Ceremony Summary and Analysis

Ceremony is a novel by Leslie Marmon Silko which takes place in the American Southwest on the Laguna Pueblo reservation. Tayo, the main character, is a half-white half-Laguna young man who fought in the Pacific during World War II along with many other young Laguna Pueblo men. The novel is the story of Tayo's return to health following a PTSD-like state after the war, but it is also much more than that.
Tayo goes to WWII with Rocky and returns to find Josiah dead. He is in an army hospital at first, later comes home and tries to get better there. Has trouble when he goes out and drinks with the other veterans, almost kills Emo in a bar fight. Eventually seeks help from elders, first one from his tribe (Ku'oosh) and then one from another tribe (Apache?) in Betonie. Betonie tries to mix modern western culture with native culture, to mix it in with the healing ceremonies, because the Native Americans must learn to live with this culture or else theirs will be destroyed. Eventually takes Tayo to a mountain and performs a ceremony with/on Tayo to heal him, which he must complete by stealing some cattle Josiah had once bought back from a white man.
Tayo goes to steal the cattle back and meets a strange (spirit?) woman in a lodge in the woods, and he "shacks up" with her before going up to the mountain to try and break the cattle out. He finds a mountain lion there who eventually helps distract guards of the rich white man's land while the cattle escape, and Tayo successfully rescues them.
After this, he lives with the cattle on the family's ranch, and the spirit woman (Ts'eh) returns to live with him and teach him for a while as he waits. Eventually Emo comes searching for him to try and kill him, and Tayo leaves but is picked up by Harvey and Leroy and taken to Emo (betrayed by his friends; like a Christ figure?). Eventually he escapes and hides, but he watches Emo kill Harvey. Eventually all of this group dies except Emo, who leaves to go to California.


Culture notes

Rocky: Tayo's cousin, was seen as having a lot more potential and ability than Tayo
Josiah: Tayo's uncle. Taught him to feel the traditional native culture as he was growing up (his "spirit teacher")
Night Swan: Josiah's girlfriend who lives in a village, is very mysterious and spirit-like.
Auntie: Tayo's aunt, who takes him in and takes care of him from when he is a kid. She makes it clear that she intends to treat Rocky better than Tayo and they have a very odd relationship because of this.
Laura: Tayo's mom. She runs around with a bunch of white men, being drunk and in general just an irresponsible person, and eventually dies while Tayo is still young. Possibly committed suicide.
Grandma: Lives with Tayo and tells stories of Laguna culture. Compares him to the sun god in the story of the gambler.
Harvey: Tayo's friend since childhood.
Emo: Another one of the Laguna around Tayo's age from his social circle, but someone Tayo never liked. Epitomizes "witchery" and tries to kill Tayo.

QUOTES:

“You don't have anything 
if you don't have the stories.” 

"They fear.
They fear the world.
They destroy what they fear.
They fear themselves."

“You damn your own soul better than I ever could.” 
“I will tell you something about stories . . . They aren't just entertainment. Don't be fooled. They are all we have, you see, all we have to fight off illness and death.” 


THEME
Ceremony is about the web of stories that make up the world and the cultural divide that exists in the Laguna Pueblo world.

The stories idea is huge, and there are a ton of examples to support it. The traditional stories like the Gambler and the Fly, as well as stories that people make up like Betonie's story about witchery. To me, the most important idea is how the stories of everyones' lives intersect, like the bear boy's story coming to play a part in Tayo's story which comes to play a part in the story of the preservation of the Laguna culture which includes the stories of all of Betonie's predecessors as well as all the stories of the Laguna Pueblo oral tradition that tie into this....

Open Prompt Revision #4

Revision from Sunday, September 16, 2012

2010, Form B. “You can leave home all you want, but home will never leave you.” —Sonsyrea Tate

Sonsyrea Tate’s statement suggests that “home” may be conceived of as a dwelling, a place, or a state of mind. It may have positive or negative associations, but in either case, it may have a considerable influence on an individual. Choose a novel or play in which a central character leaves home yet finds that home remains significant. Write a well-developed essay in which you analyze the importance of “home” to this character and the reasons for its continuing influence. Explain how the character’s idea of home illuminates the larger meaning of the work. Do not merely summarize the plot.

