"Born With A Tooth" was a fairly common Native surname where I used to live in Lethbridge, Alberta, but even so -- and I'm not eager here to make myself sound like some dumb wasichu who is condescendingly charmed by nature-based naming practises -- but even so, I always found hearing or reading that name to be jarring; maybe because it refers to something not quite natural? Maybe it hints at some innate power that is inaccessible to me? There must be something universally compelling about the name for Joseph Boyden to have used Born With A Tooth as the title of this fine collection.
These thirteen short stories run the gamut from funny to serious to tragic, and if they have a common theme, it would be that Native Peoples are at a crossroads: having lost their traditional learning through generations forced to attend Residential Schools, the youngest Band Members on the Reserves need to decide, moving forward, whether they will try to reconnect with the old ways (with drumming, dancing, sweat lodges) or whether they should embrace -- or at least adapt -- the dominant culture (with bingos, casinos, going away to college). What Boyden does especially well is to populate these stories with fully human characters: there are the damaged drunks and gas huffers, but there is also an all-Native/all-girl punk band, an activist who works within the legal system to stop the damming of a river, and a girl who falls in love with a wolf. There are quiet scenes about nature and loud scenes about anger and grief; and surrounding it all, are the tricksters and the windigos; shapeshifters and Gitchi-Manitou; as though, even if the people have become disconnected from the ancestors, those ancestors are still around and watching.
Some standout scenes include the mute Painted Tongue, old and homeless and drunk on a Toronto street, being surrounded by a group of young white men:
These thirteen short stories run the gamut from funny to serious to tragic, and if they have a common theme, it would be that Native Peoples are at a crossroads: having lost their traditional learning through generations forced to attend Residential Schools, the youngest Band Members on the Reserves need to decide, moving forward, whether they will try to reconnect with the old ways (with drumming, dancing, sweat lodges) or whether they should embrace -- or at least adapt -- the dominant culture (with bingos, casinos, going away to college). What Boyden does especially well is to populate these stories with fully human characters: there are the damaged drunks and gas huffers, but there is also an all-Native/all-girl punk band, an activist who works within the legal system to stop the damming of a river, and a girl who falls in love with a wolf. There are quiet scenes about nature and loud scenes about anger and grief; and surrounding it all, are the tricksters and the windigos; shapeshifters and Gitchi-Manitou; as though, even if the people have become disconnected from the ancestors, those ancestors are still around and watching.
Some standout scenes include the mute Painted Tongue, old and homeless and drunk on a Toronto street, being surrounded by a group of young white men:
I will count coup on you, baseball cap motherfucker, Painted Tongue hummed. The tones of his war chant came to him. I will take a knife and cut your scalp from your skull for calling me Iroquois. I will rip your ears from your head and eat them in front of you. He let his head drop, dangling the bottle. The boys backed away a little.
Lookit that! He's got attitude, one of them shouted as they formed a circle on the sidewalk around him.
Painted Tongue began to pace slowly around the inside of the circle. He felt a warrior's control suddenly, all eyes upon him, watching closely his every move. When Painted Tongue walked by one of the boys, he stared at the boy's eyes until he recognized the wolf spider of fear in them. He walked carefully, slowly by their feet, watching their faces pass his. The boys widened the ring. Painted Tongue concentrated on his own feet moving. He picked up the pace. He could hear the pound of drum in his head. The boys began clapping in time. Check it out, one said. He's on the warpath.
Painted Tongue reached out and touched each boy as he passed. He counted coup upon every single one in the group and watched the look of shame and disgust on their faces as they shrank away from his outstretched hand. He was happy. He was a warrior. He moved faster, bent far forward, lifting his knees high. He closed his eyes and danced the circle. It was effortless, like a strong wind lifting him up and carrying him.
