Previous
Part 1
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Green Grass, Running Water, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Indian Culture and White Culture
Storytelling
Oppression and the Justice System
The Power of Nature
Summary
Analysis
In an unknown location, Lone Ranger, Hawkeye, Robinson Crusoe, and Ishmael debate whose turn it is to tell a story. Ishmael begins to tell a new creation story about how Changing Woman looked over the edge of Sky World into her reflection in Water World and fell out of Sky World into a canoe in Water World.
With the start of the second part, it becomes clear that each section of the book will repeat certain patterns, including a new creation story for each section. The four parts represent the four escaped Indians, while also perhaps evoking the four seasons (since nature features so prominently in the story).
Themes
In Blossom, Latisha, Lionel’s sister who runs a restaurant called Dead Dog, prepares for a day of work. With the help of her aunt Norma, she manages to expand beyond local customers and turn the restaurant into a “tourist trap” by pretending that the meat they serve is dog.
Elsewhere in Blossom, Eli Stands Alone watches as the water rises by his porch. Clifford Sifton walks by and Eli invites him in for coffee. But Eli is a little annoyed with Sifton, believing that fishing will be worse because of a dam that Sifton built on Indian land.
Water plays an important role in every plot line of the novel—it has been there since the beginning of creation and gives life to the world. The dam’s efforts to control the water show a lack of respect for water’s power, and the poor fishing shows how the interference of the dam hurts nature.
Themes
Back when Eli used to live in Toronto, he only learned of his mother’s death a couple weeks later from Norma. At that point, he hadn’t been home to Blossom for 20 or 30 years. Norma got angry at him for going off to live like he was white, so he hung up the phone and flew right back to Blossom. When he got back, he first met Sifton in his mother’s house, and he instantly disliked Sifton. Sifton started talking right away about plans to build the dam.
The fact that Eli only learned about his own mother’s death weeks after it happened is a sign of how disconnected from his past life he was when he was living in Toronto. Additionally, the fact that the white man Sifton is literally in Eli’s mother’s house when he returns is yet another example in the story of how white people are always encroaching in Indian territory.
Themes
Get the entire Green Grass, Running Water LitChart as a printable PDF.
Charlie reflects on his recent phone call with Alberta, in which she chose Lionel’s birthday over him. Charlie is working for a man named Duplessis, who is involved with the dam, although due to a challenge in court, now no one can use the dam or the lake near it. Eli doesn’t like Charlie working for people like Duplessis, and Eli has been leading the charge to get injunctions against Duplessis’s construction of the dam. Charlie keeps thinking about Alberta and decides to make a flight to Blossom without telling her.
Although Charlie looks down on Lionel for working for the white man Bursum at the television and stereo store, Charlie is himself working for a white man who has arguably an even more hostile relationship with the local Indian community. Blossom continues to play a central role in connecting all the characters in the story, uniting different plot lines. Its name, for example, relates to the gardens that show up in several of the creation stories.
Themes
While Lionel and Norma are walking together, they happen to run into the Lone Ranger, Hawkeye, Robinson Crusoe, and Ishmael. They tell Lionel that they’re trying to fix the world, but young people won’t listen to them. The four of them are currently headed toward Blossom. Lionel marvels at how old those four Indians all look, maybe 80 or 90.
The four Indians, who may be centuries old, embody the wisdom gained from living through such a long period of Indian history. Their comment about young people not listening could be a reference to how, for example, Charlie has sided with the white men in the dispute over the dam near Blossom.
Themes
Norma once told Lionel that the key to winning Alberta over was to realize that Alberta wants babies. She recommended borrowing a baby to hold and show to Alberta.
This passage is humorous and shows how Norma sometimes goes over the top in trying to interfere in Lionel’s life and give him advice.
Themes
In his store, Bill Bursum attends to a customer named Minnie Smith. He gives a demonstration of a VCR player that shows a video with a map of Canada and the United States projected across 200 screens. He calls this display The Map. Bursum is convinced that The Map is an invaluable advertising tool, and he looks down on people like Lionel who don’t seem to understand The Map’s value.
