his father the chief



His father, the chief

1)      The characters present in the passage are Edward Nappo, an Indian man living in the reservation of Montana, with his wife Jenny and his son. There is also an Indian agent living there, who is certainly supervising the reservation for the whites.

2)      The story seems to be set in the early 20^th century because it refers to the life of Indians in a reservation, that is to say after the last American Indian war in 1878.

3)      The expression “no longer” implies that the American government used the safety of the treaties to make the native Indians accept leaving in reservation. But now that they have all moved in, the government doesn’t respect the treaties anymore.

4)      “Land was now too valuable for bargains “ l. 2

5)      The Indian agent’s job consists in supervising the Indian reservation for the American government, and in representing it (American flag) .He is given the authority to control the rules about daily life, like entries or firearms regulation,

6)      The author mentions that the agent was not a bad fellow because his job could me misunderstood as the betrayal of his own populace. He could be seen as the one working for the enemy (the American government) who expelled them from their proper lands.

7)      Reservation Indians were not allowed to sell or consume any alcohol, to preserve their image. Moreover, they had to ask for a permit to leave the reservation and had no freedom about their moves. At last, the carrying of firearms was strictly forbidden for them.

8)      a) The sentence probably means that alcohol is a too great product for the low image people have on native Indians. The Indians may not have a good tolerance against liquor, which could make them behavior shamefully.

b) The sentence means that because the Indians didn’t have any place else to go, the question of delivering a permit to go out was rarely mentioned

9)      T he Indians didn’t needed firearms anymore because they didn’t have to hunt for food anymore, now that the American government was distributing meat to every resident of the reservation, from a little store.

10)   a) True : “a gun…the last thing his father owned that had not been burned, as is the custom, at his father’s death. » l.21-22

b) True: “as is the custom” l.22

c) False: “not much of a gun” l.23-24

11)   “Edward would now have succeeded to his father and become the chief in turn if they had not been obliged to come in the reservation, he sometimes thought himself as  the chief, when he happened to dream, and dream about him telling his son about the landed he used to know as a child, the land his son had never seen, because Jennie, the mother, had been pregnant while they were escaping south . ”

12)   On one hand, Edward is nostalgic about his ancestor’s lands and the lands he grew up in. He regrets about not being able to succeed to his father and become the tribe’s chief. By carrying a gun while it is forbidden, he is showing anger against the whites. On the other hand, Jennie seems to be resigned to their situation in the reservation by working for the whites. She is not as wistful as Edward about their home lands.

13)   Edward enjoys telling his son stories about the Indians history because he knows the boy needs it to remember where he is from. It forges his character and his childhood on what his father was taught, and on what he believed was true.

14)   When Edward tells their son stories, Jennie usually gets angry and leaves the room because she doesn’t see the meaning in reminding what the Indians had suffered through. Sometimes she stays and listens to those legends their culture used to transmit from generation to generation.

15)   In this sentence, the fact that the author uses the word “truth” and then mentions an irrational explanation for the thunder and the lightning is paradoxical.