Background
He was born on January 14, 1904, to an Irish father, William McNickle, and a full Cree Métis mother, Philomene Parenteau. His mother fled to Montana to escape the Metis revolution and eventually found solace in the Flathead reservation.
( These sixteen storiesten of which have not been previo...)
These sixteen storiesten of which have not been previously publishedrepresent the work of one of the most influential Native American writers of the twentieth centuryheld by many to be the most important Native Americans to write fiction before N. Scott Momaday. Birgit Hans's introductory essay provides a brief biography of McNickle, sets the stories in the context of his better known work, and provides insights into their literary significance. Together, they constitute a collection essential to an adequate understanding of McNickle and of the development of Native American fiction. CONTENTS The Reservation Hard Riding En roulant ma boule, roulant... Meat for God Snowfall Train Time Montana The Hawk Is Hungry Debt of Gratitude Newcomers Man's Work Going to School The City Manhattan Wedlock Let the War Be Fought In the Alien Corn Six Beautiful in Paris The Silver Locket
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0816513317/?tag=2022091-20
( First published in 1954 and long out of print, this nov...)
First published in 1954 and long out of print, this novel of pre-Hispanic Indian life in the Southwest combines the authenticity of an anthropological report with the suspense of a mystery novel. The author, best known as an anthropologist during his lifetime, is now recognized as a major Native American novelist. Hitherto virtually unknown, Runner in the Sun is sure to take its place next to McNickle's The Surrounded, also available from UNM Press, as a classic of Native American fiction.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0826309747/?tag=2022091-20
( A tragedy of good intentions gone hopelessly wrong, Win...)
A tragedy of good intentions gone hopelessly wrong, Wind from an Enemy Sky tells the story of the Little Elk People, a fictional Northwestern tribe. Through the eyes of Antoine, grandson of the tribal leader, we see the tribe attempt to overcome their demoralization at the hands of advancing white civilization. The Indians respond to the building of a dam by trying to gain the return of a sacred medicine bundle. McNickle's ability to depict psychologically complex characters of both races, such as Bull, the aging leader of the Little Elk, and Rafferty, the Indian Agency Superintendent, results in a convincing story and leads the reader to hope that tragedy can be averted. At the same time, McNickle provides a sensitive portrait of the religious depth and human warmth of Indian culture. But although whites and Indians grow in their understanding of one another, the mistakes of the past compound to bring about the violent final confrontation, envisioned in the dreams of the mysterious Two Sleeps.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0826311008/?tag=2022091-20
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0192181211/?tag=2022091-20
( As The Surrounded opens, Archilde León has just returne...)
As The Surrounded opens, Archilde León has just returned from the big city to his father's ranch on the Flathead Indian Reservation in Montana. The story that unfolds captures the intense and varied conflict that already characterized reservation life in 1936, when this remarkable novel was first published. Educated at a federal Indian boarding school, Archilde is torn not only between white and Indian cultures but also between love for his Spanish father and his Indian mother, who in her old age is rejecting white culture and religion to return to the ways of her people. Archilde's young contemporaries, meanwhile, are succumbing to the destructive influence of reservation life, growing increasingly uprooted, dissolute, and hopeless. Although Archilde plans to leave the reservation after a brief visit, his entanglements delay his departure until he faces destruction by the white man's law. In an early review of The Surrounded, Oliver La Farge praised it as "simple, clear, direct, devoid of affectations, and fast-moving." He included it in his "small list of creditable modern novels using the first Americans as theme." Several decades later, long out of print but not forgotten, The Surrounded is still considered one of the best works of fiction by or about Native Americans.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0826304699/?tag=2022091-20
He was born on January 14, 1904, to an Irish father, William McNickle, and a full Cree Métis mother, Philomene Parenteau. His mother fled to Montana to escape the Metis revolution and eventually found solace in the Flathead reservation.
