medicine walk essay topics

Themes of Medicine Walk

We contemplate our thoughts and writers’ ideas by reading the writings of history’s most fascinating minds. Reading is a practice in empathy or walking in someone else’s shoes for a moment, and it trains our imaginations to dream big. Character, setting, theme, and world perspective are essential considerations for all fiction writers. While these components determine whether a novel succeeds or fails, historical fiction has the added task of bringing the past to life. Richard Wagamese is regarded as a significant stylist in contemporary American literature. His style is full of emotions and is developed substantially through the use of phrases, and it is characterized by short plain structured sentences and colloquial language. Richard’s novel Medicine Walk illustrates his enthusiasm for life and the pursuit of adventure, as well as the themes of loss, connection to nature, and the importance of stories.

The literary theme in the novel Medicine Walk is the central idea and the underlying meaning Richard explores in the novel. The theme expresses the truth about human behavior and thought in a way that words cannot. It allows the readers to empathize with the characters and their hardships and become emotionally invested in the ending. The theme of a work of fiction is its perspective on life and how people act, but it is not provided directly to the reader; instead, it is designed to teach the reader. Medicine Walk is a literary fiction that tells the narrative of Franklin Starlight, an unusually mature 16-year-old who an elderly family friend raises after being abandoned by his drunken father. On the other hand, he enjoys the virtual peace of not dealing with his immediate relatives.

Medicine Walk themes are essential because they are the story’s reason and idea. Franklin’s journey toward acceptance and forgiveness of his drunk father, a journey that begins to heal the traumas of a parentless childhood, is symbolized by the title medicine walk. The theme of loss is just one of the many parts that make up the story, exemplified by the protagonist. The central characters in Medicine Walk are confronted with significant losses, to which they respond in a variety of ways. Eldon Starlight has suffered several losses, one of which is his estrangement from his mother, also his greatest friend.

Eldon’s love, Angie, dies in labor due to neglect, and she was killed in the Korean War. Eldon’s drinking impacts his wife since it contributed to her death. “She had a chance if she had made it here in time” (222), the doctor explains to Eldon as he approaches him as Eldon drinks to cope with his losses. Bunky, on the other hand, copes with the loss of Angie by deciding to raise her kid, Franklin, because Eldon is unqualified to care for him. “He said he would raise ya cuz he owed Angie,” Eldon says when he initially brings Frank to Bunky’s farm. I did not get it, so I asked him, and all he did was stare down at you for the longest time. Then he said she “brought him back to life.” Bunky copes with his loss by giving Frank life the same way that Angie had given him life.

On the other hand, Franklin must bear all of these losses, including his father’s death. “Sometimes when something gets taken away from you, it seems like there is a hole at your center where you can feel the wind blow through,” Bunky says as Frank returns home from burying his father. “I always went to where the wind blows,” (170) he tells Frank, to cope with his loss. The novel implies that genuine love often leads to significant losses through the relationship between love and sadness. As a result, people react to grief in different ways: accepting the loss, which leads to increased love for others, as in the case of the older man, or resisting it, which leads to increased anguish, as in the case of Eldon.

Franklin’s relationship to nature is another central theme in the story; due to Bunky’s upbringing, he is at ease in nature, which provides him with peace and a link to his ancestors. Both Eldon and Bunky have suffered traumatic losses, but while Eldon reacts by turning to alcohol, he respects his loss by rearing Franklin. For both Frank and the old guy, nature is a source of comfort and security. The countryside of the land in British Columbia is nearly a character in and of itself, where the land is the kid’s closest companion aside from the old guy. He defines the open land as a “genuine location where a person can learn to see properly—whether by pursuing an animal for hours through the forest or simply understanding the rhythms of it” since it is “free from artificial structures like a school rather than childhood hobbies” (290), he finds calm and contentment.

Regardless of Frank’s academic challenges, the older man teaches him to cherish what is true, as the terrain had become what the old man referred to as accurate by the time they got down the other side. Eldon has never been able to connect with nature in the same way for the majority of his life, and he suffers immensely as a result. Because he struggled to live as a child, Eldon does not have Frank’s attachment to nature. His family was very busy looking for jobs to hunt and live off the land, so he spent his time in the woods salvaging wood to sell. As a result, he spent his life bouncing around from place to place, never settling down.

