“Life Is a Poem”: Oral Literary and Visual Arts of the Northwest Coast

Abstract

Elder Nora Marks Dauenhauer, Kheixwnéi, a poet and oral literary scholar and a mentor of the author, told the author “Life is a poem”. This essay will explore the ways in which the oral literary and visual arts of the Northwest Coast interact, how artists across multiple disciplines attain knowledge and develop as artists, and the ways in which the arts sing the poetry of Tlingit life. Examining the relationship between the arts will deepen one’s understanding of each art and illuminate how they inform and enrich one another.

My conception of Indigenous art—in particular, as I will discuss here, the literary and visual arts of the region where I live—comes from my Elders. I was raised in the “Raven Creator Bioregion”, as my father, Tlingit poet and scholar Andrew Hope III, aptly named the Pacific Northwest,1 given the proliferation of Raven stories in the area, of the Raven who transformed the world into its present form. I am also informed by the intellectual traditions of the surrounding peoples, as I am Tlingit and Inupiaq, and I have learned from many Elders across what is now known as Alaska, Canada, and the Pacific Northwest of the United States.

Nora Marks Dauenhuaer, Kheixwnéi—distinguished poet, a cherished Elder, a teacher of mine, and half of the editing team of the seminal “Classics of Tlingit Oral Literature” series (her husband Richard Dauenhauer, also a close teacher of mine, was the other half. See Figure 1)—told me that “Life is a poem”. As I sought advice from her, she also told me, “The things you want to do in life, do it now”. She was an Elder in her eighties at the time, while I was a college student in my twenties, figuring life out. She also told me, “The thing to do is to listen to the old people. They’ve been through it. All of it”. I hold on to her wise sayings like they are precious jewels. Life is a text of beauty, of wonder, of drama, of tragedy, of joy, of delight in its creation, unfolding before us, a beautiful text we are living within and writing as we live. When we write poetry, when we carve, when we paint, when we weave, when we compose songs, when we learn the arts of singing, dancing, oratory, storytelling, they reflect and emanate the poetry of life.

It is often remarked that Northwest Coast visual arts depict the crests of the clans and tribes who commission and own the works, and that visual artists must know the crest origin stories in order to adequately depict the crests. This is true, yet much of Native Northwest Coast visual arts scholarship betrays a lack of understanding about the oral literary arts. Visual arts scholars may rarely cross paths with oral literary scholars, yet both arts inform and enrich one another, and understanding of each will illuminate the other. Northwest Coast visual arts scholars may nevertheless speak to and illuminate areas of concern to the oral literary scholar, such as history which culls from many sources including interviews and histories told by Elders. Examples of astute Northwest Coast art history include Emily Moore’s (2018) Proud Raven: Panting Wolf: Carving Alaska’s New Deal Totem Poles, which examines the contributions of totem carvers for the Depression-era Civilian Conservation Corps, and which highlights contributions from previously overlooked master carvers; and Megan Smetzer’s (2021) Painful Beauty: Tlingit Women, Beadwork, and the Art of Resilience.

Both the visual and the oral arts utilize basic forms—the oral formula, discourse pattern, and theme, for example, on the one hand, and the so-called “ovoid” (the eye design) and “u-forms” (“kóon t’aawú”, “flicker feathers”) on the other—and both could utilize such building blocks and form them into high art. In fact, this occurs with great regularity.

Following Nora’s advice, I try to live my life like a poem. Every day after I wake up, while I get in 45 min to an hour of jogging, I usually listen to a podcast—I like The Fight with Teddy Atlas—or an audiobook, such as biographies on boxers and artists and some classic novels by the likes of Gustave Flaubert and Fyodor Dostoevsky. Then, I listen to recordings of Tlingit Elders while looking out into the sky with my apartment window open. I have been recently listening to the stories of Robert Zuboff, Shaadaax’ and A.P. Johnson, Íxht’ik’ Éesh, two genius storytellers. I also spend much of my time with my children, and I try to teach and share with them about our way of life, about artists, about oral and written literature. I am currently writing curriculum and curriculum resources for the Douglas Indian Association, which includes a lot of transcribing and translating Tlingit texts. I am also writing articles on Northwest Coast art. Finally, I am editing a book of the magnificent stories of Shaadaax’. During the day and night, I get some reading time in, with physical texts, as much as possible: publications and books on Northwest Coast art and oral literature, and literary classics and biographies. I am slowly making my way through the novels of Fyodor Dostoevsky, so I am “reading” his works both through audiobooks and with hard copies. I also read aloud to my children, both Western and Indigenous oral literary classics.