John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath is a novel in which the characters may leave their homes, but their homes never truly leave them. Tom Joad is forced by the circumstances to become the major provider for his family, a major contrast to his position as an inmate while they still lived in Oklahoma. The family consisted of self-providing farmers who got by well enough on their own, but when they were unable to grow enough to survive, they were uprooted and it seemed like their whole lives changed. However, they still retained a few qualities that had been central to them at their home. This sense of home is used by Steinbeck to create the sense of family's importance and power as a central meaning in Grapes of Wrath.

Family is very important when you are a farmer; when there are very few other people around, the bonds that are formed between family members are amazingly strong. An agricultural family works as a social unit to support each other against the face of a seemingly all-powerful force: nature. The Joad family tries to stick together throughout the story, but they are eventually split up as Tom again becomes a fugitive from the law, and the quality of home in the form of their family seems to be gone. It seems that their family is broken up, they have lost what held them together, and they are away from home in a hostile land where they can't survive like they used to. One could take away from this that they did indeed lose everything that had been theirs in their home. If all the details are accounted for, it would appear to be that while Tom may have lost almost all of what his "home" was, but there was still some with him. He refused to let the circumstances dictate his actions, and began to lead an effort to organize the farm labor of poor migrants with similar circumstances.

After losing his physical home, Tom found his home away from home in the form of his family. After being forced away from his family, Tom once again found a home in the form of the burgeoning organized labor movement that he became a part of. United once again with a group of people working to support one another against a seemingly all-powerful force, Tom retains an aspect of what his home was to him even though he has lost the most precious part of his home: his family, his farm, his livelihood. Home is not something that you can take away from somebody; it is a part of a person as much as their hands or their mind.

Through the development of home as an important part of the work and the connection of home to family, Steinbeck creates the feeling that family has the power to help lift people up from the terrible disasters we may face in life.

(I would add better textual evidence, as I'm sure there is some, but I haven't read this book for like 2 years and I only read it once, I hardly remember the specifics except the ending...)

 

Response to Course Materials 8 (LAST ONE!!!)

We have just finished annotating Ceremony, and I have to say it was really really long. I hope we don't have to do the same for Fifth Business, because I think my time would be better spent studying for APs at that point, but we'll see.
I actually really liked reading Ceremony and it was good to go back and spend more time thinking about it, as I definitely would have had major gaps in my understanding of it if I hadn't done so. The differences between this book and more traditional Western literature is intriguing to me and the themes of the book are also very interesting (trying to reconcile the differences in cultures, restoration of Laguna culture, web of stories, etc.) although I know I don't understand them as well as I would like.
I don't remember everything that we did before spring break but I hope that we work a lot on our writing in timed situations before the exam. I don't really have any idea of how well I'll do on the exam, MC or writing, but I'm sure if I study hard enough for it I'll be well prepared.

One more month until we're done!

Open Prompt Revision #3

Revision from December 9, Open Prompt post #4

2007. In many works of literature, past events can affect, positively or negatively, the present activities, attitudes, or values of a character. Choose a novel or play in which a character must contend with some aspect of the past, either personal or societal. Then write an essay in which you show how the character's relationship to the past contributes to the meaning of the work as a whole.

In Death of a Salesman, the often seamless blending of both past and present into one narrative causes interaction of characters with the past to be an important part of the play. This is especially evident with Willy who often relives past events at the same time as he is interacting with people in the present. He is unable to let go of the past and causes it to become a distorted reality of the present, unable to accept the sometimes harsh realities of life.

This distorted reality is embodied in Willy's relationship with his son, Biff. Willy had seen Biff as an extremely promising young man with boundless potential until he failed to graduate from high school, something that has haunted Willy ever since. He decided not to pursue his degree after he walked in on Willy having an affair in a Boston hotel and went between dead-end jobs for fourteen years after that. Because Willy was driven by a desire to be "number-one man" and his passion was to make it big as a salesman, he was crushed by Biff's decision not to follow in his father's footsteps seemingly solely because of the affair that he witnessed. Willy believes that Biff ruined his life "to spite [Willy]," and he makes this clear throughout the play. This conflict of one life goal with another is one of the key themes of the play, with Willy going the route of a capitalistic salesman and Biff taking another which he doesn't seem to be quite sure of, but it is doing whatever makes him happy.

