Almost Browne Essay, Research Paper

Almost Modernism

“Words are crossbloods too, almost whole right down to the cold printed page burned on the sides.” —Almost Browne

Post modernism has been described as dealing with the fact that the meanings of words change over time. Modernism deals with thoughts, and words inside the mind, but post-modernism goes further and takes away the meanings of words altogether—the story comes more so from the mind than other styles of literature. Thus is the case in Gerald Vizenor’s short story “Almost Browne.” It starts out explaining how Almost Browne was a person’s name, and how this character got his name. His whole life, even from birth was one shortcoming after another. He was almost born to be a tribal trickster as well. The story seems to hint that his mixed blood heritage has some effect on his trickster nature, as the story calls him a “crossblood trickster” (Vizenor p. 2160). Almost seemed to have grown up with a vivid imagination, telling stories to the other Indians. He learned to read from old discarded books. Some of these were in horrible condition, so he made up the part of the story that he couldn’t read. He and his inseparable best friend somehow get into selling blank books. They were perfect together, “one the crossblood trickster, the other a white consumer.” (Vizenor p. 2160) The blank books become very successful, I guess as a trendy from of post-modernist art. The idea behind this I guess is that post-modernist belief that the story is inside your mind, not in some book. “Words are crossbloods too” (Vizenor p. 2161), one doesn’t need them to tell a story; they will change meaning sooner or later anyway, so what’s the use. Maybe the Indians knew this, and that’s why they passed on stories through oral interpretation. Maybe that’s why most of our post modernist writers this class has read about are of some Indian descent.

Bibliography

Almost Browne –Vizenor