In his early years, McNickle attended school on the reservation. Then over his own and mother's objections, he was sent to the Bureau of Indian Affairs boarding school at Chemawa for three years. He was shocked by the harsh, culturally insensitive attitude that permeated the school, preferring the schooling in Washington state and Montana. When he entered the University of Montana at the age of 17, he was drawn to the world of literature and the study of languages, including Greek and Latin. He was encouraged by one of his professors to attend Oxford.
In 1925, he sold his tribal allotment and traveled to England. Difficulty with the transferability of his college credits kept him from matriculating, and, with money running out, he moved to Paris with uncertain thoughts of being a writer or a musician. Returning to New York, McNickle took a series of jobs, including positions as editor for the Encyclopaedia Britannica and theNational Cyclopaedia of American Biography. In November 1926 he married Joran Birkeland and they had a daughter, Antoinette. During his years in New York, he periodically attended courses at the New School for Social Research and at Columbia. However, he was continually working on his writing. He finished a number of short stories and revised his novel, which was published in 1936 as The Surrounded. Joins Collier Administration When the Collier administration took over the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), McNickle joined the staff as an administrative assistant. During his 16 years with the BIA, he held a number of positions, including field representative and director of tribal relations. He was a tireless advocate of Indian rights, believing in change, but change with respect and Native initiative. By 1944 he was aware of the necessity of unified political action on the part of tribal groups. He cofounded the National Congress of American Indians to create an effective Indian political voice. In 1949 he published They Came Here First: The Epic of the American Indian, which drew on anthropological sources to chronicle Indian history and the interaction of Indians and settlers. This work initiated a series of publications that included his juvenile novel, Runner in the Sun: A Story of Indian Maize (1954), Indians and Other Americans: Two Ways of Life Meet (1959) with Harold Fey, and Indian Tribes of North America (1962). These last two books reviewed Federal Indian policy and the history of white/Indian interaction so as to explain the clash of values and cultural misunderstanding that have resulted in so much tragedy. In the early 19506 the federal government increasingly strove for the termination of tribal groups and their relocation to urban centers. McNickle did not agree with the federal goals and resigned from BIA to pursue community development work with the American Indian Development Corporation. He worked extensively in Crownpoint, New Mexico, for a number of years before he moved on to other work with students and Indian communities. He sat on the United States Civil Rights Commission and worked on leadership workshops for Native students. In 1966 he was awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Colorado. Moving from community work to academia, McNickle accepted a professorship at the new Regina campus of the University of Saskatchewan. He was given the position of chairman and asked to set up a small anthropology department. In 1971, he published a biography of Oliver La Farge, Indian Man: A Life of Oliver La Farge, which was nominated for a National Book Award; and retired to Albuquerque to work on his writing. He remained on the editorial board of the Smithsonian Institution's revision of the Handbook of North American Indians. He also agreed to serve as founding director of the Newberry Library's Center for the History of the American Indian. During his retirement, he revised two of his books and wrote numerous book reviews and entries, but most importantly he worked on his novel, Wind from an Enemy Sky. In October of 1977, he died in Albuquerque of a massive heart attack.
As a writer, historian, activist, government project manager, community organizer, and university professor, McNickle's career was as diverse as his accomplishments. His voice was heard in the halls of Congress and the halls of universities, in homes on the reservation and homes in urban America. He was an advocate for Native rights both when Indian causes were championed and when Indian rights were being eliminated. Not only was he able to speak to non-Natives about the Native world, but he talked to the Natives about the changes coming from the non-Native world. Throughout it all, he was a cultural mediator, thoroughly at home in both worlds.
( These sixteen storiesten of which have not been previo...)
( First published in 1954 and long out of print, this nov...)
( A tragedy of good intentions gone hopelessly wrong, Win...)
( As The Surrounded opens, Archilde León has just returne...)
McNickle was married three times: to Joran Jacobine Birkeland from 1926–1938; to Roma Kaye Haufman from 1939–1967; and to his AID co-worker, sociologist Viola Gertrude Pfrommer, from 1969-1977. He had two daughters, Antoinette Marie Parenteau McNickle (with Joran) and Kathleen D'Arcy McNickle (with Roma).