Medicine Walk is based on several different memories and story threads. The central theme follows the little boy traveling into the wilderness with Eldon’s dying father. Along the way, Frank recalls experiences from his childhood bond with his father, and the father, more importantly, reveals memories from his own life. Eldon only has the father’s stories to pass on to the child before he dies, and Frank only has his mother’s stories, who died before he was born. When the child contemplates his father’s stories, he finds it challenging to piece together disparate memories. He tells the older man his father’s stories when he returns home following Eldon’s death, as he repeats the rhythms of their life together.

The Medicine Walk novel indicates that no one’s stories are their own and that people’s self-understanding is dependent on the stories others tell them. It is based on the kid’s process of hearing his father’s stories and hesitantly absorbing them into his life that Eldon spends his life avoiding levels because they remind him of his sad background. Storytelling is crucial to being a whole person. It not only has an emotional impact on him, but it also hinders him from opening up and chatting to others. Frank loved the stories his mother told him by candlelight as a boy, but the stories attracted a lover who abused her and drove Eldon out of his mother’s life for good. Eldon begins to believe that stories only bring suffering due to this, and he begins to hold his own stories inside and becomes quiet about them.

Though he opposes it, Angie begins to influence Eldon’s perspective on stories, and he takes a long time to act on it. She observes Eldon’s inner monologue and advises that hearing a narrative “takes you back to a story you have been carrying for a long time.” (280). Frank gives Bunky the entire narrative of Eldon’s life at the end of the book because Eldon is no longer alive to tell it himself. It indicates that Frank has absorbed Becka’s lesson—that people are, in the end, their stories—and has recognized the importance of tales in the healing process. Hearing Eldon’s experiences have given him a more profound sense of wholeness, and he now offers Bunky the same opportunity, bringing things complete circle.

In conclusion, Medicine Walk is a deliberate period set aside for delving deeply into a particular subject, entering a condition of profound listening, and connecting with nature as a powerful mirror. Through the channel of open time and spontaneous travel in a natural setting, Richard’s characters in Medicine Walk novel urge the readers to examine their relationship with nature and the characters’ life paths. The three main themes in Medicine Walk, love and loss, connection to nature, and the concept of memories and stories, all exhibit this

Works Cited

Wagamese, Richard.  Medicine Walk: A Novel . Milkweed editions, 2015.

Cite This Work

To export a reference to this article please select a referencing style below:

Related Essays

Futuristic civilizations presented in mad max: fury road, and prometheus, merriam-webster word-courage, synthesis essay; are zoos ethical or not, how is indigenous feminism expressed through art, power dynamics in “cat person,” “the green ribbon,” and “the husband stitch”, origins of protest music, popular essay topics.

• American Dream
• Artificial Intelligence
• Black Lives Matter
• Bullying Essay
• Career Goals Essay
• Causes of the Civil War
• Child Abusing
• Civil Rights Movement
• Community Service
• Cultural Identity
• Cyber Bullying
• Death Penalty
• Depression Essay
• Domestic Violence
• Freedom of Speech
• Global Warming
• Gun Control
• Human Trafficking
• I Believe Essay
• Immigration
• Importance of Education
• Israel and Palestine Conflict
• Leadership Essay
• Legalizing Marijuanas
• Mental Health
• National Honor Society
• Police Brutality
• Pollution Essay
• Racism Essay
• Romeo and Juliet
• Same Sex Marriages
• Social Media
• The Great Gatsby
• The Yellow Wallpaper
• Time Management
• To Kill a Mockingbird
• Violent Video Games
• What Makes You Unique
• Why I Want to Be a Nurse
• Send us an e-mail

Medicine Walk Novel Unit & Literature Guide

Products in this Bundle (2)

Description.

SuperSummary’s Novel Unit and Literature Guide for Medicine Walk by Richard Wagamese delivers text-specific, classroom-ready lesson plans and thought-provoking assignments divided into Before, During, and After Reading sections, plus a comprehensive summary and full literary analysis of the text.

Follow our suggested timeline in the complete teaching unit or choose from our rich array of prompts, quizzes, activities, paired resources, essay topics, and two graphic organizer worksheets for processing and analyzing the text. Review and plan more easily with our literature guide’s in-depth summary, plot and character or key figures and events analyses, important quotes, and more. 

Note : The Unit is provided as a Word document for convenient reformatting and rearranging.

Before Reading

• Context Questions and/or Activities  
• Personal Response Prompt 

During Reading

• Reading Check and Short Answer Response questions with Answer Key
• 6 recommended Texts for Pairing and Other Student/Teacher Resources
• 2 robust, ready-to-use Text Processing and Important Quotes Worksheets—found at bottom of the unit

After Reading

• Discussion/Analysis Prompt
• In-depth and Engaging Activity 
• 6 Differentiated Essay Questions
• Cumulative Exam with 15 Multiple Choice and 2 Long Answer Questions with Answer Key

✏️ How to use:

As either a supplemental teacher material or as a primary basis for an entire unit on a literary work, this resource equips teachers to:

→  Draw students in with an enriched sense of pre-reading context.

→  Utilize thought-provoking warm-up prompts and in-class analysis opportunities involving free-writing or discussion. 

→  Ensure deeper understanding and true enjoyment of the literature with activities that engage all learning types.

→ Stretch students’ critical thinking and writing skills with strategic and probing essay topics that offer an entry point for every reading level.

→ Assess their knowledge with pertinent during-reading quizzes, a post-reading prompt, and a final exam.

→ Provide students with a structured framework in which to build analytical skills with the optional character, theme, and quote worksheets.

To support lesson-planning, connections to the work’s primary themes are noted in bold throughout this resource .

LITERATURE GUIDE

Delve into the easy-to-navigate 34-page guide for chapter-by-chapter summaries and analyses on Medicine Walk by Richard Wagamese . Build rich lesson plans using our comprehensive analyses of the book’s multiple themes, symbols, and motifs, such as “The Nature-Human Continuum” and “The Dangers of the White Man's World”.

Featured content also includes:

• Commentary on major characters or key figures
• 25 important quotes with accompanying analysis
• 10 thoughtful essay topics for writing or discussion

✏️ How to use: 

Created to provide a thorough review and to support students’ deep understanding of Medicine Walk , our literature guide quickly refreshes teachers on important plot points or events throughout the work as well as essential themes, symbols and motifs. The contents of the guide provide a strong framework for helping students understand the underlying meaning of a work of literature.

Questions & Answers

Supersummary.

• We're hiring
• Help & FAQ
• Privacy policy
• Student privacy
• Terms of service
• Tell us what you think

Medicine Walk

By richard wagamese.

• Medicine Walk Summary

The novel begins with 16-year-old Franklin Starlight riding into town to see his alcoholic father, Eldon Starlight . Eldon has been absent for most of Frank’s life. Frank is Ojibway and Cree, but has mostly been raised by his white foster father, referred to as the old man. When Frank arrives in town, Eldon informs Frank that he is dying of liver failure from his years of alcoholism. Eldon asks if Frank will take him into the backcountry to be buried the warrior way: sitting upright and facing east.

Before the journey, Frank reflects on the life he’s lived with the old man. The old man has always been more of a father to Frank than Eldon has, and for the longest time, Eldon believed the old man was indeed his father. The old man taught Frank how to hunt, how to give thanks to the animals he hunted, and how to honor the land. The old man taught Frank everything he knows.

Frank agrees to accompany Eldon, and the two begin their journey. They leave the town of Parson’s Gap, British Columbia, and travel to the bush. Along the way, Eldon begins to tell Frank stories from his past—stories Eldon has never shared with another person before. Eldon tells Frank about his mother, Frank’s grandmother, who was a wonderful storyteller. Eldon tells Frank about laboring in work camps when Eldon was younger, and about Eldon’s best friend Jimmy who worked alongside him. Eldon’s mother was trapped in an abusive relationship with Eldon’s foreman, Jenks, and Eldon was forced to abandon his mother. Frank becomes angry when he hears this story, feeling as though he was robbed of a grandmother.

During their journey, Frank and Eldon come across the house of Becka Charlie . Becka is Indigenous and white, much like Frank and Eldon. Becka cares for Frank and Eldon, gives them food, and gives Frank advice about Eldon. Becka tells Frank that all anyone is, in the end, is their stories, and then Becka sends Frank and Eldon along with some medicine to aid in Eldon’s alcohol withdrawal.

The stories continue as father and son travel, with Eldon becoming weaker along the way. Eldon describes how he signed up for the Korean War with Jimmy. While in the trenches, Jimmy made Eldon promise to bury Jimmy in the warrior way if Jimmy died. Eldon promised. Jimmy was shot in battle, and Eldon was forced to finish Jimmy off so as not to give their position away. Eldon also had to leave Jimmy’s body on the battlefield, and so he was unable to bury Jimmy in the warrior way. After the war, Eldon began drinking heavily, and soon developed an alcohol problem.

Eldon’s stories are interspersed with Frank’s memories of Eldon during Frank’s childhood. Frank learned Eldon was his father when Frank was seven years old. Eldon was always drunk when Frank came to see him, and one time Eldon had sex with a woman when Frank was in the room. On Frank’s 10th birthday, Eldon promised to stay sober, but ended up getting very inebriated secretively. Eldon was unable to keep his promises to Frank due to the severity of his alcoholism.

In the present, Eldon nears the brink of death. His body is shaking from withdrawal, but the medicine Becka gave Frank and Eldon helps to ease Eldon’s pain. The final story Eldon tells Frank is the story of Frank’s mother, Angie Pratt . Angie was a Cree woman Eldon met in a bar. Eldon also met a man named Bunky, and a week later Bunky offered Eldon a job at his farm. Angie was romantically involved with Bunky at this point. Eldon agreed to take the job.

Eldon built Bunky a fence over the course of a few weeks, and during this time Angie and Eldon began sleeping together. Eldon also got sober during this time. Bunky discovered their affair, and Eldon and Angie admitted that they loved one another. Angie and Eldon left Bunky’s farm. The couple found an old cabin, began fixing it up together, and Angie got pregnant. Eldon began drinking again during Angie’s pregnancy because he was ashamed of his past and fearful of being a father. Eldon was at a bar when Angie went into labor, and consequently, Angie got to the hospital too late. Angie died, but their son, Frank, lived. Eldon brought a week-old Frank to the old man, Bunky. Bunky agreed to raise Frank out of his love for Angie, but he despised Eldon and blamed him for Angie’s death.

After the story of Frank’s mother, Eldon passes away in the night. Frank buries Eldon like he asked, in the warrior way. Frank is unsure if he forgives Eldon for being a neglectful father at the end of the novel. Frank returns to the farm with the old man, and the two eat dinner together. In the final scene of the book, Frank walks out onto the land. In the space between sunset and darkness, Frank sees the ghostly shapes of his ancestors on the land. Frank raises his hand to his ancestors, and heads back to the farmhouse.

Medicine Walk Questions and Answers

The Question and Answer section for Medicine Walk is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel.

Why did frank had to come back to Nechako On pg:173?

What chapter are you referring to?

Medicine walk

In chapter 17, the story catapults back into the Korean War, where Jimmy and Eldon sit in the trenches.

Please tell me a one good question about Medicine Walk By Richard Wagamese from pg: 169-210.

Study Guide for Medicine Walk

Medicine Walk study guide contains a biography of Richard Wagamese, literature essays, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis.

• About Medicine Walk
• Character List

• Ask LitCharts AI
• Discussion Question Generator
• Essay Prompt Generator
• Quiz Question Generator

• Literature Guides
• Poetry Guides
• Shakespeare Translations
• Literary Terms

Medicine Walk

Richard wagamese.

Ask LitCharts AI: The answer to your questions

Sixteen-year-old Franklin Starlight —referred to as “the kid”—saddles his old mare for a trip over the mountains to the mill town of Parson’s Gap, British Columbia. His father Eldon has asked him to come, but he doesn’t know why. His guardian, the old man , warns him that his father will be very sick, perhaps dying, and reminds him that Eldon is dishonest.

When the kid reaches Parson’s Gap, he finds his father in a broken-down rooming house. Eldon takes the kid out for dinner and reveals that he wants the kid to take him into the backcountry to bury him there. (His liver is failing after years of hard drinking.) He also wants to tell the kid about his past, because it’s all he has to give. The kid isn’t sure at first, since his father has drifted in and out of his life and feels like a stranger to him. It was the old man (his guardian) who’d taught him how to survive school, to track and hunt, and to love the land. However, he agrees to the plan. Soon the men and the mare are headed into the mountains with a small pack of supplies.