When I walk outside, at my home of Dzantik’ihéeni and the neighboring island, X’áat’k’táak (which have only recently been given colonial place names)2, for grocery shopping or checking the mail, I see the beautiful “Four Stories Totem” by Haida master carver John Wallace (1940),3 and the modern masterpiece, the “Harnessing the Atom” pole by Tlingit carver Amos Wallace (1967. Also, Amos and John bear no relation). Occasionally, I make it inside the State Office Building to spend time with the Waasghu totem pole by Dwight Wallace (Figure 2),4 who was John’s father.5 The Waasghu pole is one of the world’s sculptural masterworks. It emanates monumentality, as if the great spirits of Haida Gwaii, with a rainforest full of huge cedar trees, and with the great ocean surrounding it, were captured in sculptural form. I continue walking, recalling the history in each direction. I think of the places of historical importance: the migrations down the Taku River; the settling of the Áak’w and T’aakhú Khwáan territory; the establishment of clan houses, including the Wooshkeetaan Xeitl Hít, Thunderbird House which held the magnificent Xeitl Xh’éen, Thunderbird Screen, painted in the early 20th century by the great artist James Rudolph, Kushxeet; and of Sheep Creek Mary—relative and a clan sister of Rudolph, each of the L’eeneidí clan—and her caretaking of the creek in the middle of Mt. Juneau, from which she was named. There are many, many histories and places, of events ranging from many thousands of years ago to recent times, which come to mind as I walk through town.

As I vacuum my apartment, sort groceries, bring in and water a new plant, and use a lint remover on my wool jacket, I think of the old stories, and they enrich daily life. Paul John was a master Yup’ik storyteller who taught young people how to live through storytelling. He was an Indigenous philosopher. In 2015, I invited him to Juneau. I was organizing a seminar with my good friend and colleague, the late Cherokee Nation scholar Sol Neely, at the University of Southeast Alaska. Sadly, Paul John became ill and died before the conference. I had heard about Paul John through his highly accomplished educator-scholar daughters, Agatha John-Shields and Theresa John. Though I never met him, I got to know of his beautiful mind through his profound stories, in Stories for Future Generations/Qulirat Qanemcit-llu Kinguvarcimalriit: The Oratory of Yup’ik Elder Paul John, edited by Anne Fienup-Riordan and translated by Sophie Shield (2003).

Paul John’s genius story, “The boy who was taken away by the bladders”, tells of a boy who lived among the seals, who appeared to him in human form. The seal people taught him the proper ways of thinking and of building habits as a hunter. The seals live just like people, who live in an underwater qasgiq, a dome-shaped community house made of sod and driftwood. They can observe people through their skylight, a hole covered with a bladder at the top of the qasgiq. The seal people instructed the boy as they observed other humans, who showed either destructive or productive habits, habits which would influence the success of their hunt. In one of the beautiful passages of instruction, the seal tells the boy to clear the pathway outside of his home because of its ramifications on hunting:

And sometimes some snow would land on top of the qasgiq they were staying in. You know how snow sounds when you fill a shovel with snow and toss it away. The snow that he was tossing away was landing above them, and some of it came down through their window as flakes. [The boy’s host] would say to him, “When you return home, always clear the doors when the weather is bad by going from place to place. See, one of the men is clearing away the doors in bad weather instead of sitting around. The snow he is shoveling is landing on top of our house. By carefully clearing that snow that is landing on our house that man is clearing the path that one of us will use this spring when we go to him so he can catch us. Take care not to carelessly clear the doorways. When people clear away the doors in your village, they are carefully clearing a path for their catches in the spring.

Like any classic of visual art, music, or literature, this story is an intellectual watershed, a nourishing home for contemplation, giving the listener many subjects and themes to think about, to meditate upon, to become enriched from it. Its gifts extend into my daily habits, thoughts, and practices. I am opening the pathway to my own hunt, my goals and life journey, to prosperity and fulfillment. Mythology interacts with daily life. What a wonderful concept this is. Clearing the pathway outside one’s house is clearing the metaphorical pathway to one’s hunt. If the front of your door is blocked, it blocks your pathway to your goals. I believe there is a deep lesson here. We are much more affected by our surroundings, what we see and hear, than we tend to realize. If the door in front of your house is cluttered and messy, it could have a negative impact on your habits and practices, and those habits and practices play a large factor in the success and prosperity one attains. It is like you can almost feel it when one does not take care of oneself. A messy character can be unattractive. The way you care for your surroundings demonstrates the kind of character that will translate to other facets of life.

