Almanac of the Dead

by Leslie Marmon Silko

Book Overview

"To read this book is to hear the voices of the ancestors and spirits telling us where we came from, who we are, and where we must go." --Maxine Hong Kingston

From critically acclaimed author Leslie Marmon Silko, an epic novel about people caught between two cultures and two times: the modern-day Southwest, and the places of the old ones, the native peoples of the Americas

In its extraordinary range of character and...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0140173196
• ISBN13: 9780140173192
• Release Date: November 1992
• Publisher: Penguin Books
• Length: 768 Pages
• Weight: 1.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.8" x 5.5" x 8.2"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

Never recieved it....

I bought the book but instead of recieving the book i purchased i was sent a completely different book that i have no interest in reading. Wow smh

The American Ulysses

This novel is one of the great novels of the 20th century--IMHO. It ranks with Joyce's "Ulysses" in dissecting a culture, this one of North America (sans Canada). There are lessons here, and the writing cuts to the bone. Not F. Scott Fitzgerald or Ernest Hemingway, to be sure. More like an extended take by Flannery O'Connor from a Native American perspective. To read (and re-read) "The Almanac of the Dead," "Under the Volcano," (Malcolm Lowry) "Wise Blood," (O'Connor) and "Moby Dick" (guess who) is to obtain a comprehensive view of America from the underside. And the underside, as Carl Jung was at pains to point out, is where the collective unconscious is at work.

Native Reality Check

I am a Native American woman, and I found this book empowering, depressing and very raw. I can see people that I know in the characters in the book as well as having had some of the same experiences. The book gives a realistic glimpse of a small population of Native American experiences. It shows how hard our world really is, and how Natives struggle through their lives knowing that there is no alternative. This book shows the other, real side to the "noble savage" myth.

Novel Might not be the Best Term for this Book

In much the same way that her brilliant and beautiful 1st novel Ceremony is intended to function as a ceremony for its readers, Almanac is intended to function as a a prophetic document. Silko's text is inspired by, and meant to serve as an extension of, ancient Mayan codices--books which keep exact and detailed record of Time and attempt to prophesy based on this knowledge. Time is as much a character in this "novel" as the Land is. Of course, Silko doesn't lay all this out for her reader, but the clues are there. The ancient notebooks that old Yoeme leaves in the hands of the twins Lecha & Zeta are directly inspired by & directly refer to the codices. Twins themselves are of mythological significance in Mayan (and many other Southwestern) cosmologies. Almost every Native American character in this novel can be read as a mythological being in disguise. They all have dual functions, especially the female characters. Silko has said that the anger which can be so overwhelming in her text does not come from her. She sees herself as more of a conduit for a much more ancient and dangerous rage. What began as a project about the seedy underbelly of Modern Tucson quickly transphormed itself to a work of mythological scope and political indictment. This novel is demanding, complex, and mind-blowing in scope. It is by no means a casual read, nor is it sympathetic towards its reader. It requires things of you that typical novels don't. It even demands you abandon your theory of what a novel is and does. But if you are willing to follow Silko's narrative & thematic trails, the vision she reveals for you is truly astounding. Silko's next novel, Gardens in the Dunes, was written, she says, to reward all of us who braved and withstood the onslaught that is Almanac of the Dead. It is true that those who make it through this book develop a bit of an obsession with it. Approach this text with this in mind, and you might make it to the end. But be prepared to return immediately to the beginning--you'll never get the scope of Silko's vision in one read.

An excellent book...

Wow, what a concept...we finally have a Native American stream-of-consciousness novel! Enough of these white-man's dreams like The Tunnel or Gravity's Rainbow, we finally are letting some other voices tell the other side of our sorry travels.Dense. Jumpy. And a few things you might wish you never read. But most of this novel is gripping and, quite sadly so, possibly the truth. If you've read the white man's tales listed above then you really should check this trip out.

prettysnake says, sssssuper book Sssssssilko!!!!

Not nearly as complex as some would like to make it. The "land" interacts with people to manifest its spirits. Those who are "cut off" from the land, become alienated and "alien." 500 years is not so long in the grand scheme of things. What is yet to come is what has been before, a people who are shaped by the spirits of the Americas.Her novel might not make some people "happy." It certainly isn't your romantic "Indian story" (that so many people seem to want). The lives it depicts in fiction aren't far from the convoluted inner workings of some of the indigenous movements here in the Americas (the Zapatista, AIM, etc.) nor from the "cultural elite" who rot in their penthouses in the monuments of Western civilization.It might not be an "easy" read, but it is certainly an engaging one, and a well-crafted one. Highly recommended.