Bill Bursum’s obsession over The Map has an imperialist tinge to it. Although the map he wants to control is just a simulation, it represents how white people throughout history have wanted total control over land, even when it already belonged to Indians. This is partly why Lionel struggles to understand The Map in the same way that Bursum does.
Themes
Latisha entertains some tourists in her restaurant, noting to herself that tourists always love to talk. They ask her if she’s married, and she says no, although she isn’t quite single either. She thinks of George Morningstar, a white American man that she likes because he doesn’t look like a cowboy or an Indian. Latisha always thought he looked intelligent when he came to the reserve (the Canadian word for Indian land—called “reservations” in the U.S.) on occasions like the holiday Indian Day.
Latisha is one of several Indian characters in the story to have a romantic relationship with a white person. As is the case in all of these stories, a promising beginning to the relationship slowly fades away as the essential differences between the two cultures become more apparent. For George, Indian culture remains more of a curiosity—something to see on a holiday—than a true way of life.
Themes
Many years ago, when George and Latisha first met, she thought he was a gentleman who didn’t touch her like many of the other men she knew. They get married within 6 months. By the end of the first year, she was pregnant, although she had begun to see George’s shortcomings and realize that he might not know as much as he seems to. As she tells the tourists in her restaurant in the present, she stayed with George for nine years and had three kids.
Just as George took an interest in superficial elements of Indian culture like Indian Day (a holiday in Canada), Latisha was also taken in at first by superficial elements of George, like his appearance of being knowledgeable. In spite of their incompatibility, George and Latisha nevertheless end up together for many years, showing how circumstance often forces both Indian and white people to be together.
Themes
As Eli sits on his porch and talks to Sifton, he tries to imagine the dam getting cracks in it. He remembers Julys when he was growing up and his mother would take his family to an event called the Sun Dance that involved days of consecutive dancing. In the present, Sifton complains of all the rights the government gives to Indians, which have stopped him from being able to use his dam.
The connection between dancing and Eli’s vision of the cracking dam will become important later, in the fourth part of the novel. Sifton’s complaints about the government giving too many rights to Indians are humorous (although he may not realize it) because the Canadian government has historically been poor about following treaties outlining the rights of Indians. The novel’s title, Green Grass, Running Water, comes from a phrase that often came up in these broken treaties.
Themes
During the annual Sun Dance in Eli’s past, sometimes a tourist would wander in. One tourist tried to take pictures, but an Indian named Orville had to explain to him that that wasn’t allowed during the Sun Dance. The tourist claimed he also had family photos on his film roll, but Orville insisted on taking it. In the present, Eli reflects on how he’s never seen anyone as angry as Orville on that day. After the Sun Dance, when Orville took the tourist’s photos to be developed, the man at the store told him the film was blank.
The Sun Dance represents an authentic example of Indian culture, and it holds appeal for tourists because it is not permitted to be photographed. By photographing the ceremony, the tourist wants to take a part of it for himself. Although Orville’s reaction to the man might seem to be harsh, the end of this passage reveals that the tourist was lying to Orville and that he never had any family photos on the film.
Themes
Continuing the creation story, the narrator tells Coyote about how Changing Woman fell out of the sky. She starts falling toward a canoe, but as she gets close, she sees that it’s full of poop. Fortunately, Old Coyote happens to wake up and roll over, and so Changing Woman lands on him. Near Old Coyote on the canoe full of poop is a little man with a big beard who calls himself Noah. His canoe is also full of animals. Changing Woman goes with Noah.
Just as the first creation story had similarities to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden in the Book of Genesis, this new creation story has similarities to the Genesis story of Noah and the great flood. The poop on the boat is a side effect of all the animals Noah has on it, as well as perhaps being a metaphor for how this particular Noah is “full of shit.”
