The Star-Spangled Banner Analysis

“Because My Father Always Said He Was the Only Indian Who Saw Jimi Hendrix Play “The Star-Spangled Banner” at Woodstock,” Sherman Alexie, the author, depicts a very rare, but normal image of a Native American family. Victor, the narrator, father beat a National Guard solider during an anti-Vietnam war rally. The incident was documented, seeing that his father a Native American. In result of this incident, Victor’s father was imprisoned for two years. After being released from being imprisoned, the first thing his father did was go back to Woodstock, where he says he was he was the only Indian to see Jimi Hendrix’s famous performance of the “Star-Spangled Banner”. Many years later, Victor’s father continued to listen to the famous recording while drinking time and time over again. As years went on, Victor’s parents began to grow apart and eventually separate and get a divorce. In this story, there is a plethora of symbols of “escape,” from problems and pain in many different and unique ways in this story. Music, drinking, a

The attachments were so strong that Victor refers to Jimi Hendrix and his father as “drinking buddies." His father became wistful and dependent on alcohol after him and Victor’s mother’s marriage started to take a turn for the worse. Victor once stated, “When an Indian marriage starts to fall apart, it’s even more destructive and painful than usual” (52). The failure of his father’s marriage really took a toll on him and didn’t help with the things he had already been through, which resulted in more drinking. Victor once compared his father’s drinking problem to a traditional ceremony and that suggests the importance of drinking in Victor’s dad’s life, especially as a Native American. The “ceremony” Victor refers to is more like a routine his father follows when he would come home from a long night of