Traditional Literatures of the American Indian ed. by Karl Kroeber, and: Karok Myths by A. L. Kroeber and E. W. Gifford (review)

320 Western American Literature or fate or human nature. Natural forces are not seen as a backdrop for our activities, but as the source of our humanity. Deal looks at western Nebraska as if it were her spiritual encyclopedia possessing the age-old secrets of serenity and creativity. KATHARINE W. COHEN, Murray, Kentucky Traditional Literatures of the American Indian. Edited by Karl Kroeber. (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1981. 162 pages, $16.50 cloth, $5.95 paper.) Karok Myths. By A. L. Kroeber and E. W. Gifford. Edited by Grace Buzaljko. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980. 380 pages, $25.00.) In a refreshingly lucid and cogent introductory essay, Karl Kroeber (son of the distinguished anthropologist A. L. Kroeber) presents a convincing brief for bringing to bear upon Native American texts in translation the full panoply of literary criticism. His basic argument is that Indian narratives often need critical attention that lies outside the province of anthropologists and folklorists. Heeding Alan Dundes’admonition that native materials need to be tackled on the three interacting levels of texture (verbal form), text (a single telling of a tale), and context (the specific social situation), Kroeber includes in this fine collection both texts and interpretations by four other well known interpreters: Jarold Ramsey, Dennis Tedlock, Barre Toelken (with Tacheeni Scott), and Dell Hymes. Consequently, the reader is pre­ sented five different ways to recognize artistry in American Indian narratives. Nonspecialists are bound to feel sensitive about constructing hypothetical relations between literary elements of traditional native texts which were collected mainly by folklorists and anthropologists. But Kroeber insists that the same fate obtains for any critics who seek to understand the great literary texts in their own tradition. He offers his own essay and four others as sup­ porting evidence for “cut and try” methods. Jarold Ramsey’s presentation and analysis of a beautiful Orphic story from the Nez Perce persuasively articulates the intricate structuring of a dramatic tale that recurs in many cultures but has few if any artistic peers to its native version. Dennis Tedlock analyzes the interpenetration of Zuni storytelling and interpretation. He suggests that the Zuni reciter in fact is necessarily a reviser, whose art thus requires a sophisticated critical procedure worthy of a Paul Ricoeur or Martin Heidegger. Barre Toelken, with assis­ tance by Tacheeni Scott, elucidates the enormously complex interaction between story, storyteller, and audience, wherein the story serves to bring together a “critical mass” of Navajo perspectives, touching off a profound vicarious experience. Finally, Dell Hymes treats a linguistic subtlety in a Clackamas text in a way that makes us all recognize that superior literary Reviews 321 works characteristically require precise attention to aesthetic orderings of language for their full elucidation. Thus, the volume not only convincingly argues the case for nonspecialist involvement but demonstrates how some contemporary practictioners open the door to a fuller comprehension and enjoyment of traditional native literature. As an introduction, Kroeber’s prefatory essay is exemplary. As guides, all five critics persuade one that they have found a clear way through the difficult terrain of an alien literature. We, too, are encouraged to set about learning to travel on the various paths of native reality. Karok Myths is a companion volume to the elder Kroeber’s Yurok Myths published in 1976. A most unusual volume because it contains two distinct collections of Karok folklore, one from A. L. Kroeber early in the twentieth century and the other from his colleague Edward Gifford nearly forty years later, the collection makes available valuable materials previously accessible only in the archives at Berkeley. Since both men made their collections from Karok-speaking informants and then translated them into English (usually aided by bilingual Indians), the two collections coexist comfortably and yet give some sense of the changes in the lives of these upper Klamath people wrought during the first four decades of this century. Sometimes the tales in the two parts are told by the same informant. Many are nearly identical stories told and retold for many hundreds of years. All in all, they represent a rich field for cultural and literary analysis. In his commentary, the eminent folklorist Alan Dundes says that this publication...