Resistance And Expectance Of Contemporary American Native Novelists Towards Readers In Their Texts

Native American Renaissance began with the publication of the novel House Made of Dawn by Scott Momaday in1968. Having been oppressed and persecuted for hundreds of years, Native Americans finally found their way of articulation. In those dark years, Native figures could only be found in the White’s works, such as: James Fenimore Cooper’s or Mark Twain’s. The Natives had no chance to show what they really were those of themselves. So what the non-Native readers could see was always distorted Native Americans—stereotypes in the dominant culture. Under the doctrines of compelled assimilation, the ideology, culture, education, and even the language of the dominant society in America had somewhat taken place of their own. Now, Native culture has been withering and some of the people in the Native community have taken the White’s values as their own. With the development of this renaissance, many aboriginal writers in America give their voices from different angles and texts. This development is shown in two aspects:on one hand, new Native works were composed one after another; on the other hand, some Native writers began to rewrite the old Native works and them; meanwhile, they kept down the traditional oral stories in English.In order to correct the wrong stereotype of Natives and show the readers the real Native people and real Native culture, some contemporary Native writers published their works which drew the attention of the literary world. Considering that most readers of Native American fiction are non-Native, Native writers explore different themes in their texts and express different expectations for indigenous readers and non-Native readers. In this dissertation, five contemporary Native novelists are chosen:N. Scott Momaday, James Welch, Sherman Alexie, Gerald Vizenor and Leslie Marmon Silko. This dissertation is my response to the orientation of their texts. And my goal is to read how the indigenous novelists want to communicate with Native readers and non-Native readers respectively.The first chapter focuses on N. Scott Momaday’s House Made of Dawn, and I will explore the oral tradition and landscape description in the work. Momaday helps all the readers review Native people’s profound understanding of the relationship among human beings, culture and nature. But Momaday intentionally puts non-Native readers outside of the text, and keeps distance between non-Native readers and the tribe culture. Because he believes that non-Native readers, especially white Americans, are always the observers of the Native culture, but not the experience, therefore, they cannot fully understand Native’s life, culture and beliefs as Natives themselves. As a matter of fact, House Made of Dawn challenges all non-Native readers and tries to reject them. But anyhow, the novel finally builds a bridge between Native writers and non-Native readers, so as to set up a philosophic and spiritual foundation for later Native writers to attract non-Native readers to a literature centered on Native people. The publication of the novel marked the beginning of the Native American Renaissance.The second chapter talks about James Welch’s historical fictions Fools Crow and The Heartsong of Charging Elk. The two novels retell the history shared both by the whites and the Natives, and they will tell readers the truth. Protest and anti-prototype are the main points in Welch’s works. Being different from Momaday, who keeps distance from the non-Native readers, Welch chooses blackfoot’s culture and history as themes and chooses white Americans as his target readers. He depicts stories from inside to outside, letting Natives articulate their own history, and hopes that non-Native readers can take part in his works and hear their sound. For the first time, non-Native readers read the truth told by the Natives, and Natives finally find their right of articulation. In this way, Welch challenge the prototype created by the mainstream.The third chapter concerns about the most controversial Native writer Sherman Alexie and his collection of short story The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven. Humor is the main technique Alexie uses to depict the reality of Native people’s life, such as, depression, despair, poverty, alcoholism and violence. And it is also a kind of weapon to attack the prototype of Natives in mainstream culture. Some Native readers make complaints against Alexie because they believe that Alexie has betrayed them and exposed them completely to the whites. But Alexie believes that his humor and satire are the best way of challenging the prototype and he wishes to set up a new way of existence for Natives who are still living in a society which has great misunderstanding and prejudice against Natives. As a protest writer, he satirizes not only Natives, but also whites. He uses humor to expose the real history and humanity. His purpose is to rewrite the history told by the whites, and force the readers, especially the non-Native readers to admit that the violence and massacre in colonial period indeed brought disaster to the Natives. However, except the help he offers the readers to understand his work and to face the reality, Alexie does not intend to please any reader.The fourth chapter discusses Gerald Vizenor and his postmodern novel Bearheart:The Heirship Chronicles. Vizenor is one of the most radical Native novelists and literary critics, and he is a rigorous language user. Vizenor combines modern mainstream literature with traditional Native literature. His works are full of the ideas of philosophy, epistemology, literary criticism, magic realism, post-structuralism and trickster theory. Thus, his works are quite difficult to understand. But Vizenor does not require his readers to tell how much they can understand his work or judge whether it is right or wrong. Instead, he requires his readers to fully use their imagination to understand it. Everything is open, and there is no judgment or conclusion. All depend on the readers’imagination. But when the readers draw different conclusions, the process they have experienced to illustrate the work will unite all the readers together. Bearheart needs the readers to raise questions, and challenge all the assertions. Readers can tell all the possibilities according to their unique comprehension. That means, Bearheart is a novel which can reach a kind of unity upon readers. Its unity does not lie in its answers, but lies in the process of getting the answers. In this way, Vizenor tries to expose the importance of imagination for the development of Native culture, and tell the readers that the Native people do not develop lonely, but try to set up a kind of communication with all the others.The last chapter centers on Leslie Marmon Silko’s famous novel Ceremony. Ceremony is quite similar with Momaday’s House Made of Dawn both in theme and plot. But their expectation for readers is quite different. Silko tries to combine narration with the clan stories in oral tradition together to heal the hurt of Natives and balance the world. Here, language and clan stories have the power of saving the world, and they can comfort people and the race. Silko wishes to communicate with all the readers. She intends to enclose all the readers into her story, and wants them to take part in it actively. Many Native readers criticize Silko because they believe that she sells the secrets of Native culture out to the outsiders. But Silko’s purpose is to expose her work to not only Native readers, but also the readers in the mainstream. She wants the non-Native readers to know more about their culture. By this means, she can mend the rift between the Native and the mainstream, heal the Native people’s pain and bring hope to them.My dissertation focuses on the literary expression of the Native novelists. They teach us lessons and inform us that what we outsiders think of them is not true and the basic communication and interaction is necessary to get the knowledge of their culture. Even though their writing techniques and themes differ greatly from each other, their goal is quite similar:communicating with the other cultures and keeping balance with them, so that they can set up a new way of existence for American Natives. This dissertation is my genuine appreciation of the artistry and ideas of contemporary Native novelists. It is my sincere hope that my work will prove my worthy efforts and my worthy efforts will be appreciated.