45 pages • 1 hour read
Susan PowerThe Grass Dancer
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1994A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 9-11Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 9 Summary: “Snakes”
When Red Dress is a baby, two snakes slither beside her. Her mother is terrified to see this, but the snakes do not bite the child. Red Dress is unaware of the danger and holds the rattlesnakes as if they are toys. When the snakes leave, the women realize the little one is “beloved of snakes” (240).
When Red Dress reaches maturity in 1835, her band of Sioux is experiencing the beginnings of colonization. A priest has come to convert the people, but no one shows much interest, least of all Ghost Horse, who mocks the priest with his contrary ways.
Red Dress has a dream, instructing her to go to Fort Laramie. Before departing, she climbs Angry Butte to pray. Atop the butte, she trips on two perfectly smooth, round stones. She takes them home and paints them red, “the color of life” (248).
She leaves for the fort with her brother, Long Chase, and Spotted Dog.
When she arrives, she takes a Christian identity and goes by Esther. She blends in, to a degree, with the white community. She becomes secretary to Reverend Pyke and assists with a production of Macbeth. However, life in the community changes when Red Dress places her sacred stones among weeds.
The first man comes to her, sacred stones in his hand, with a rope. Red Dress accepts the stones and winds one of her hairs around the man’s button. He then hangs himself from a tree. This process repeats twice more with different men before suspicions are aroused. Each time the stones magically “move with a purpose” (248) to the men, the men return them to Red Dress before committing suicide.
Red Dress is startled when Reverend Pyke enters her home. He says he will “unmake her” before shooting and killing her. Red Dress’s spirit follows him as he is trapped in a snowdrift. She sees the stones in his pocket moments before he shoots himself.
Long Chase returns Red Dress’s body to their family. Ghost Horse asks permission to marry her spirit and does so, keeping her spirit on earth. He tries to release her after one year but fails. Red Dress stays with Ghost Horse until he dies on the battlefield. She is heartbroken when his spirit goes directly to the ancestors. He has left the earth while she remains watching as the destruction of her people slowly progresses.
Chapter 10 Summary: “Swallowing the Birds”
In 1981, Charlene dreams Pumpkin is on her chest. She feels a weight on her heart. Pumpkin tries to speak to her, but when she opens her mouth, little birds fly out and die. Charlene gets up to walk and realizes it was not Pumpkin she felt on her chest but the grasp Mercury has on heart.
On Columbus Day, Mercury and Charlene go to the Stomp Columbus event. Charlene bakes a casserole for the potluck. There, she sees Harley, who is heartbroken over Pumpkin’s death. He appears as a grass dancer, and although he does not dance with Pumpkin’s talent, he honors her by dancing. Charlene leaves the event early. As she goes, she sees her casserole was thrown away. She drives away and wishes she could be different like Pumpkin was.
Charlene decides to use magic. She bakes chocolate cupcakes and places her eyelashes inside. She feeds them to the boys in her class, and they become enchanted in the same way as Mercury’s boyfriends. She goes with them to the abandoned house, and they spend the night touching her and doing her bidding. Charlene starts to lose her sense of identity.
She awakens to the ghosts of a white woman and Red Dress. Red Dress tells Charlene that she misused “the medicine” the same way Mercury does and that she must “give it up” (299). Charlene accedes to the spirit’s command.
A few days later, Charlene finds a newspaper clipping on her desk about a Dakota woman in Chicago who created a beadwork mural with her husband. Charlene looks at the picture and realizes these are her parents. Jeannette helps Charlene get in touch with her parents. They want her to come to Chicago. Her mother warns her not to return to Mercury’s house, so Charlene stays at school until Jeanette can help her get to Bismarck and take the bus to Chicago.
While Charlene is on the bus, she dreams Pumpkin is dancing outside the window. Pumpkin opens her mouth and the little birds come out. However, they do not die. They fly into Charlene’s mouth and release the words, “It wasn’t your fault” (310). Charlene is able to release her guilt over Pumpkin’s death and forgive herself.
Chapter 11 Summary: “The Vision Pit”
In 1982, the community is planning a powwow after the annual North Dakota Prison Rodeo. It is the year Frank Pipe and Harley Wind Soldier graduate high school. Frank is helping to set up the event. Harley appears, but unlike Frank, he is sullen. He has not been the same since Pumpkin died a year ago.
