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One Smart Indian
Paperback
First published January 1, 1977
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
July 29, 2013
John Leonard's review in the NY Times:
"One Smart Indian" is the story of Tumbling Hawk, a young Cheyenne on the verge of bravehood in the Great Plains in the decade before the Civil War. . . Mr. Seidman does not shy away from difficult narrative moments. . . These pages on Tom's* education are stunning. Culture shock becomes art; the organization of knowledge is itself a weapon and a prison. We are made to feel the edges of language, the mystery of glass, the violence of music, the terrors of perspective. . . . "One Smart Indian" is an astonishing act of empathy, imagination on a rampage. . . . Someone has taken the trouble to write a novel that is interesting without being cheap."
[*Note: After his capture by an Army Colonel, Tumbling Hawk is re-named Tom Hyde.]
"One Smart Indian" is the story of Tumbling Hawk, a young Cheyenne on the verge of bravehood in the Great Plains in the decade before the Civil War. . . Mr. Seidman does not shy away from difficult narrative moments. . . These pages on Tom's* education are stunning. Culture shock becomes art; the organization of knowledge is itself a weapon and a prison. We are made to feel the edges of language, the mystery of glass, the violence of music, the terrors of perspective. . . . "One Smart Indian" is an astonishing act of empathy, imagination on a rampage. . . . Someone has taken the trouble to write a novel that is interesting without being cheap."
[*Note: After his capture by an Army Colonel, Tumbling Hawk is re-named Tom Hyde.]
October 7, 2023
My limited experience researching Native American history has two major categories: the one before the arrival of European settlers, and the one after. An example of an author who harvested the happenings leading up to the worst for Native Americans is A. B. Guthrie, whose books The Big Sky, The Way West, and These Thousand Hills use a white-settler point of view to illuminate what the indigenous people in North America had and what they (and all of us) lost, in "the taming of the West."
In his book, Mr. Seidman chose another angle, and I have the utmost respect for him as a result. Set in the time leading up to the U.S. Civil War - again, the era Guthrie documented, when the indigenous lifestyle was decimated - his hero is a Cheyenne boy named Tumbling Hawk. Through this sensitive young man, we are immersed within "civilized" white culture, and romanced by all it has to offer those it favors. The spells disarm, charm, overwhelm, and break the boy down, but he is smart; he learns how to adapt. However, the entire world can see what's to come for indigenous people, and as an intelligent man of means, Tumbling Hawk's fate is a tantalizing question.
Mr. Seidman carries this provocative narrative through with inspired imagination, and extraordinary skill. As readers, we feel the sublime expressions of all those caught up in this unsavory destiny. Even nature tells its tale as backdrop to USA's brutal campaign to misappropriate America.
In his book, Mr. Seidman chose another angle, and I have the utmost respect for him as a result. Set in the time leading up to the U.S. Civil War - again, the era Guthrie documented, when the indigenous lifestyle was decimated - his hero is a Cheyenne boy named Tumbling Hawk. Through this sensitive young man, we are immersed within "civilized" white culture, and romanced by all it has to offer those it favors. The spells disarm, charm, overwhelm, and break the boy down, but he is smart; he learns how to adapt. However, the entire world can see what's to come for indigenous people, and as an intelligent man of means, Tumbling Hawk's fate is a tantalizing question.
Mr. Seidman carries this provocative narrative through with inspired imagination, and extraordinary skill. As readers, we feel the sublime expressions of all those caught up in this unsavory destiny. Even nature tells its tale as backdrop to USA's brutal campaign to misappropriate America.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews