The Ancient Child by N. Scott Momaday

"The Ancient Child" by N. Scott Momaday, copyright 1934, ISBN 0-385-27972-8, and published through Doubleday, is a story about the crisis of identity and one man’s struggle to discover his true self. Written as four books, "The Ancient Child" explores the undeniable tie to identity and the discovery of how the soul truly exists. Through dreams, visions, myths, dialogue, and thought processes the reader begins to discern the true nature of the main characters and their acquisition and acceptance of their true identity.

The story focuses on Set, a middle-aged artist living in San Francisco. Born as a Kiowa Indian, Set was adopted by a white family and moved away from the reservation. As an older man, Set finds himself losing his identity to demanding patrons and losing the integrity of his soul by bending to their every will. After the death of his grandmother, Set returns to the reservation in Oklahoma where he meets the very young and beautiful medicine woman, Grey. Grey is a free spirit that possesses a calm and wise-beyond-her-years demeanor. Often ensnared by dreams of the notorious Billy the Kid, Grey finds herself struggling to find satisfaction and purpose in her own life. Together, Set and Grey set off to reconnect with something they had lost along the way. Set suffers a mental breakdown after returning to San Francisco and is returned to Grey, who teaches him to embrace his true nature as the bear and accept his Kiowa existence (Momaday).

The story couples myth and reality as way of juxtaposing the different societies, Native American vs. Western. Also, through the use of distinct dialogical differences the reader can further gather where a character is heralding from and how they tie their identity to their homeland. In the case of Grey, she possesses one dialect when with her Kiowa family, and another when she’s with her mother and the Navajo’s.

"The Ancient Child" is truly a masterful work that combines the sweet poetic language of a dream world with ruthless punches of reality to create a story that can resound through the hearts of readers across generational and cultural boundaries. Through the use of Spanish, Navajo, and Kiowa words and phrases, the reader becomes embroiled in the world of Momaday and the depth of the lives of these struggling characters. The beauty of the world that surrounds these characters is often eclipsed by their desperation for a true and whole identity and the harshness of their realities. Delicately portrayed and profoundly thought provoking, "The Ancient Child" is truly a work of art.

Momaday, N. Scott. "The Ancient Child." New York: Doubleday, 1934.