Though I missed the opportunity to get to know Paul John personally, I feel a connection to him by repeatedly, carefully reading his stories. He shows through storytelling how to live a good life, how to think, how to approach things in ways that will attract success and prosperity, and to live healthfully and well.

I cherish the memories of the time with my Elders, listening to stories, being a guest in their homes, seeing them at events, and I feel the responsibility of passing those memories on. These Elders taught much more than stories. Their humanity, their individuality, their character, experiences with them, have left the deepest impressions with me. I would knock on the door of master storyteller George Davis, Kaaxwaan Éesh. He would answer it and say to me, “Neilgú!” (“Come in!”). Then, George would tell me the great stories. Experiences like this connect me to the oral literature and intellectual tradition.

Remembering Nora’s lessons on life and art brings up memories of my time with her brother, Johnny Marks, K’óox, a deeply knowledgeable Elder of their clan, the Lukaaxh.ádi. He was raised by his paternal uncle, Jim Marks, and Jennie Marks, Khultuyáxh Sée. Richard Dauenhauer would tell me how the couple were Tlingit speakers of nearly a generation before Johnny’s biological parents,6 so they spoke an older dialect of Tlingit and carried with them a world saturated with 19th century Tlingit knowledge. Jim and Jennie’s speaking style presented a sense of depth and expansiveness which offered a glimpse into an earlier time. This is the kind of knowledge and language dialect Johnny was raised in. His sister Florence, a master speaker herself, tells that she frequently went to Johnny when she had questions about the Tlingit language.

Johnny used to call me up, about once a week. When I answered the phone at the offices of Perseverance Theatre, when I was the director of Outreach there in the early 2000s, Johnny would exclaim, “Ishmael!” Then, I would invite him to a lunch at the Hangar, where he told me so much about Tlingit life, and taught me so much by example, by mannerism, by character, the way of life of Tlingit Elders. I once asked him what my Tlingit name, Khaagwáask’, a name of an ancestor from the Kiks.ádi battles of Sitka of 1802 and 1804, meant. He told me that some names do not have a meaning, because it was lost since they are so old. He smiled and said, “That means you’re royalty!” As I think back on it, I am moved by the simple kindness and encouragement toward a young man finding his way. I think he sensed how I needed encouragement and validation at that time, and he gave it. They say the phrase, “Has du eetínáxh áyá haa yatee haa káak hás, haa léelk’w hás”. “We are in need of our uncles, our grandparents”. Esther Littlefield, Aanwooghéex’, Kiks.ádi matriarch, said of her grandfather, greatly respected Elder and clan leader Kh’alyáan, “Du eetíx’ yaa kxhajélch”7 “I reach out in his place”. They feel the responsibility, and also the burden, of carrying on in place of the departed family members and Elders.

I offer this brief sketch of my artistic life as a Northwest Coast literary artist to demonstrate how the oral literature, intellectual history, and living art may affect and inspire me as an artist. In this Raven Creator Bioregion, there is an abundance of poetry, if you stay with it, if you maintain focus on the art, if you do not let the negativity and distractions get you down. I “listen to the old people”, like Nora and Johnny, and their guidance and example help me.

When I asked Nora Dauenhauer about some aspects of the Khu.éex’, the potlatch—like the yikteiyí, the dramatic performances of clan history, often mimed with masks, which has not been performed much since the 19th century—she told me, “What I know of the culture, I learned directly from my Elders, like Jessie Dalton, David Kadashan, my mom, my dad”. The Elders she named were some of the finest orators and storytellers. That direct experience is the lifeblood of our intellectual traditions. It affects the story, the oratory, the ritual, when you witness them directly in front of your face, observing and interacting with living, breathing human beings.

I learned a lot about literary art, and about how to be a literary artist in this land, from observing and listening to Nora Dauenhauer. I took many classes from Nora and Richard at the local University of Alaska Southeast. I attended countless events with them. They’d often ask me to read poetry with them, or if I was organizing, I would ask them. When Nora read the Tlingit oratory aloud—which was most often that of Jessie Dalton, Naa Tláa8—she’d ask me to read the words of appreciation and affirmation that the “opposites” on the other side would share in the middle of the speeches.