Themes
Noah becomes infatuated with Changing Woman and believes she was sent to be his wife. He chases her around on his canoe for a month, but she flees him. After a month of sailing, they find an island and stop. Old Coyote comes over to visit them, and Changing Woman is surprised to see him again. Old Coyote warns her that Noah has thrown several animals out of his canoe, including Old Coyote himself. On the beach, Noah continues to try to have sex with Changing Woman, but she keeps running away.
Like GOD in the first creation story, this Noah is much more possessive and greedier than his biblical counterpart. This is yet again a commentary on how many of the ostensibly Christian white colonists in the Americas acted greedily toward the Indians. Noah’s unwanted advances on Changing Woman perhaps suggest how some white settlers committed rape against Indian women.
Themes
Charlie arrives in Blossom and signs a rental car form. He wonders what he’ll say to Alberta when he sees her. A woman he meets at the car rental place asks him if he’s a movie star, but he says that was his father, Portland Looking Bear, who was indeed a movie star. He never got to play the hero, however, because movies never had Indian heroes. Portland turned down a prominent role in a John Wayne film because he didn’t want to wear a fake nose. At the rental car place, Charlie doesn’t like his car because it’s a red old Pinto.
This passage reveals that one of the reasons why Charlie can be insecure is because he’s lived much of his life in the shadow of his famous father, Portland. Portland has integrity, refusing to change his appearance with a fake nose, even for a major part. But in spite of good qualities and his initial success, Portland never got to play the hero, making the situation particularly bleak for Charlie, who struggles just to achieve what Portland did.
Themes
During the time when Latisha was married to George, he would always make broad statements, like that Americans are independent but Canadians are dependent. Latisha became increasingly annoyed with him but put up with it for the sake of their first child, Christian. In the present, when Latisha is cleaning a table after the tourists leave, she finds that someone has left behind a book called The Shaganappi and a 20-dollar tip.
Latisha’s situation embodies the compromises that many Indian people have had to make throughout the years. Her bad marriage with George symbolizes how Indians have often had to accept a “bad marriage” with local white settlers or governments for the sake of preserving peace.
Themes
Elsewhere in Blossom, at Eli’s house, Sifton gives Eli some books he’s brought as a gift. Sifton says he himself doesn’t really read anymore. Seeing the books makes Eli think of Karen, whom he met in his second year at the University of Toronto. She used to read more books than him and lend him some of her favorites. He gave her a couple books too, and many of the books they traded related to Indian life and history. Karen wasn’t Indian but liked that Eli was. She seemed to come from money, and she and Eli eventually moved in together.
Like his niece, Latisha, Eli also has a significant romantic relationship with a white person. Like George, Karen seems to be intelligent and to take a real interest in Indian culture. Unlike George, she is a true reader, and so there is actually some substance to her knowledge. Still, Karen has her blind spots—perhaps because of her family’s wealthy background—and this leads her to fixate on Eli’s Indian qualities in a way that may be unhealthy, where she sees him as exotic.
Themes
Now, Eli sits on the couch and starts reading one of the new novels he got from Sifton. The novel is full of cliches about Indian life, but he finds it easy to read. He thinks more of Karen and how they lived together for two years before he met her parents. Eli felt awkward the whole time because the “cottage” where Karen’s parents lived suggested they were very wealthy.
Even Eli, who is an activist that supports Indian issues (like the closing of the dam), finds himself moved by a cliched depiction of Indian life, showing the power that stories and stereotypes can have. Karen’s comment about a “cottage” reflects how in general she doesn’t have a strong grasp on the level of privilege she has relative to Eli.
Themes
Elsewhere in Blossom, Lionel thinks about how, despite his three big mistakes, he’s also made some good choices. He considers Alberta a good choice—even Norma likes her. Alberta’s first meeting with Lionel’s parents was awkward, though, and she ended up leaving abruptly, claiming she had a meeting. Now, Lionel drives home to his apartment, where he watches television and falls asleep.
