Hemmingways Indian Camp - Essay Example

Themes in Hemmingway’s Indian Camp The short story, “Indian Camp” by Ernest Hemmingway is a story about life and death. An old adage once said that whenever there is a birth, there is also a death. In this story, this is very much the case. The story begins and ends with a father and son as they both are experiencing birth and death at the same time. For the father, life and death are separate but he has seen a lot of it in his day. As a doctor, he would be able to help some people and not help others. The doctor during this time would not have all of the remedies that are apparent today and this would have created challenges for the doctor. For Nick, this is a coming of age story and it sets the stage for how he will look at death. The first issue that the reader sees is that the story is a coming of age story for Nick. He is being initiated into the family business as many children were during this time period. Up to this point it seemed that Nick did not see much of life other than what he had seen in his home. This was a chance for him to see what his father did as a country doctor. Nick is faced with seeing life and death at the same time, which creates questions for him. The story is also one about prejudice. The time period is a time when Indians and blacks would not have been thought of as viable. In fact, blacks did not have the vote yet and many Indians were looked at as savages. As an example, Carolyn J. Marr writes that Indian education during that time was to teach Indians to assimilate into the “melting pot of America” (par. 1) which meant that they were taught to leave their culture behind in favor of living in the way that the government sanctioned. This meant that many American Indians were sent to boarding schools or mission schools where they were taught to be like white people. By 1924, the Indian Citizenship Act provided citizenship to people who were born in the territories of the United States but prejudice still remained (UNL Libraries). This is a significant issue because the prejudice against Indians is shown by Uncle George when he is bitten by the Indian woman who has been in labor for so long. He states, “Damn squaw bitch!” (Hemmingway 2) which is a derogatory term for an Indian woman. She was delirious with the pain of the childbirth and probably did not know what she was doing. Amy Strong suggests that the Indians are a symbol of darkness in the story and that the Indians come to take the white men across from their sophisticated land to the darkness and primitiveness of the Indian camp. The fact that Uncle George offers cigars is seen as a symbol of white domination or it can be simply a gift that the white men are used to giving when a white child is born (Strong 2). Strong suggests that the reader has no way of knowing exactly what Hemmingway meant to show in this capacity. Nick is responding to all of these issues around him but one of the most difficult is that of the father’s suicide. Although his father did not want Nick to see this suicide, Nick was most interested as it was something that he was not used to and had never seen previously. Lisa Tyler states that Nick is faced with responding to women’s suffering which is something that he has not experienced. She states that he can either respond with empathy as the woman suffers in childbirth or he can ignore what he is hearing (par. 6). What is interesting is that Tyler also states that the woman’s husband committed suicide because he could no longer take the pain his wife was going through and he was responding to the doctor’s statement that her screams meant nothing. Nick is faced with understanding that there is more to what is going on but he has no control over any of it. What Nick eventually does is follow his father in ignoring what is going on instead of empathizing with the woman in the way that her husband did. In other words, Nick chooses not to die but to triumph over empathy. This seems to be the way that he wants to emulate his father and make him proud. Prior to making this decision, Nick asks several questions about life and death but as he does this, the reader understands that there is a change coming about. In the beginning of the story, Nick comes with his father as a naive young boy. As he continues through the story and is exposed to death, the innocence of his youth begins to disappear. It is as though he has gone through a metamorphosis leaving some of his innocence in favor of something more appealing. Throughout the story he is digesting and understanding the issues around what is happening. He first sees a woman who is in excruciating pain. His father only explains that she has been sick for several days, but he does not tell him the entire story. As a doctor in training, Nick’s father leaves the entire situation up to Nick’s own interpretation. Nick does not want to end up as the Indian father who commits suicide, but he also must take into account all of the things that are happening around him. By the end of the story, he understands more about life and death in general and he has decided to stand up against it. This aspect shows the naivete of youth again because he thinks he has control over what can happen to him. In the last words of the story, Nick is contemplating what happened and Hemmingway states: “In the early morning on the lake sitting in the stern of the boat with his father rowing: he felt quite sure that he would never die.” (Hemmingway 5). This sets the pace for other stories about Nick that Hemmingway eventually wrote. In conclusion, as stated previously, the short story, “Indian Camp” by Ernest Hemmingway is a story about life and death. It is also a story about a boy who is learning to deal with death. Nick in the story has never gone with his father to watch what his father does and on the first time he goes with him, he sees death very personally. He is able to follow in his father’s footsteps and leave his emotions to decide that he will not die. He has no intention of dying. Of course, he is a young boy who does not have life experience so the reader expects that he may feel this way in the situation. Nick is also a boy who has learned from his grandfather that Indians are different than he is as a white boy. This theme plays a small part in the process of the story, but it is overshadowed by the fact that Nick must face death to see what it does to people. For Nick, Indians are no different than he is because they still have problems like other people. He is faced with this and he understands that at least for this time, he has a choice to make and that choice is not to die. References Hemmingway, Ernest. “Indian Camp.” 1924. 13 October 2011. < http://www.nbu.bg/webs/amb/american/4/hemingway/camp.htm> Marr, Carolyn J. “Assimilation through Education: Indian Boarding Schools in the Pacific Northwest.” Digital Collections University Libraries, University of Washington. 13 October 2011. < http://content.lib.washington.edu/aipnw/marr.html> Strong, Amy. “Screaming Through Silence: The Violence of Race in 'Indian Camp' and 'The Doctor and The Doctor's Wife.' Short Story Criticism. Ed. Janet Witalec. Vol. 63. Detroit: Gale, 2004. From Literature Resource Center. Tyler, Lisa. 'Dangerous Families' and 'Intimate Harm' in Hemingway's 'Indian Camp.' Short Story Criticism. Ed. Jelena O. Krstovic. Vol. 117. Detroit: Gale. From Literature Resource Center. UNL Libraries. “Native American Citizenship 1924 Indian Citizenship Act”. 13 October 2011. 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