Summary Of Green Grass Running Water By Thomas King

“There are no truths. Only stories”: The Power of Green Grass, Running Water
The novel Green Grass, Running Water (1994), written by Thomas King, serves as a reminder of the negative effects of Western imperialism. By making the Western worlds more indigenous, it provides the Eurocentric reader with a completely different world view and shows an alternative to the world of print. Green Grass, Running Water is full of historical and cultural references that challenge the reader, yet while the reader attempts to understand and evaluate them, many references go unexplained. It is then left to the reader to decipher these allusions, which proves that the purpose of the novel is to educate. Not only does Green Grass, Running Water provide an education

Throughout the novel, King tackles difficult questions, but only a narrow portion of the audience is equipped to answer them. This portion requires an Indian status, along with a mastery of Euro-American literature. However, the novel also establishes a second-tier Eurocentric reader who understands the text. Furthermore, it does grant these well-educated readers with insider status, but only to a certain degree. Additionally, Green Grass, Running Water serves as a political statement that defines the Canadian Europeans against their negative acts within history to educate these non-Native readers. It shows Canadian Europeans what it is like to be the minority, while making Aboriginals the authority. In conjunction with education, King suggests that the people with the most agency are not the Canadian Europeans, as once believed, but rather the indigenous peoples. Finally, with the use of oral storytelling, King breaks down the authority vested in print stories. He accomplishes this by retelling the creation story while also poking fun at his own “oral stories,” which are not actually oral at all. Taking everything into account, it can be said that King’s Green Grass, Running Water attempts to educate and thus begins to reorganize society in a way that benefits indigenous peoples, while poking fun at sacred Western “stories” to destabilize the belief that written texts are indeed