Basic Facts:
-Written by Leslie Marmon Silko
- 1977
Setting: Pueblo Reservation, New Mexico
Important Characters:
Tayo- He is the main character in the book, he is half Native American and half white. He had to go to fight a war against the Japanese and came back very sick.
Rocky- He is Tayo's best friend growing up, Tayo watched him die that changed him forever and game him severe PTSD. He was the one in the story that didn't look down on "white" culture and actually enjoyed it.
Auntie- The person who raises Tayo because his mom is not around. She is
more superficial than the other characters and pays more attention to
what people think of her over anything else. She is the mother of Rocky
who died in the war.
Emo- His name in itself is a horrible thing, his real name is Geronimo which is like Hitler to the native Americans. Tayo ends up killing him, he pretty much stands for everything evil in the book.
Symbols:
-The atomic bomb (symbolizes a false hope)
-Grandma ( sometimes called thought women)
-Emo (witch/evil)
Theme: In Ceremony Silko suggests that good and evil exists in everything and are therefore meaningless classifications; understanding this allows one to achieve a personal balance.
Explanation of Theme: Through the book Tayo both has good and evil in him, so do all the other characters as well. The important thing that Tayo has to learn is it is the balance not the classification, he must fight the evil inside him to be successful.
Hi Kate,
ReplyDeleteYou have the start of a good post here, but I feel like you have a lot more work to do before it will be useful to you. You're missing a lot of important characters, and the author bio section is also lacking. I think it's important to note that, like Tayo, Silko is also of mixed races -- that seems like it may have played a role in her framing of the story.
You also probably need to go more in depth with your explanation of the theme. Can you provide examples of how Tayo has both good and evil in him? How does Tayo realize that balance is important? You need to have proof to back up any claims you might want to make about the theme of this book.
I think you could have a good post if you spent a little more time on this!