And I'll cut that scene off while Painted Tongue is at the height of dignity. My other favourite scene was from the story Kumamuk. This story hit all the right notes: about the excitement of having "pro wrestlers" (or at least, wrestlers that the Reserve has watched on TV) come to fight in their community center, it beautifully demonstrates the relationships between those on Reserve and those from away; the relationships between the generations (and those who have embraced the white man's church vs those oldtimers who still believe in vision quests); about hero worship (and false heroes when it's revealed that Chief Thunderbolt -- naturally, everyone's favourite Native wrestler -- is actually Puerto Rican); but mostly, about a young boy whose enthusiasm and joy are universal. That he kind of accidentally had a vision quest, and that his vision animal was a flock of butterflies, was a beautiful scene. And when he attends the final wrestling match with his grandfather:
This was Noah's chance. He pulled the stocking he'd carefully painted in the bright colours of the butterfly from his coat pocket and pulled it over his head, adjusting it so he could see through the little holes he'd cut for eyes. He tore off his coat and kicked off his jeans to reveal the costume he'd created, ran from his seat and pulled himself onto the side of the ring. He quickly scrambled up the ropes and balanced himself on the top turnbuckle, lifting his arms wide to reveal the cape he'd painted orange and red and green, the wings of the butterfly. His wings. "I'm doing it" was all he could think. His ears were filled with the roar and rush of his blood, with the butterflies whispering to him, "You're doing it!" Beneath his cape Noah wore another pair of his mother's pantyhose, these ones black like a butterfly's body, and pulled up to his chest.
For the first time he could hear the crowd. He could make out Thomas' and Gerald's voices in the shouting. Some of the women screamed. Others were laughing with excitement. Noah looked across the ring at the awestruck face of Kid Wikked. He raised his arms higher for the crowd to drink in his costume and shouted, "I am Butterfly Warrior!"
With his back still to Noah, Diesel Machine was still completely unaware of his presence. Noah looked down at Chief Thunderbolt. The Chief looked surprised. He slowly, haltingly raised his arm from the mat and gave Noah a thumbs-up. Noah tensed, then leapt.
It's a cliché, but my heart soared with Noah, and throughout this book, I identified with the characters, and no matter how terrible their situations, Boyden created understanding instead of pity.
Not all of these stories were my favourites (Men Don't Ask, Shawanagan Bingo Queen, and Legend of the Sugar Girl in particular didn't work for me), but the final four -- as four perspectives on a tragedy -- were outstanding. What I most appreciated was Boyden ending on a note of hope: as the hundred-year-old patriarch of the Cheechoo clan regards his relatives engaging in a solemn drumming circle, he thinks, And I began to feel something good that I'd not felt in a long time.
Not all of these stories were my favourites (Men Don't Ask, Shawanagan Bingo Queen, and Legend of the Sugar Girl in particular didn't work for me), but the final four -- as four perspectives on a tragedy -- were outstanding. What I most appreciated was Boyden ending on a note of hope: as the hundred-year-old patriarch of the Cheechoo clan regards his relatives engaging in a solemn drumming circle, he thinks, And I began to feel something good that I'd not felt in a long time.
I didn't want to say it on goodreads, but the only time I ever heard or saw the surname "Born With A Tooth" would have been in connection with some petty crime -- and the name did come up often enough, and like I said, it was kind of jarring. I googled the name before I wrote this review and found this person: Milton Born With A Tooth, an activist who went to prison for diverting the Old Man River so that it couldn't be dammed (and flood the Peigan burial grounds). There's obviously something wrong with a world where flooding Native burial grounds in the name of progress is a good idea; where imprisoning someone for preventing it is normal. These two facts associated with the name -- the petty crimes of mostly hopeless drunks and the selflessness of true activism -- couldn't be unknown to Joseph Boyden and can only underscore how thoughtful a writer he is; this is the crossroads where these stories converge.
Also, the character of Painted Tongue is such a reminder of my own Uncle Allen, who spent his final years as a homeless drunk on the streets of Toronto; someone who would have looked Native enough to attract the special kind of scorn that these young white men heaped upon Painted Tongue; yet, someone without any Native history or traditions to fall back upon. Would Allen (and for that matter, his twin brother Alvin) have turned out better if he could have fit into one or the other (Native or white) world better? No small wonder that my own Dad pretty much disavowed any Native heritage.
