FNAT 101 RECONCILIATION: IS IT POSSIBLE?

Presenting Drew Hayden Taylor

• Curve Lake First Nation (Ojibway)

• Playwright, columnist,

essayist, storyteller • 10 published plays • His work is widely

anthologized • 17 titles in Mal-U’s

library

Someday• Only Drunks & Children Tell

the Truth is a sequel to Hayden Taylor’s Someday

• Annie Wabung has dreamt all her life of re-uniting with her eldest daughter, who was taken away from Annie as a new-born

• At 35 Gracie returns home to Otter Lake during Christmas and then leaves in an emotional storm

Freytag’s Triangle

Topics & Themes • To say that “ODCTT is

about loss” is an insufficient theme statement. Why?

• Making a theme statement requires a thoughtful interpretation of what the artist might be commenting on with his work.

• A close examination of the interaction between the characters in Drew Hayden Taylor’s play Only Drunks and Children Tell the Truth, may lead to a deeper understanding of the broader discussion about authenticity, acceptance and identity.

Authenticity Markers

• The minutia of daily life for Janice Wirth is up for comment & subsequent assessment about what is authentically native about her identity.

• “She’s not as white as you thought”

• The trouble with Rodney is that he thinks like a white person. His heart is native but his brain needs a good tan.”

• “Sometimes you’re just too Indian”

Acceptance • .

• Barb is full of blame verbally ‘barbs’ Janice for:

• Running away at Christmas• Being raised away from

their home • Representing the ‘ideal’• Janice accepts Barb’s

invitation to return home to pay last respects to Annie, after she finds out that Tonto is a kind of kindred spirit in that he too was adopted

Identity • Janice Wirth began

life as Grace Wabung• Scooped & raised in a

non-Native family • Barb came looking for

her sister Grace• What is a name

“Wirth”? • Amelia Earhart

becomes Amy Hart

• Janice is all the family that Barb has left

• Janice protests being called Grace throughout the play, until she gets drunk with Barb—indicating a recognition of her relationship with Barb and Annie

• Is it true that only drunks and children tell the truth?

When Thinned w/Alcohol, Blood is Thicker than Water

• If experience is any indication, alcoholics can be the biggest and best liars. What is the larger message behind the title?

• Is Identity an abstract concept? Re-read the play and contrast Barb’s identity with Janice’s and/or Tonto’s identity with Rodney’s.

Recalling Benton-Benai

• For many, “what is left by the trail” is really in our own bodies, in our blood memories

• In what ways does this play illuminate the concerns of Benton-Benai?

• Journey to find “what our people left by the trail” as signs to guide our future lives

• We need to journey to find the centre of ourselves – reason for being

• Lack of knowledge of ‘our story’ diminishes us as a people