The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian – Sherman Alexie

In Alexie’s highest-acclaimed novel, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, Arnold Spirit is a teenager living on the Spokane Indian Reservation in Washington, where everyone calls him Junior. As a baby, he was hydro-cephalic, which caused seizures, poor vision, and a perception from his peers that he was different. Most of the others on the rez picked on him, except his family and his closest friend, Rowdy. Rowdy was a tough guy and would fight anybody over anything, especially anyone who got too rough with Junior.

Beginning high school at the rez became a turning point for Junior. He got upset that the textbooks were so old his mom’s name was in them. He was suspended for throwing the book, which hit the teacher, Mr. P. During his suspension, Mr. P visited Junior and convinced him to get his education off the reservation.

Most of the Indians picked on Junior because he was different, and now they picked on him because he was a traitor for leaving the rez.

Reardon was Junior’s new school, it was twenty miles from the rez. Sometimes his dad was sober enough to drop him off and pick him up, but every once in a while Junior had to walk. He was the only Indian at the white school, and it was a rough start for him. He was half white at the rez and half Indian at the school. It took some time but Junior found his place after he realized he was as smart and athletic as anybody at Reardon. While finding himself there, he also lost some close friends and family back home. Rowdy believed he was a traitor and went for blood during the high school basketball game.

Reading this book, I was reminded of the character’s in NS Momaday’s House Made of Dawn, which focused on an American Indian’s struggle with modernization- living in the white world. It is a struggle between centuries of knowledge their family had taught them about their culture, or going outside on their own to try find a better life. A struggle of honoring ancestors to keep the culture alive or turning their back on them to leave the rez. It is a tough battle, and many on the rez didn’t fight it. They stayed and accepted life as they lived it.

The Martian Chronicles – Ray Bradbury

The early culture of space sci-fi was built on a foundation which portrayed Martians as beastly killers attacking Earthlings with no remorse. However, in Bradbury’s 1950 novel, Martian Chronicles, we have a chance to think about what really might happen. How would humans feel if Martians came to colonize Earth? Would we defend ourselves? Would we welcome the aliens with open arms and help them make a home here? Another viewpoint Bradbury explores is the human pioneering spirit. He writes about humans exploring and settling on Mars much like the US Western Expansion through the 19th century. He reveals that humans are determined to take what they want and to make the land and culture adjust to themselves, rather than adapt to the new settings.

The first few chapters had a humorous tone. The humans sent the explorers to Mars, but the first three crews were killed in defense. In a dream, a woman saw the first rocket coming, and she talked to the captain of the rocket in her sleep. Her jealous husband overheard the conversation and resolved to keep his wife away from the mysterious visitors. He made sure she stayed at home while he went for a casual walk with his hunting gun (which shot shells full of bees!). The chapter ends with two shots in the distance and the wife solemnly welcoming her husband back home.

The second crew found themselves in a frenzy of Martian paranoia. Martians had used telepathy to brainwash each other. Many didn’t care that the humans arrived and found it more of an annoyance. They sent the captain and his crew here and there until finally a smart Martian welcomes them and sends them into a room to wait for him to return. The crew was dumbfounded, how could the the aliens not acknowledge that they have actually traveled through space? This was a major accomplishment! The crew met many Martians in the room they entered and soon realized that each of the Martians was delusional. The smart Martian was a psychologist, he returned and conducted interviews with the humans and determined that only the Captain was real and the other crew members were holograms to trick those who met him. The psychologist then asked the Captain to take him to the rocket as he suspected this was also a hologram, and then he could prove that the space travel was fake. After exploring the rocket, the psychologist knew it was the best mental projection he had ever seen. The Captain’s brainwashing telepathy was unlike he had ever seen before. He knew if the simply shot the Captain the rocket and crew would disappear- but it didn’t. It was the best projection he had ever seen. Even when dead, the Captain’s brain power still made him see the rocket and crew! So he shot each crew member, and he still saw it all in front of him. The only other explanation he could think of was he, himself, was projecting the imagery, so he took his own life in an attempt to stop the delusion.

The third rocket’s crew landed in a small town on Mars. Each crew member strangely recognized the village as their own hometown. Each also happened to see a deceased loved one they recognized in their fake hometown. The friends and family they met explained that they didn’t know how they got there, but they had died on Earth and showed up there. They tried their best to make it more like home with the houses and shops familiar to them from their past life. This Captain was very leery of it all, but dropped his guard when his brother showed up and took him to visit their parents. They had a wonderful meal and the captain held his mother close and danced in the living room with her for hours. At bedtime, the two brothers lay in the same room, when the Captain had a quick thought that it might be a trick… He decided to sneak back to the ship to wait for the others. The Captain crept across the floor toward the door when the brother suddenly killed him. The following morning, the entire town of Martians held a service to bury all the dead human explorers.

Further into the book, similarities between the real pioneers and the characters in MC are more apparent. A character resembling Johnny Appleseed saw a need for oxygen production in the early days of humanity on the red planet, so he devotes himself to the task. A husband and wife build a business selling hotdogs at an intersection of two major roads. Priests believe the Martians need saved so they join the adventure and send missionaries to the planet. Bradbury said Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath was a major influence on the Chronicles and with the mass migration the states saw in the 1930s, one can find many parallels between the two works. The Martian Chronicles was a very imaginative work 70 years ago, and can still captivate audience today, making for a very enjoyable book.

The venture, Mars One, plans to turn The Martian Chronicles into reality with a mission to create the first permanent human settlement on Mars.  You can find out more here.