April Raintree Character Analysis

The central motif of April Raintree is one of identity. For many years, the main character April, tries to repress the truth regarding her true cultural background as she tries to live a different lifestyle, that of a white person. April spends her time running from the past, from love, and acting unacquainted with her cultural background. For the time being her identity is dubious and cryptic. Only when April reconciles her past wither present after her sister Cheryl tragically commits suicide, does April come into direct conscious conflict with herself and her true identity be found. Once April has found her identity, her chance at finding genuine happiness will be a promising dream. Although April Raintree did in fact find her true identity,

April’s identity crisis began as a small child, growing up in Winnipeg Manitoba, where she resided with her mother, Alice, a clean and quiet woman stemming from an Irish and Ojibway background, her father, Henry “who was mixed blood, a little bit of this, a little bit of that, and a whole lot of Indian” (p.11). April’s sister, Cheryl, who is eighteen months younger and takes after their father in regards to skin tone, while April is pale like her mother, Alice Raintree. The family of four survived from government assistant cheques. The sisters mainly lived off of bread and butter, and rested their heads on a cot that smelled of urine every night while their parents, Alice and Henry, drank “medicine” with their friends, which was in fact alcohol. Alice and Henry would drink on any occasion, regardless of their daughters being present. Fights would happen, fists would be thrown and infidelity would be an occurrence. As the older daughter, April, felt it was her duty to watch over Cheryl in a motherly way, in spite of April being just a small child herself. In the year of 1995, Mrs. Grey, a social worker entered the Raintree household with the