On their first night in the wilderness, Eldon is impressed with Frank’s skill in setting up camp and fishing. He begins talking about himself, telling Frank that his parents, Frank’s grandparents, were half white and half Ojibway. They spent all their time traveling from job to job and didn’t have time to learn wilderness survival. He tells Frank they’re out here in the woods because he “owes” his son.

Frank thinks back to his earliest memory of Eldon, when he was almost six. Eldon had stayed at the farm briefly, leaving some money in a jar for the kid. The old man had explained that Eldon is someone he used to know very well, and that he drinks because things have gotten so broken inside him that they’re hard to fix. About a year later, Eldon returned and told the kid that he was his father, then disappeared again.

On the second day of their journey, Frank helps Eldon up a steep trail to a cliff that’s covered with sacred Indian paintings. He’s always loved coming here to sit and think about what the pictures mean and what they might reveal about who he is. Eldon says he was always too busy trying to survive to think about “Indian stuff.” That night, they take shelter in a cabin with a half-Indian woman named Becka Charlie . Though Eldon finds Becka to be nosy and critical, he softens when she guesses why he’s traveling West in order to die and be buried in the “warrior way”—it’s an effort to die with honor. Becka’s words prompt Eldon to tell Frank the story of his childhood.

After Eldon’s father died in the Second World War, he began traveling and working wherever he could in order to provide for his mother. Eldon became best friends with Jimmy Weaseltail , who became like a member of the family. One summer, the friends became accomplished logrollers in British Columbia, working under a foreman named Jenks . Before long, Jenks became intrigued by Eldon’s mother and started having meals with the family; then he and Eldon’s mother began sleeping together. Within a month, Eldon saw evidence that Jenks was abusing her. When he and Jimmy caught Jenks in the act, Jimmy attacked Jenks, nearly killing him. Eldon’s mother defended Jenks and told the boys to run. Eldon never saw his mother again.

Frank calls his father a coward for never going back; it has cheated him out of a grandmother and deepened his sense of not knowing who he is. As Eldon sleeps, however, Becka suggests that Eldon was brave to tell what most would rather forget, and that our stories are all we are.

The next day, when the kid and his father continue their journey, they cross paths with a juvenile grizzly. Frank succeeds in confronting the bear. Later he tells Eldon that out here in the wilderness, you just do what you have to in order to survive. Soothed by the herbal medicine Becka gave them, Eldon tells Frank to pour out his remaining whisky.

The kid recalls traveling to Parson’s Gap when he was nine to see his father. The old man accompanied him. They found Eldon in a crumbling rooming house, dancing drunkenly with a woman. Before he and the old man left in anger, Frank told his father that he didn’t know anything about having a father, except for what Eldon showed him through his actions.

The following year, for his tenth birthday, the kid visited Eldon by himself. At first, things looked promising; Eldon was living in a tidy boarding house and even planned a birthday outing for his son. After a blissful afternoon of fly-fishing, however, Frank discovered that his father had been sneaking whiskey the whole time, breaking his promise. Frank (an experienced tractor driver) was forced to drive his drunken father home in the pickup. A couple years later, Eldon promised to visit for Christmas. When he failed to show up, Frank was furious with himself—after all he’d witnessed, he should have known better than to hope.

The following day, Eldon’s condition worsens. By evening, he and the kid arrive at a ridge Eldon had hoped to reach. The valley is filled with a beautiful turquoise river and ringed with snowcapped mountains. Eldon visited this place once before, and it’s the only place where he ever felt as though he fit. That’s why he’s chosen to die here. He begins telling Frank a story he needs to hear—of how he once killed a man.

In 1951, Eldon and Jimmy enlisted in the Royal Canadian Regiment to fight in Korea. More loyal to Jimmy than to the war effort, Eldon committed himself to becoming the best soldier he could be. Sitting in a trench outside Busan, Eldon swore to Jimmy to make sure that if he got killed, he’d receive a warrior’s burial. Soon after, they were sent on a reconnaissance mission, and Jimmy got fatally wounded. Knowing his screams would give away their position, Jimmy signaled to Eldon to kill him. Eldon stabbed his friend to death, and his body was never recovered, so Eldon was unable to keep his promise to bury Jimmy. He’s never admitted this story to anyone before.

