The Pulitzer Prize winner of 1966, House Made of Dawn by Kiowa writer N. Scott Momaday, is the first title of the Literature and War Readalong 2017. It’s the first novel by an Native American or American Indian writer (I’m not sure which is the preferred name) I’ve included in the readalong. We’ll be reading another one later this year, Leslie Marmon Silko’s Ceremony.
N. Scott Momaday is a writer, poet and essayist. House Made of Dawn is considered to be the first novel of the Native American Renaissance and because it won the Pulitzer Prize it is also the first novel of a Native American that made it into the mainstream.
Here are the first sentences of House Made of Dawn:
Dypaloh. There was a house made of dawn. It was made of pollen and of rain, and the land was very old and everlasting. There were many colors on the hills, and the plain was bright with different-colored clays and sands. Red and blue and spotted horses grazed in the plain, and there was a dark wilderness on the mountains beyond. The land was still and strong. It was beautiful all around.
And some details and the blurb for those who want to join
House Made of Dawn by N. Scott Momaday, 208 pages, US 1966, WWII
The magnificent Pulitzer Prize-winning novel of a stranger in his native land
A young Native American, Abel has come home from a foreign war to find himself caught between two worlds. The first is the world of his father’s, wedding him to the rhythm of the seasons, the harsh beauty of the land, and the ancient rites and traditions of his people. But the other world — modern, industrial America — pulls at Abel, demanding his loyalty, claiming his soul, goading him into a destructive, compulsive cycle of dissipation and disgust. And the young man, torn in two, descends into hell.
*******
The discussion starts on Tuesday, 31 January 2017.
Further information on the Literature and War Readalong 2017, including all the book blurbs, can be found here.