Postmodern Bears in the Texts of Gerald Vizenor

Abstract

Most of commentary on Gerald fiction focuses upon trickster and post-modern implications of texts; however, bears and their meaning within Chippewa (1) oral tradition and religion appear often and directly in work. Discussing famous Lakota leader Luther Standing Bear's comments on bears, Vizenor notes that the bear is an archshadow in silence of tribal stories, memories and sense that are unsaid in name (Ruins 144). If, as Vizenor often asserts, trickster is a figure in a language game, then bear is a shadow in remembered tribal stories and rituals of Grand Medicine Society or midewiwin, and this shadow looms heavily over texts. A. LaVonne Ruoff notes that Vizenor's emphasis on bear transformation is explained by that animal's role as renewer of Ojibwe life in their mide [shaman] (44). In myths and ceremonies of midewiwin bears transform, sustain, and even regulate human existence. In Summer in Spring, Gerald Vizenor tells us how gichimakwa, great bear, serves as a means to bring sun spirit to teach Chippewa about midewiwin (91-92). In rituals of Grand Medicine Society, bears serve as guides, barriers, breaker of barriers, and guardians of portals to spiritual power. Great Bear could also restore life (Vizenor, Summer 91); power of immortality and resurrection are specifically associated with orders of midewiwin. (2) There are eight orders or degrees of membership in Society: four earth and four sky (Dewdney 111-14, Johnston, Ojibwe Heritage 84, Landes 22). Basil Johnston notes that there were minor variations in different areas of land of anishnabeg (84). While first allows successful initiate to conduct funeral ceremonies and preside at Feasts of Dead (Johnston 89), fourth gives mide masters power over life and death. To go beyond fourth was considered by many a perversion of power (Dewdney 114, Landes 52). However, in his 1997 novel Hotline Healers, Gerald Vizenor protests that, shamans can be treacherous, unstable, and touchy, but only envious mistrust their visions (52). The process of becoming a mide of any resides in initiation ceremonies of various degrees of midewiwin and involves important Bear Spirit as well as other animal spirits. Candidates for initiation traditionally went through a year of preparation including vision quest, learning about spiritual and medicinal issues, and fasting. After year of preparation initiation ceremonies into these orders represent death and rebirth into a new spiritual life. As candidate makes his way around midewigun, a rectangular structure where ceremony takes place, bears represent both good and (Vizenor, Summer 93-94, Dewdney 117, Johnston, Ojibway Heritage 85-86). Good bears appear at entrance and serve as guides, but candidate also meets bears representing evil and temptation that candidate would encounter in moral order and who serve as barriers to candidate (Johnston 83-86). An offering is made to bear to purchase entrance to mide life (Landes 136). At certain moments shaman conducting ceremony as well as candidate impersonate bear (Dewdney 116). While bears can represent barriers, bear and otter are considered great breakers of spiritual barriers. According to Selwyn Dewdney, most prominent in ceremony are Bear's three hesitating steps and final successful one into midewigun (171). After testing, candidate arrives at center of lodge and is shot with a sacred shell (3) and revived, Such was dramatic way in which state of non-existence and resurrection were demonstrated. The candidate now was not what he was before, but transformed. He had been reborn (Johnston 87). The bear motifs of bears breaking barriers, of humans being guided by spirit bears, and of rebirth into a new life are central themes in works. …