizenor. University of Minnesota Press. "Envoy to Haiku" was first published in the Chicago Review. “Miigis Crowns” is reprinted from The Heirs of Columbus. Copyright © 1991 by Gerald Vizenor. Wesleyan University Press/University Press of New England. "Victoria Park" is reprinted from Griever: An American Monkey King in China. Copyright © 1987 by Gerald Vizenor. University of Minnesota Press. Griever: An American Monkey King in China was originally published by Illinois State University/Fiction Collective as the winner of its National Fiction Competition for 1986. "Terminal Creeds at Orion" is reprinted from Bearheart. Copyright © 1978 and 1990 by Gerald Vizenor. University of Minnesota Press. Bearheart was first published in a limited paperbound edition as Darkness in Saint Louis Bearheart by Truck Press in September 1978. "Shadows" is reprinted from Dead Voices. Copyright © 1992 by Gerald Vizenor. University of Oklaho- ma Press. "Almost Browne" and "Ice Tricksters" are reprinted from Landfill Meditation: Crossblood Stories. Copyright © 1991 by Gerald Vizenor. Wesleyan University Press/University Press of New England. "Almost Browne" was selected by the PEN Syndicated Fiction Project for newspaper and radio distribution; "Ice Tricksters" was first published as "Almost a Whole Trickster" in A Gathering of Flowers, edited by Joyce Carol Thomas, Harper & Row. "Tulip Browne" is reprinted from The Trickster of Liberty: Tribal Heirs to a Wild Baronage. Copyright © 1988 by Gerald Vizenor. University of Minnesota Press. "Trickster Photography" was published in Exposure. "Separatists Behind the Blinds" is reprinted from Wordarrows: Indians and Whites in the New Fur Trade. Copyright © 1978 by the University of Minnesota. University of Minnesota Press. "Double Others,” “Casino Coups,” and “Ishi Obscura” are reprinted from Manifest Manners: Postindian Warriors of Survivance. Copyright © 1994 by Gerald Vizenor. Wesleyan University Press/University Press of New England. “Ishi Obscura” was first published as “Ishi Bares His Chest" in Partial Recall: Photographs of Native North America, edited by Lucy Lippard, New Press. “Unnameable Postindians” was, in part, an essay Acknowledgments continue on page 343. 343 Man and nature trade shadow and life. . . . All writing invites to an anterior reading of the world which the word urges and which we pur- sue to the limits of faded memory. . . . My truth in the book is my truth outside life. Thus my life grows around my books. . . . You will die in the mirror. Edmond Jabès, The Book of Questions This page intentionally left blank CONTENTS Introduction by A. Robert Lee ix AUTOBIOGRAPHY Thank You, George Raft, from Interior Landscapes 3 Measuring My Blood, from Interior Landscapes 7 Haiku in the Attic, from Interior Landscapes 14 Envoy to Haiku, from Chicago Review 25 Avengers at Wounded Knee, from Interior Landscapes 33 FICTION Miigis Crowns, from The Heirs of Columbus 47 Victoria Park, from Griever 69 Shadows, from Dead Voices 80 Terminal Creeds at Orion, from Bearheart 90 STORIES Almost Browne, from Landfill Meditation 107 Ice Tricksters, from Landfill Meditation 115 Viii CONTENTS Tulip Browne, from The Trickster of Liberty 125 Trickster Photography, from Exposure 142 Separatists Behind the Blinds, from Wordarrows 145 ESSAYS Double Others, from Manifest Manners 155 Unnameable Postindians, from Genre 173 Ishi Obscura, from Manifest Manners 184 The Tragic Wisdom of Salamanders, from Sacred Trust 194 Casino Coups, from Manifest Manners 210 Reversal of Fortunes, from Caliban 219 Crossbloods, from the introduction to Crossbloods 227 Sand Creek Survivors, from Earthdivers 247 Terminal Creeds, from The People Named the Chippewa 260 Shadows at La Pointe, from The People Named the Chippewa 274 SCREENPLAY Harold of Orange 297 Selected Bibliography of Works by Gerald Vizenor 337 INTRODUCTION A. Robert Lee . . . about Indian identity I have a revo- lutionary fervor. The hardest part of it is I believe we're all invented as Indi- ans. ... So what I'm pursuing now in much of my writing is this idea of the invented Indian. The inventions have be- come disguises. Much of the power we have is universal, generative in life itself and specific to our consciousness here. In my case there's even the balance of white and Indian, French and Indian, so the balance and contradiction is within me genetically. . . . There's another idea I have worked in the stories, about termi- nal creeds. ... It occurs, obviously, in written literature and totalitarian sys- tems. It's a contradiction, again, to bal- ance because it's out of balance if one is in the terminal condition. This occurs in invented Indians because we're invented and we're invented from traditional stat-
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