At this point in his life, everything for Lionel revolves around television. He goes out to sell televisions during the day, then comes back to watch television at night. In general, the novel presents a negative view of television, depicting it as a pale alternative to things like the Indian tradition of oral storytelling.
Themes
Alberta arrives in Blossom from Calgary too late to drive to the reserve, so she books a hotel room alone. The rude receptionist reminds her of the time she tried to phone a hospital for information about artificial insemination. It was a long process that involved filling out a lot of forms. She goes to bed that night in the hotel thinking of how Charlie needs someone in his life to help him.
Part of the reason that Alberta is drawn to both Lionel and Charlie is because they are flawed people that she believes she can help. Her desire to play a mother-like role in a relationship connects back to her desire to have a child of her own to raise.
Themes
Back when Lillian was pregnant with Charlie, Portland moved out of Hollywood for good. Charlie grew up watching Westerns with Portland, who complained that his roles were cut out of some of them. In the present, Charlie watches a Western and struggles to remember if it was one he saw with his father. He thinks about Lionel and figures Alberta must like Lionel because he’s helpless.
Portland goes from acting in Hollywood movies to just having to watch them, showing how he has been forced to take on a more passive role in life. As much as Charlie admires his father (trying to bring back his memory by watching a Western), a part of Charlie also seems to fear being forced into a similarly passive state.
Themes
In another part of Blossom, Latisha comes home from the Dead Dog Cafe to her three children: Christian, Benjamin, and Elizabeth. For a while, Christian was an only child, but Latisha and George decided to try to save their marriage with Benjamin. Elizabeth was an accident. In the present, Latisha apologizes to her children for getting back from work late.
Latisha’s situation as a mother contrasts with Alberta’s status as an unmarried woman who really wants to be a mother. As much as Alberta thinks a child might solve some of the current issues in her life, Latisha’s relationship with George is a good example of how some problems can’t be fixed by having children.
Themes
During their marriage, George started having affairs. He beat Latisha for the first time on a day when she insulted the fringed leather jacket he was wearing earlier. In the present, Latisha watches a Western with her children, and Christian asks why the Indians always have to die.
A fringe jacket is associated with both cowboy and Indian culture. Although Latisha’s insult of the jacket may seem like a small thing, it clearly triggers some much deeper insecurity within George about his relationship with Indian culture.
Themes
In a creation story, Changing Woman stays by herself on the island for a long time until one day a man named Ahab comes to the island and asks her if she’s seen a white whale. He insists on calling her Queequeg because the story already has an Ishmael, and he forces her to keep watch for whales. But Changing Woman is horrified when she learns Ahab plans to kill the whales.
Just as the first creation story incorporated elements of The Lone Ranger stories, this second story incorporates elements of Moby-Dick, including the characters Ahab, Ishmael, and Queequeg (who is Indigenous). Ahab’s desire to hunt the white whale is yet another example of a man in the novel who has a greedy relationship with nature.
Themes
Instead of a white whale, Changing Woman spots a black female whale that she calls Moby-Jane. Coyote interrupts to protest that there can’t be any Moby-Jane, but the narrator tells Coyote to look again. When Ahab’s crew members start saying the whale is black, he throws them overboard, insisting it’s white. Soon, only Changing Woman is left.
The fact that Moby-Jane is a black female rather than a white male perhaps reflect how the people who are the victims of greed (like Ahab’s greed) are often women and people of color. Ahab’s insistence that the black whale is actually white shows how men like him are delusional and live in a distorted version of reality.
Themes
At his home in Blossom, Eli continues to read his cliched Western, even though he already knows where it’s going. After Eli first met Karen’s family, he remained reluctant to have Karen meet his mother. At last, he wrote to his mother that he wanted her to meet a special person, but his mother replied that she and Norma would be at the Sun Dance then. Eli and Karen made plans to both go, but Eli warned Karen not to bring a camera.
