Education of Little Bigot?

So I have been reading this book published as an autobiography “The Education of Little Tree” by Forrest Carter and have really been enjoying it: great wit, funny, thoughtful, eye-opening, and informative. It is a story from a 6 year old orphan’s point of view. His parents die and he goes to live with his Cherokee grandparents and learns a great deal about life and society from them; he is about a third Cherokee himself. He writes about the racist things that were said and done to his grandparents, but from his 6 year old perspective, which is wholesome and unaware of the cruelty of man. It has sold millions of copies and won the 1991 American Booksellers Association of the Year Award. Oprah even had it on her booklist for a while. Here are a few quotes and comments I have thought about or enjoyed, and then a few surprising things I found out about the author.

Much of what he talks about is the Cherokee “Way”: to only take what you need. The white mountain men kill every deer and every buffalo they see. This is wrong. The way is to take the weakest and leave the strongest to ensure that there will be many more buffalo and deer. The cougar knows the way. He takes down the smallest and weakest game because there is more chance that the strong will have offspring and support him and his offspring. This way there is always enough game to feed your family. I loved this thought. I’m sure there some hunters who will be disgusted by this, but I am thinking on a larger scale. We as a society are always looking for more, more, more: the biggest house, nicest car, flashiest watch, bling bling, best food, the list could go on forever; why can’t I be happy with only what my family and I need to support ourselves? Greed. I know I am far from innocent. Have I ever stopped eating when I have had enough to sustain myself and there is more left? Maybe once, but I was sick. I get caught up in the desire for more way too often. If our society lived by this rule think of how different our lives would be.

Politicians are responsible for just about all the killings in history. Wow, think about that. Maybe extreme… maybe not. First of course are the Hitlers, Stallins, Smuts, Husseins, Kims, and too many others who are infamous for cruelty and murder; but what about our politicians? Leaders set the tone, the standard. And when politicians set a standard of corruption, perversion, hate, and deceit, the nation follows. Look at the turn the country has taken since Bill did or did not have 'sexual relations' with Monica. If we took care of the mentally ill, if public education could prepare our youth for self-reliance, bottom line: if we really cared about each other, would crime decrease? I say yes. Are they responsible for all the killings in history? No, but I understand what he is saying and even agree to a point.

Here is a shortened excerpt where after reading I couldn’t stop laughing. His grandma makes him study words out of the dictionary and use them a few times each day:

“I had been practicing a …word so I hollered to Granpa “I abhor briers, yella jackets, and such.”

Granpa stopped and waited for me to catch up. “What did ye say?” Granpa asked.

“I said ‘I abhor briers, yella jackets, and such,” I said.

Granpa looked down at me so steady-hard that I commenced to feel uneasy about the whole thing. “What in the hell,” Granpa said “has whores got to do with briers and yella jackets?”

I told him I didn’t have no way in the world of knowing, which I didn’t, but the word was “abhor” and it meant that you couldn’t stand something. Granpa said “Well why didn’t you just say ye couldn’t stand it, instead of using ‘abwhore’?”

I said I couldn’t figure that out myself, but it was in the dictionary. Granpa got pretty worked up about it. He said the meddlesome son of a #*@% that invented the dictionary ought to be taken out and shot.”

So I have really been enjoying the book and wanted to learn more about it or the author so I google it looking for a fan site or some more information. Here is what I learn: the author, Forrest Carter’s real name is Asa Carter, and he was a freaking leader in the Ku Klux Klan!! He also wrote all kinds of white supremacy material involving segregation. Here he is making a statement about, what I perceived, is tolerance and acceptance, and the dude is KKK.

He is obviously not Cherokee, not an orphan, no Indian grandparents, grew up in Alabama, the whole story is fiction. He claimed to be part Cherokee, but there is no proof. He later moved from Alabama, changed his name to Forrest Carter, once denied that he was Asa Carter, and perhaps distanced himself from the white supremest movement. He died in 1979.

So I have two thoughts, neither of which I am happy with:

1. His intentions in writing this book were evil and he was being hypocritical of American Indian culture.

Or 2. His beliefs changed, and he felt so guilty about his white supremacy/KKK days that he was trying to make up for it.

If it’s #1 I am obviously not going to finish the book.

I believe people can change and change in drastic ways. I hope #2 is the case and he rethought his life’s path and left the miserable life of hate and contempt behind. The fact that he changed his name could have been a symbol of leaving that person behind. But why later deny who you are? And when it is made public who you really are why not declare your departure from your hateful past?

I believe that life is what you take from it. I decide what is meaningful to me and how I will interact with the world. I was taking the good from this book and loving it. But was it really good? Was it really entrenching me in a stereotype of the American Indian I already had? Since he had no experience living with the Cherokee, there is no other explanation than he did take a stereotyped image of the Indians to create this story.

I still appreciate the messages I gleaned from the book and it has affected my thinking and living to a degree, and it will continue to do so. Can I still read it without analyzing and questioning whether everything I read has some hateful message? I don't know, but if not, I am not going to enjoy it much anyway. I guess it's time to just move on.

Links:

http://archive.salon.com/books/feature/2001/12/20/carter/print.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Education_of_Little_Tree