Black Elk Speaks Book Report

Black Elk Speaks, is a personal narrative that tells a story about Black Elk who is a medicine man of the Lakota tribe; the book is narrated by John Neihardt and is twenty-five chapters long. Black Elk mostly talks about the visions he had when he was a young child. Black Elk explains to Neihardt that he had his very first vision when he was five years old and he says that he saw two men appeared in the sky singing a sacred song (Black Elk Speaks p.17). The second vision that Black Elk tells Neihardt about is a very detailed one that takes place when he falls ill for a few days. The vision that he had involved him seeing a highly detailed symbolic message from his ancestors. During the vision Black Elk learns from one of his Grandfather 's that

From my understanding of what I read Black Elk seems to be destined to help lead his people, but he either lacks the confidence to do so or he is afraid to do so. Thinking about the struggle Black Elk is going through when it comes to acting on his visions I believe that Black Elk, like myself had a problem taking action in situations that needs you to. For example, when Black Elk recovered from his illness people were still noticing that he was acting strange (almost like he was still sick), but the reason for that was because he was holding in the visions he had just had. I personally have had moments in my life that I needed to do something that scared me and instead of talking to someone about it I bottled it in and my friends and family noticed that something was wrong with me. I really did enjoy reading Black Elk Speaks and I do believe that this is a reading assignment that you should assign in the future. This story teaches the readers about Native American history and it also allows the reader to connect with Black Elk because he talks about some of the inner battles he faced which is something most people can relate to. In conclusion, I believe that Black Elk Speaks is a great book and it teaches the reader a lot of Native American history, and it also makes the reader look at themselves and mirror and think about past