I had not yet fired my piece, but not because of delicacy. “The cavalry pounded in among the lodges now, the band still playing out in the open valley where they rested.
I suggest giving it a read to make the decision– it is fantastic! Good Luck! (less) But only you know yourself, your students, your school, and the parents. If a teacher were ready to allow students to talk about these parts of the book in the context of modern culture, that would be amazing. But rape, kidnapping, prostitution, buying, selling, trading, and marrying off of women– these are peppered throughout the book with no real acknowledgment of their damaging results. I would say that given the time period in which this book was written and the time period it was written about, Berger was likely pretty progressive on this topic. There is a lot of violence in this book and many gruesome descriptions, but I think it offers a uniquely balanced view of two very different cultures– no one escapes criticism.īut what stands out to me most, in this age of information, social media, and the increasingly open conversation around rape culture and violence against women, as well as a growing embrace of feminism by men and women, is how this book handles women. In general, I think it's a wonderful read for older high schoolers, but missing opportunities to discuss how our culture has changed and how it hasn't changed would be remiss. Unless you would be ready to take on conversations about rape and rape culture with the young men and women in your classes, reading this book could be traumatizing for some of your students. Unless you would be ready to take on conversations about rape and rape culture with the young men and women in your classes, …more I would be cautious here. Part-farcical, part-historical, the picaresque adventures of this witty, wily mythomaniac claimed the Wild West as the stuff of serious literature. He dressed in skins, feasted on dog, loved four wives and saw his people butchered by the horse soldiers of General Custer, the man he had sworn to kill.Īs a white man, Crabb hunted buffalo, tangled with Wyatt Earp, cheated Wild Bill Hickok and survived the Battle of Little Bighorn. As a "human being", as the Cheyenne called their own, he won the name Little Big Man. So starts the story of Jack Crabb, the 111-year old narrator of Thomas Berger's masterpiece of American fiction. He dressed in skins, feasted on dog, loved four wives and saw his peopl "I am a white man and never forget it, but I was brought up by the Cheyenne Indians from the age of ten." "I am a white man and never forget it, but I was brought up by the Cheyenne Indians from the age of ten." So starts the story of Jack Crabb, the 111-year old narrator of Thomas Berger's masterpiece of American fiction.