Killers of the Flower Moon: Allegory 2 key examples

The image is beautiful and hopeful before it turns horrifying. The little white flowers, which look like confetti spread by the gods all over the hills and prairies, represent the Osage in the 1920s. They had lived on this land for many, many generations; as far as they were concerned, they had been put there by the gods. The tall plants that soon pop up and begin choking them out represent the greedy white settlers who moved into the area and began murdering the Osage over their oil headrights. In one month, the white flowers are violently driven underground until they can work their way up to the surface again the following year. Grann calls his book "Killers of the Flower Moon" because he sees the white murderers as sinister weeds that would rather kill the Osage than share resources with them. The title also acknowledges that the Osage, like the flowers that return each April, are resilient and have fought their way back again and again.

The allegory is imperfect. For one thing, the flower-killing is a natural process. The murders Grann chronicles were anything but natural. What's more, the white flowers suggest a little too much innocence and naivety. The Osage had endured a great deal of settler colonial trauma prior to the murders and had learned by the 1920s to be on their guard. For instance, the United States' Indian Removal policy stripped them of a huge portion of their traditional land. Even if the gods had a hand in putting them in the Osage territory, the U.S. government also had a major hand in determining where they would live. The Osage understood that and had formed advocacy groups to fight further injustice. People like Mollie Burkhart and her sisters had already survived abusive Catholic boarding schools where they were forced to speak English and dress in western clothing. Mollie later wore a traditional blanket in defiance of these edicts from her childhood. Still, the image of the flower-killing moon is poignant and captures the way even Mollie and her family members were taken aback by the intense betrayal they faced in the 1920s. As he will do throughout the book, Grann uses nature imagery to great effect to set the tone for a painful story.

Law enforcement, criminal defense, prosecution, and judgment in a court of law are all—according to this preacher—earthly stand-ins for what will happen in the afterlife. Hanging the prisoner allows "Sheriff Death" to arrest him and bring him before the divine court. God will be the ultimate judge who will mete out his punishment. The Holy Ghost will hold the prisoner accountable for his misdeeds, while the ever-merciful Jesus will defend him as an imperfect but ultimately good person.

Hearing this religious allegory at the public execution has an indelible effect on White. He does not fully agree with everything the preacher says. For one thing, he opposes the death penalty and struggles later in life when he is asked to carry out an execution. He does not believe that it should be up to a human court of law to determine when "Sheriff Death" will take someone in for the final judgment. He makes a point not to let his own children see prisoners executed as he did when he was young. However, White does take away from this moment the notion that law enforcement is deeply intertwined with morality. Although not all of his choices are unimpeachable, he spends his life trying to do not only what is legal, but moreover what is right.