The next morning, Eldon is worse, but he’s determined to talk to the kid about one more thing: Frank’s mother. After the war, Eldon was in bad shape, drinking to forget his memories and working odd jobs in Parson’s Gap to afford his binges. One day, he was drinking at his favorite dive, Charlie’s, when he noticed a graceful, long-haired woman dancing to the jukebox. An older man, who introduced himself as Bunky, sat down with Eldon and admired the woman, Angie , too. When Angie’s dancing partner, Dingo , bullied a weaker drunk, Bunky stood up to him. Soon Angie joined their table, and Eldon fell in love with her. However, she was attracted to Bunky.

A week later, Bunky drove into Parson’s Gap and hired Eldon to put up 10 acres of fencing on his farm; Eldon stayed on the farm for a couple of weeks. Angie was living there now, too. Each day, Angie brought him lunch and told him about her life, and in the evenings, Angie told Bunky and Eldon stories she made up on the spot. Eldon grew increasingly attracted to Angie, and she hinted that she felt the same, but he resisted opening up to her. He could see how much Bunky loved Angie, and he felt guilty about his own feelings—all the more since he’d stopped drinking.

On Eldon’s last day on the job, Angie visited him in the pasture, and he finally opened up to her a little. They ended up making love in the field. That night, Eldon, guilt-ridden, tried to avoid everyone, but Angie climbed to his loft, and they made love passionately. Bunky discovered them and was furious. But after Eldon and Angie admitted their love for one another, Bunky wept brokenly. He told Eldon that if he and Angie were going to build a life together, he must treat her right, or Bunky would come and find him. He gave them the keys to his truck and some cash and told them to be gone before he returned.

Eldon tells Frank that for the longest time, he kept his promise and didn’t drink. For the first time, he even felt he could settle down contentedly. But the following fall, Angie found out she was pregnant with Frank. Eldon’s fears of inadequacy awakened the old darkness in him; he believed he was destined to destroy everyone he loved. He began drinking in secret to cope with his fear and shame. One night, Eldon drove home drunk from a tavern and discovered Angie in an agonizing breech labor. He got her to the hospital, but she died as the baby was delivered. The doctor said if he’d gotten home in time, she might have lived.

Eldon believed that his loving Angie had killed her, and he feared he would hate Frank because of this. In the only deed he was ever proud of, Eldon brought Frank to Bunky (who, he confirms, is the old man) when Frank was a newborn. Though Bunky was devastated by the news of Angie’s death and blamed Eldon, he loved Frank instantly and quickly decided to raise him for Angie’s sake. After telling Frank this, Eldon is spent. He overlooks the valley one last time, moaning “I’m sorry.” That night he dies in his sleep.

The next morning, Frank buries his father in the traditional warrior way. When he gets back to the farm, he sees himself in the old man’s working rhythms and smoothly rejoins the comfortable home routine. After telling Bunky Eldon’s whole story, Frank also tells Bunky that Bunky has always been a father to him. That night, he overlooks Bunky’s land and imagines he sees a traveling band of Indians waving warmly to him, making him feel connected to an ancestral line he’s never known. Then he goes back to the cabin where the old man is waiting for him.

• Quizzes, saving guides, requests, plus so much more.

Medicine Walk

73 pages • 2 hours read

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapters 1-2

Chapters 3-4

Chapters 5-6

Chapters 7-8

Chapters 9-12

Chapters 13-15

Chapters 16-17

Chapters 18-21

Chapters 22-23

Chapters 24-26

Character Analysis

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Discussion Questions

Chapters 1-2 Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapter 1 summary.

Eldon summons Frank to Parson’s Gap, a nearby mill town where Eldon works odd jobs. Bunky cautions Frank against the trip due to Eldon’s unreliability. Although Eldon abandoned Frank as a baby, Frank believes he has a duty to Eldon, his biological father. Frank starts his journey on horseback. Although Frank is only 16 years old, he is a capable hunter and trapper who understands how to survive alone in the wild. Frank is a silent and solitary boy who, after learning more from nature than from books, has dropped out of school: “He was Indian. The old man said it was his way and he’d always taken that for truth” (5). Frank camps for the night, smokes a homemade cigarette, and wonders why his father summoned him.

Chapter 2 Summary

Related Titles

By Richard Wagamese

Indian Horse

Keeper'n Me

One Native Life

Ragged Company

Featured Collections

Audio Study Guides

View Collection

Canadian Literature

Indigenous People's Literature