Harley leaves Frank and the arena feeling down. He does not feel like he is “interesting or talented” (319) like his friends and family. He drives to an isolated parking lot and gets drunk. He then puts on his grass dancer regalia and heads for the event.
Meanwhile, Lydia Wind Soldier is also preparing for the powwow. She has spent years recreating the dress her ancestor made, which is now held in the Field Museum. The dress is ready, and Lydia will wear it tonight. She believes that through dance she will be able to tell her son everything she cannot say with her voice.
However, Lydia does not dance with Harley after all. When he arrives drunk, his mother is ashamed. Frank takes Harley home, where he awakes the next day in Herod Small War’s pantry. Harley meets Herod, Frank, and other men for a sweat, then returns home to Lydia.
Harley decides to follow in his father’s footsteps and enter the vision pit. There, he has a vision of Dakota warriors on horseback. They take him to the medicine hole he searched for as a child. Harley enters the hole and comes out in the spirit world. He sees his grandmother, his brother, his father, and Ghost Horse. They greet him and tell him he will learn from them every time he recalls this meeting.
When Harley returns to the pit, he sees a final vision of Red Dress. She reveals to him the true meaning of the grass dancer. She tells him the outfit was once made with the hair of enemies and that the dance is one of victory in battle. She tells him, “You are dancing a rebellion” (331).
His time in the vision pit ends, and Harley hears the voices of his friends and family singing an honor song as they come to collect him. He hears a new voice among them, singing louder than the rest. He realizes this voice is his own.
Chapters 9-11 Analysis
This section begins with Red Dress’s story. The events of her life are foundational to the rest of the narrative and foreshadow the themes that appear in the storylines of future generations. Her most pivotal experiences revolve around her spirit of resistance, use of magic, and tragic romance.
Red Dress knows she is “here for a reason” (246); her destiny is decided as an infant, when two snakes curl themselves around her. The snakes do not strike her, suggesting that this occurrence is supernatural in nature. The two snakes foreshadow the two stones that Red Dress finds and uses as part of her attack on the fort. Both come in pairs, an indication of duality. In this case, this may be a representation of the duality between non-Indigenous and Indigenous cultures and the struggle between those forces. It also may represent individualism and collectivism. Red Dress must sacrifice her individual destiny with her love interest, Ghost Horse, to serve a larger collective purpose by resisting colonialism.
Red Dress’s struggles can be applied to future generations. Charlene is also trying to break free from an oppressive force. However, in her case, she must escape the domestic violence she experiences through Anna’s emotional and psychological abuse. Charlene feels rejected by her own community due to her proximity to Anna, and this contributes to her battle with alienation. When she learns her parents are alive in Chicago, Charlene begins to foster a sense of hope that she will belong to family unit that has escaped the cycle of abuse instituted by her grandmother.
When Charlene leaves the reservation, her vision of Pumpkin reflects her own hope for the future. She learns that she cannot blame herself for Anna’s actions and is ready to start life free of that guilt. When Charlene swallows the birds, she takes on a willingness to continue on for herself and for Pumpkin. She will be the voice that Anna took from Pumpkin and will live a life that will honor Pumpkin’s memory.
Like Charlene, Harley also wishes to escape from his circumstances. He first does this by dressing as a grass dancer. However, this is not a role he is prepared to fill. He doesn’t have Pumpkin’s ability to perform this role, and the dance only leaves him feeling a greater sense of inadequacy. He turns to alcohol as a means of escape, attempting to soften his emotional pain through an altered experience. However, this only makes his situation worse, causing him and his mother pain.
When Harley enters the vision pit, he is again altering his state of mind. This time, however, it is through a healthy and culturally relevant means. He is following in the same tradition as his father and many others before him. Harley’s connection to his ancestors in the spirit world gives him a sense of peace and an understanding of his place in society, his family, and the broader world. However, his vision is not complete without meeting Red Dress. Red Dress explains that a grass dancer is a warrior, someone who will rise and face the challenges set before them. With this knowledge in mind, Harley now has everything he needs to face the hardships that come with life on the reservation and with growing up. His coming-of-age journey is complete.