Karen tries to take an interest in Eli’s past and in elements of his culture like the Sun Dance, not realizing that Eli himself has a complicated relationship with these parts of his life. Just as the Western novel that Eli reads seems to be heading toward a predictable conclusion, Eli’s relationship with Karen seems to be heading toward the inevitable problems that arise when two different cultures clash.
Themes
When Karen first arrived with Eli for the Sun Dance, she was amazed at how beautiful it is, like something from a movie. They went into one of the many tepees at the camp where Eli’s mother is. His mother was interested in hearing all about his and Karen’s life in Toronto. Karen remained tentative at first, but after three days, she seemed to feel more comfortable talking. Norma confronted Eli about how he never came home, but he tried to avoid having the discussion. Afterwards Karen said she had a wonderful experience and thought Eli must miss coming home.
Karen only sees an idealized version of Eli’s past life at the Sun Dance. She thinks that Eli must miss his old life, when in fact, Eli has voluntarily stayed away from it for many years. Although Karen is often portrayed as naïve, she also helps Eli see his past in a new light. Later in his life, Eli does return home to Blossom, and he puts greater stock in traditions like the Sun Dance than he did back when he was away living in Toronto.
Themes
In the later days of his film career in Hollywood, Portland faces many difficulties. He’s not part of the acting union but doesn’t have enough experience to join. When he stops getting even small parts, he decides to move his family. At one point, Portland and Charlie work together to park cars at a steakhouse while dressed as an Indian, where all the waiters dress like cowboys. In the present, Charlie decides he needs a fresh start with Alberta.
The situation with the actor’s union—where Portland can’t get jobs without joining but needs to get more jobs to join—reflects the impossible situation that many Indians have found themselves in throughout history. The fact that a relatively recognizable actor like Portland is reduced to parking cars at a steakhouse shows how little white society values him and his talent.
Themes
While working at the steakhouse, Portland and Charlie get an offer for a better-paying job as backup dancers at a burlesque. They perform a routine with a woman dressed as Pocahontas—a routine in which Portland strips the woman on stage only for Portland to then be defeated by a cowboy. Portland quits after a week, but Charlie sticks with the job longer. Portland spends a lot of time in front of the television and seems to be depressed. When Charlie asks his father where in the world he’d go if he could, Portland replies “Hollywood.”
This performance at the burlesque club depicts Indian men as full of uncontrolled sexual urges. This makes the Indians look villainous and helps portray the cowboys as heroic—even willing to protect Indian women. This negative portrayal of Indians is similar to the depictions in many of the Westerns that keep showing up throughout the novel, revealing how many of people’s negative ideas about Indians have been shaped throughout popular culture.
Themes
Alberta, Christian, Charlie, and Eli are all separately watching or reading Westerns. The Lone Ranger, Robinson Crusoe, Ishmael, and Hawkeye also watch a Western. Meanwhile, Sergeant Cereno has left Babo and Dr. Hovaugh alone for the day.
This passage continues the theme of how people’s perceptions of Indians have been shaped by popular culture. This doesn’t just apply to white people observing Indians—Indians also get ideas about themselves from the culture around them.
Themes
In the creation story, Moby-Jane tells Changing Woman that she can take her to Florida. Changing Woman rides on the whale’s back and finds she enjoys it. They swim together for about a month until Changing Woman thinks she sees new land. Moby-Jane drops her off on shore, and the two part ways. Moby-Jane doesn’t see the soldiers that grab Changing Woman soon after landing. She asks the men to call her Ishmael, but they recognize her as an Indian. They take her to Fort Marion. Coyote interrupts to point out that The Lone Ranger is also at Fort Marion.
The second creation story ends much like the first, with the main woman being imprisoned and sent to Florida. Fort Marion is a real fort in Florida where Indian prisoners of war were sent. The association of Changing Woman with Ishmael parallels the association of First Woman with the Lone Ranger. The imprisonment of these women in Florida is similar to the imprisonment of the four Indians in the psychiatric hospital, showing how different threads of Indian history, past and present, are related to each other.
Themes
