Blooms Literary Themes - THE TRICKSTER.pdf - ymerleksi - home

92
N. Scott Momaday
(Momaday, HMD, 40). As Velie points out, “Th e Jemez have taken the
saint’s life, with its obligatory miracle, and transformed it to conform
with the chief genre of their own sacred literature, the myth of origin
with wondrous deeds by a trickster acting as culture hero” (325). Th e
relevance of Santiago as trickster is huge for the culture of Walatowa—the
myth enabled the tribe to integrate their own beliefs with
the Catholicism imposed upon them by Spanish conquerors, so that
their principal religious festival, the Festival of Santiago, celebrates
their own heritage even more than the conqueror’s religion because
Santiago is remembered more as trickster than saint.
Even the protagonist is a candidate for trickster. For example, as
Velie notes, Abel plays the role of the trickster as buff oon during the
Santiago festival (325). When the killing and dismemberment of the
rooster is re-enacted by an albino, Abel is the one he chooses to strike
with the dead rooster. Although that action is part of the ritual, Abel
mistakes it for a personal assault and kills the albino for the aff ront.
Th ough Abel possesses many trickster behaviors, such as his drunkenness,
fi ghting, and outsider status, he does not qualify as a trickster
because Trickster tends to be an agent of change, an active manipulator
of events, while Abel is almost always a victim.
Th e most prominent candidate for trickster in House Made of
Dawn is John Big Bluff Tosamah because of his appearance, manner,
words, and, most importantly, his role in Abel’s healing. Th is priest of
the Los Angeles Holiness Pan-Indian Rescue Mission exhibits his
trickster qualities from the moment of his fi rst appearance:
Th ere was a ripple in the dark screen; the drapes parted and the
Priest of the Sun appeared, moving shadow-like to the lectern.
He was shaggy and awful-looking in the thin, naked light: big,
lithe as a cat, narrow-eyed, suggesting in the whole of his look
and manner both arrogance and agony. He wore black like a
cleric; he had the voice of a great dog. (HMD 90–91)
To begin with, Tosamah joins other Native American tricksters typically
identifi ed with animals. Moreover, as Lewis Hyde points out,
“Trickster is the mythic embodiment of ambiguity and ambivalence,
doubleness and duplicity, contradiction and paradox” (7). Tomasah is
both catlike and doglike. His manner juxtaposes both arrogance and
agony. Although he is the priest of the sun, he moves “shadow-like.”