Alexie, Sherman. (2007). The absolutely true diary of a part-time Indian. New York: Hachette Book Group. ISBN-10:0-316-01368-4. p. 229
Genre: Fiction/Multicultural
Interest Age: 14+
Curriculum: Literature Class, Multicultural Studies
Reader’s Annotation
Junior Spirit leads something of a double life: Half-White when he’s at his mostly white high school; Half Indian when he’s at home on the Reservation.
Plot Summary
Junior Spirit is a 14 year old Native American kid living in poverty on the Spokane Indian Reservation. Born with “water on the brain” and numerous other physical ailments (a big head, poor sight, etc…) which make him the target of constant bullying from not only kids his age but just about everyone else on the “rez”; his family is dirt poor, his father is an alcoholic, his mother suffers from depression, his sister does nothing, and Junior feels buried in a sense of hopelessness. To try and escape the cycle of depression, alcoholism, and hopelessness, Junior decides he wants to go to school off the reservation, with the white people. For this, he is branded a traitor by the entire tribe including his best friend. Junior becomes an outsider not only at his new school where he is the only other Indian his classmates know is possibly Tonto from the Lone Ranger, but also at home.
Junior deals with his daily struggles with leading a sort of double life with a self deprecating, witty, and sarcastic sense of humor and by drawing the people in his life.
Critical Review
In Junior Spirit, Sherman Alexie has created one of the most off-beat and intelligent characters in the YA Fiction genre. The laundry list of struggles that Junior must face on a day to day basis (e.g. alcoholism, racism, poverty, and prejudice from both white people and his tribe) sets the stage for what could be a soul crushingly intense story; but Alexie writes Junior with such a sarcastic, self deprecating wit that the reader can’t help but laugh at Junior’s situation. Junior’s first illustration of himself as the glasses wearing, lopsided, shaking nerd exemplifies how he chooses to deal with his struggles, the humor. The writing and especially the illustrations done by cartoonist Ellen Forney make the Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian a hilarious read, as well as a enlightening and touching one.
Through humor, Alexie addresses many sensitive issues concerning modern Native American and reservation life. He skillfully addresses heartbreaking issues of poverty and alcoholism which are rampant on many reservations; he laments the self destructive nature of his people (Alexie himself is Spokane/Coeur d'Alene Indian); racism and prejudices of both the white people Junior goes to school with and the members of his tribe at home on the reservation are masterfully dealt with.
Humor and tragedy surround Junior Spirit’s life and Alexie blends the two so subtly that the reader may find themselves laughing on one page and choking up the next. If it can be said that comedy and drama are two faces of the same coin, Sherman Alexie has found a way to balance the coin on its edge without having one side obscure the other.
Author Info
Sherman Alexie was born in 1966 on the Spokane Indian Reservation in Wellpinit, Washington (where Diary of a Part-Time Indian is set). Alexie has garnered critical acclaim for his stories about contemporary reservation life. Alexie’s early life on the reservation was characterized by poverty and alcoholism. He was an exemplary student and attended Gonzaga University on Spokane. After struggling with alcohol abuse himself, he transferred to Washington State University. Here he began writing and received a Washington State Arts Commission poetry fellowship.
In 1992, Alexie had his first collection of poetry and short fiction published. The Business of Fancy Dancing is filled with themes of “despair, poverty, and alcoholism that often pervades lives of Native Americans of reservations”. He went on to publish numerous novels Reservation Blues (1995) and Indian Killer (1996), the short story collection The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven (1993), and several collection of poetry including First Indian on the Moon (1993) and Old Shirts & New Skins (1993), War Dances (2009) and Face (2009) His YA novel The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007) won a National Book Award.
"Sherman (Joseph), (Jr.) Alexie." Contemporary Literary Criticism Select. Detroit: Gale, 2008. Literature Resource Center. Web. 13 May 2010.
Book Talking Ideas
1. How does Junior describe life on the reservation?
2. What are the differences between the school on the reservation and the school at Reardan?
3. Who are the most important people in Junior’s life? Why?
Challenges
The book has been challenged several times. In 2008, the book was pulled from a Freshman English class curriculum after a father complained that the book “had a lot of references that I didn’t feel comfortable with.” The main issue was the short passage referring to masturbation.
The book also contains some profanity. Issues of alcoholism, child abuse, and racism are also discussed.
Dake, Lauren. (2008). “School yanks book from class after complaint”. The Bulletin. Retrieved May 13, 2010 from http://www.bendbulletin.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081211/NEWS0107/812110432/10 41&nav_category=
Why I choose this title
It is an award winning book that deals with important issues that teens face every day: fitting in, racism, romance, friendship, etc. It also explores a culture of which few teens are knowledgeable or even really aware of.
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