Ceremony

The novel Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko follows a young man, Tayo through his journey beginning when he returns home to the Laguna Pueblo Reservation, from World War Two; and is very ill. During the narrative Silko introduces us to Tayo’s life before the war, which gives insight to reasons of why Tayo is ill. Through out his illness Tayo goes through many ceremonies both literally and metaphorically to try to cure his ailment. One of the ceremonies that is performed, is lead by Old Ku’oosh, the medicine man, where he performs a cleansing ceremony for someone who has killed someone in battle, even though Tayo doesn’t recall killing anyone. However, he adds that this ceremony, which he has been performing for many of the returning war soldiers, has not worked for all of them. He then recommends another medicine man with the tools to cure and perform ceremonies, for the old ceremonies, since the white man had arrived, have not been able to cure the new diseases. Along with the medicine man ceremonies he also goes to American “white” doctors, which also acts as some what of a cleansing for him. In his case vomiting is can also be used as a ceremony for Tayo because he uses it to cleanse his body of the poisons and evil, both physical illness and mental illness. The ceremonies that Tayo goes through whether traditional through a medicine man or contemporary like visits to the psychiatrist and stays in the hospital, all add to his recovery, either through physical or mental cleansing.

In the beginning of the story, Tayo is in a Veteran’s Hospital. In the hospital he felt like smoke, virtually invisible. When the doctor asked him questions he simply responded, “ sorry but nobody was allowed to speak to an invisible one.” (p.15) However, the doctor kept asking him the same question, “If he had ever been visible.” (p.15) Every time the doctor asked the smoke that clouded his vision cleared away. His visits to the doctor can be seen as the very first ceremony. It is there that the doctors are able to get Tayo to communicate with them. First he only speaks of himself in the third person. He sees himself as invisible and separate from his body. As the doctors keep talking to him Tayo starts to realize why he cries and is able to see more clearly. “ Why does he cry, Tayo?” “He cries because they are dead and everything is dying.” “He could see the doctor clearly then, the dark thick hair growing on the back of the doctor’s hands as they reached out at him.” (p.16) Once Tayo is able to realize why he is crying and vomiting he is able begin to see the world and the changes that he was going through after he came home from the war. It is important to note that the white doctors were the ones that were able to begin Tayo’s recovery because it was in fighting their war that he began to be sick. To continue his recovery the doctor thinks that it will be better for Tayo to go home and face his problems there as well.

In Tayo’s time at home his grandmother thinks that it is wise for Tayo to see a medicine man. Old Ku’oosh performs a ceremony on Tayo that is supposed to cleanse him because he has killed someone in battle. While Ku’oosh was with Tayo he expressed his concern for the men who had come back from the war. “There are some things that we can’t cure like we used to, not since the white people came. The others who had the Scalp Ceremony, some of them are not better either. I am afraid of what will happen to all of us if you and the others don’t get well. He said” (p. 38) Old Ku’oosh expressed his concern that the ceremony many not work because it was not a disease that was not from the native land or culture it was something that old cures could not fix.

A personal ceremony for Tayo that he performed regularly was vomiting and crying. “He vomited out everything he had drunk with them, and when that was gone he was still kneeling on the road beside the truck, holding his heaving belly, trying to vomit out everything- all his past, all his life.” (p.168) The reasons for Tayo’s vomiting can be a result of two ideas. One being that he is physically sick. He came back from Japan with a disease such as malaria where nausea is a common symptom. However his vomiting can be explained as him trying to cleanse himself of the war and the bad things that he saw there. He tried to rid himself of the images of the death and destruction of people and a place that had done nothing to harm him.

As well, Tayo’s crying can be seen as a release as well as an attempt to restore the life of the land. “He cries because they are dead and everything is dying.” (p.16) This can be seen as Tayo crying for the earth. He maybe was trying to find a solution to the drought that he felt like he created by going to war. His tears were possibly an attempt to cry the rain back to the reservation and bring back life to the land or to perhaps use his tears