Willy is affected so significantly by Biff's failure in high school because he believed that Biff truly had a chance to be everything that he himself had hoped to be. He puts the pressure of his hopes and dreams on Biff and expects him to succeed in everything that Biff had failed in, as some parents try to live through their children. A football star with the opportunity to go to a fantastic school on scholarships in U of V, Biff seemed to be going places to his father despite the fact that he was "failing math" according to Bernard. While blowing off school, Biff worked to become "well-liked" as Bernard worked hard to acquire skills that would help him succeed in the real world. The turning point in their relationship occurs when Biff returns from Boston and burns his U of V sneakers, making it clear to Bernard that he had "given up." They switch places as adults, and Bernard's role as a foil to Biff is clear when Willy finds that Bernard is arguing a case before the Supreme Court as Biff fails to find a job. This shows very clearly that the relationship to the past plays a large part in the lives of the Lomans.

One of the most noticeable times that the mixing of past and present occurs is whenever Ben is present, as Willy's focus alternates between what "Ben," or his mind's perception of Ben, and the people he is really interacting with. In scenes with Charlie and with his family in their yard, Willy often returns to the times that Ben visited his house and offered him what seems to him now an opportunity to make it big. In the climactic scene where Willy ends up killing himself, this mysterious figure from his past (of his brother) influences Willy to do what his family dreads. He represents the desire to earn money at all costs and Willy subscribes to this ends-justify-means approach by killing himself for insurance money. His son Happy then goes on to commit to the same ideals as his father, and the cycle of self-destructive work as salesmen vying to be successful continues in the Loman family, making the relationship between past and present of this particular character cyclical and continuous throughout the family.

Through the mixing of past and present, Miller creates a relationship between Willy and his past in which his mind is caught somewhere between the two. He is unable to forget the past and is especially caught up on when Biff's supposed failure as a kid many years ago. This inability to let go creates an alternate reality for Willy in which he refuses to accept a reality where his son is a failure. The combination of his relationship to the past and Happy's taking up his mantle create a sense that this will continue to happen in future generations of the Loman family, and that the only way out of this pattern is one that Biff took.

Response to Course Material #7

During the past few weeks, we have been mostly working on Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, with some AP writing practice, and we just started Ceremony this week with an in-class group reading and cultural education session.
To be honest, I was not at all interested in reading R&G, and didn't really enjoy it at all. After a while I warmed up to it and was fascinated by the discussion of destiny in the play, but it really just isn't my type of literature. I did learn to appreciate the sense of humor that Stoppard possesses and the work obviously has literary merit, but it was quite a slow read for me.
The AP writing practice, the most recent on a passage from Shakespeare's Henry VII in which Cardinal Wolsey laments his dismissal from the king's court, has shown me how much more I still need to improve. My skills at analyzing literature quickly and developing a good argument that I can present in a good essay are really not the greatest, but I've known that it would be something for me that takes practice. Hopefully before the end of the year I'll be able to improve a lot.
Ceremony has been great so far. I read a lot this weekend, as I drove to and from Cleveland to visit my family and had about 8 hours in the car with nothing better to do (except maybe sleep). I can't wait to find out what happens at the end of the book, and I think I've done a pretty good job of understanding what has happened up until this point. I look forward to our class discussions on this book.

Open Prompt Revision #2

Revision from Sunday, October 14, 2012 

2007. In many works of literature, past events can affect, positively or negatively, the present activities, attitudes, or values of a character. Choose a novel or play in which a character must contend with some aspect of the past, either personal or societal. Then write an essay in which you show how the character's relationship to the past contributes to the meaning of the work as a whole.

