A Note on *Black Elk Speaks*

The most striking images from the opening of Black Elk Speaks come from
the chapter describing his extraordinary vision. He starts out with a
disclaimer stating that the following text is not a story and then begins
telling a tale filled with unbelievable occurrences. He speaks frequently
of animals speaking and changing form, of trees sprouting out instantly
from the ground, and of dying things coming back to life. At first I was
unaware that this was a dream, and I questioned the fact that this book is
intended to be autobiographical. He speaks of this great vision as
something that has indeed happened to him yet the events that occur are
physically impossible as we know it. Not until the end of the chapter did
I realize that this vision occurred during a dream while Black Elk was
deathly ill.

After realizing this vision occurred only in Black Elk’s mind, I was
astonished at his ability to recall the events so vividly. Even though he
had this dream at the age of 9, Black Elk is able to reiterate the events
down to exact words that the “Powers of the World” had spoken to him. The
entire chapter is covered with colorful adjectives and not a single
detail is left out. Black Elk describes every color, every number, and
every event so vibrantly that I question his ability to recall the vision
so accurately when it occurred during a state of comatose.


In the next chapter, Black Elk reassures the reader that even he is
surprised at how much of the vision he can recall. The images often
reappear in his head and he often tricks himself into thinking that he is
in this alternate universe. As he gets older, he is able to draw further
meaning from the vision and better understand the events that happened.
Although Black Elk was able to fully recover from his illness, his
perception of reality was forever changed. I think that this was a
defining moment of his life and it was likely a large contributing factor
for Black Elk becoming a tribal leader and a famous Indian author.

~A.A.

Seeing Mistakes From All Directions *The Closing In*

There were two main themes that I took away from "The Closing In." First
was that people make mistakes or don't live up to expectations. The second
is vision and looking at something from all viewpoints. Each story has at
least one of these themes and usually it is one or the other.

In XIX, both brothers made mistakes of getting caught by the Utes. Even
though they escaped due to perseverance, I doubt it was out of their
control completely. The buffalo hunt in the winter of 1879 did not live up
to the expectations of feeding the tribe. Also, in XX the man did not live
up his horse's expectations of sorts because he felt fear while the horse
did not (a rare occurrence of the animal being superior to man). Mammedaty
made a mistake of shooting his arrow and missing the intended horse and
instead killing another horse.

The theme of vision is relevant in most of the other stories. Momaday
talks about about New Mexico and how he "truly and intimately, in every
season, from a thousand points of view." Momaday also speaks of
Mammedaty seeing a little boy nearby, but then checking for the boy
and not seeing him. Finally, Momaday writes that he believes "a man
ought to concentrate his mind upon the remembered earth." Also, he
talks about the grave where the woman in the beautiful dress is and being
able to see in the direction it is. However, all of these things to do with vision
are actually not seen by the person at the time. They are not really stories,
but more remembrances.

Why would Momaday choose to end his book with a sad theme and a theme
involving the unknown and unseen? He started the "The Going On" with a
very inspirational tale, so why did he not just continue with it?

~A.L.