German Heritage and Culture in Louise Erdrich's The Master Butchers Singing Club

Authors

Thomas Austenfeld, North Georgia College & State University

Date of this Version

2006

Document Type

Article

Comments

Published in GREAT PLAINS QUARTERLY 26:1 (Winter 2006) Copyright © 2006 Center for Great Plains Studies, University of Nebraska–Lincoln.

Abstract

Reid's discussion of the formal properties of Erdrich's work helps explain the author's popular appeal. Mewing easily between urban and rural settings, between reservation culture and mainstream culture, Erdrich has been evoking the various sets of social and historical circumstances that define the lives of contemporary Native Americans in the Great Plains. In The Master Butchers Singing Club (2003), Erdrich turns her attention explicitly to her own part-German ancestry and fictionalizes it, thereby bringing a n element of both thematic and autobiographical relevance into prominence.