               

In Edward Albee’s The American Dream, the Young Man must cope with the brutal mutilation of his twin brother 20 years ago. This event leaves him a shell of what he appears, devoid of desire and passion, literally unable to feel due to the actions of Mommy. He loses all internal elements of what makes someone a person, having a sort of empty inside while his appearance makes him seem perfect. Through the relationship of the Young Man to his past, Albee emphasizes the condemnation of the "American Dream" and its influence on society that are the focus of the work as a whole.

When the Young Man was just a child, he had a twin brother who lived at an adoption center with him. Grandma reveals that Mommy and Daddy “bought” this twin brother, but they grew dissatisfied with it and accordingly they got rid of him, but not before punishing him through physical abuse. When he wouldn’t show Mommy the love she wanted, she gouged out his eyes, just one of many body parts that were cut off. Every time a part of the twin was cut off, the Young Man lost feeling in that area, and as a grown up man he cannot feel anything but passively lets others love him and enjoy the perfect image that they see in his appearance. This is how the mutilation causes the Young Man’s present to be different.

Another aspect of the adopted baby that is very important to mention is that in the story, he is always referred to as an object without gender. He is called a “bumble,” and referred to as “the bumble” or “it.” This has huge significance for the meaning of the play. A baby, usually a symbol of innocence and love, is turned into a commodity and used as a means for Mommy and Daddy to experience pleasure. By doing this, Albee is warning that we shouldn’t treat people like objects that we can use to fulfill our desires and then discard when they no longer serve that purpose. Relationships between parents and a child should not be about the best interests of the child or the adult, but about love between the two, and the materialism of modern society has threatened this.

The way the Albee chooses to address the American Dream is also through the use of the Young Man and his twin brother. The Young Man is called “the American Dream” by Grandma three times, and he represents the “new” American Dream as people saw it in Albee’s time. The new American Dream values things like money and the ability to earn it, as the Young Man shows when he is very interested in all things related to money. It doesn’t place any value on empathy or any sort of feeling at all, but instead allows people to love it and attribute whatever they want to it. The old American Dream, represented by Grandma, is willingly replaced by the new one before the end of the play. There is a stark contrast between the two: the Young Man’s appearance is flawless, and on the outside he contains all of the qualities that people see as positive. Grandma, on the other hand, is old, wise, and has many positive qualities on the inside that aren’t shown by her appearance. It isn’t even possible to tell if she is a man or a woman, as she implies that she really isn’t either, but possesses qualities of both. The new American Dream certainly seems better, and after everyone meets the Young Man their thoughts about Grandma are completely forgotten and replaced by this new American Dream.

In his character the Young Man, Albee created a mechanism through which he could convey his thoughts on the old versus new American Dreams, and also how the materialism in society was wrong and could lead to very disconcerting situations.

Response to Course Material #6

Since the last response to course material, we have wrapped up our discussion on Shakespeare's Hamlet, seen a ton of movies and begun our work with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead.
 
I think that I understand a couple of the themes of Hamlet really well, but that it would take a couple more reads to be satisfied with how well I know Hamlet overall. I'm certain that I would also notice many other little techniques and ambiguities that Shakespeare put into his work and that my opinions on what the truth is for each of these ambiguities would take shape (e.g: was Ophelia really insane, or was her suicide a calculated political move?
 
The film interpretations of Hamlet that we watched were interesting, some trying to be very faithful to the original and others taking on new and widely varying settings or other elements. My favorite was the 19th(ish?) century interpretation filmed in a castle, where at the end of the play Elsinore was invaded by Fortinbras as the entire castle was preoccupied with the infighting of the royalty. It seemed to fit a movie interpretation well, allowing the director to mostly stay faithful to Shakespeare while changing major details in the time period. The most modern, independent film-type version (where Polonius is a woman) was extremely odd, and didn't really help me understand Hamlet any better, but it was quite entertaining.
 
From our in-class reading of  Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, I'm not sure whether I am going to like this play. It's very different from Hamlet, but it seems to share a similar theme in the discussion of fate and destiny. As Ms. Holmes warned us, I feel like a bunch of what Stoppard is trying to say totally went over my head, but I hope I will pick up more of it as we continue working on this play.