While Nora learned from her Elders, she was eclectic and keen to many world literatures. e.e. cummings was a favorite poet of hers. She felt that Beowulf resembled Tlingit oral literature, which, incidentally, I agree with. Feast oratory, for example, is a major feature of both ancient Anglo-Saxon culture and that of the Northwest Coast. Nora told me she was “Tlingit through and through”. It follows, then, that to be “Tlingit through and through” is to have extensive knowledge of and to be a practitioner of the tradition, and to also to have interests in other world traditions. Her father, Willie Marks, Kéet Yaanaayí, was a great tradition bearer and storyteller, who also loved to play the Hawaiian guitar which he learned from a Hawaiian friend who lived in Juneau (Dauenhauer and Dauenhauer 1994).

During one of those poetry readings, at the same week of the Khu.éex’ in 2011, held in memory of my father, Andrew Hope III, Xhaastánch, a close friend and intellectual colleague of theirs, Nora read her searingly beautiful “Giverny on the Alsek”, comparing Claude Monet’s masterpieces of his home garden to the gorgeous, lush Alsek River, an important ancestral river to her clan:9

• If Monet had only seen
• the flowers at Alsek Peninsula,
• I bet he would have painted
• impressions of them.
• The landing beach alone
• all covered with dwarf fireweed;
• going along the beach
• down river,
• wild asters;
• along the trail to Alsek lake,
• more fireweed,
• profusion of Indian paint brush
• in red and orange, yellow;
• pink pyrolos, purple larkspurs,
• grass of Parnassius (anemone),
• chocolate lilies, Jacob’s ladder,
• strawberries;
• at Alsek Lake more fireweed,
• dwarf around our sauna pond.
• I would love to see
• how Monet would have seen these
• against the Alsek Glacier, icebergs
• and Mount Fairweather
• capped with ice and sunlight.

When Nora read this poem, it felt like the cool waters of the Alsek were flowing from her heart. As Nora spoke the litany of delightful images, [“pink pyrolos, purple larkspurs, /grass of Parnassius (anemone)], she luxuriated in the sound, enjoying the alliteration and the multisyllabic words meaty with consonants. Her eyes were closed, her expression like she was there in her mind’s eye. It felt like she took us there in some way.

What we put in front of our face, what we bring our face to, what we hear and listen to, what we touch and are touched by, what we smell, what we taste, are like documents slowly unfolding the viscera of the present, which weaves into the material of thought and memory. They are like a Chilkat blanket perpetually being woven, storing what is important from the times, from the bioregion, from the individual character, into the collective memory bank. I return to this idea as I resist watching more reels, reading more posts, perusing more memes, commenting on more videos. I ask myself if I want the visual document of my experience and memories to be largely comprised of social media and video binge-watching, or if I want that record, the input that I feed my mind, to be full of oral literature, Dostoevsky’s novels, conversations with friends and loved ones, intellectual exchanges with respected colleagues, writing and creating. And some of that time could be spent online, as there are, after all, many intellectually rich videos and posts on platforms such as YouTube and Facebook, including Native-language storytelling, oratory, singing, and dancing. It is a struggle. It is hard to resist the flush of hormones one gets from mindlessly clicking and scrolling. Nevertheless, I always feel good, spiritually nourished, and intellectually invigorated while reading a great novel or listening to an Elder.

I consider this concept of a perpetual scroll of experience as I imagine the life of this region in earlier times, informed by a lifetime of listening to Elders and of study. My Tlingit ancestors would wake up “ch’u l yéil du.áxhji”, “before the call of the raven”, and get right to work, often with physical training at the beach early in the morning, which includes bathing in the cold water. They would work all day, hunting, fishing, gathering, repairing tools, creating art. Finally, during evening, the Elders would tell stories around the fire. James Skeek of Petersburg called this, “xh’aan shkalneek”, “fire stories”. Their daily “screen” would consist of mental and physical training, work, developing their abilities, listening to the great oral literature, the clanhouses, the art, the regalia, the tools, and the magnificent bioregion of Lingít Aaní. This daily input leaves an imprint on their character, the words they speak, the stories they tell, and the creations they make.

When reading or hearing oral literary masterworks, one frequently encounters moments of searing clarity, of penetrating psychological acuity, a sense of deep familiarity, relating to thoughts and feelings so particular that one may not have realized that others thought and felt the same way, until they encountered it in such art. Robert Bringhurst highlights such an aesthetic moment told by the great Haida mythteller Ghandl (2000), in “In His Father’s Village, Someone was Just About to Go Out Hunting Birds”. The hunter’s bird-wife left at night. The hunter notices her sneaking out, and he follows her:

He started toward her.

She was eating eelgrass that grew there,

and the breaking waves were lifting her back toward shore.

He saw her, they say.

And then she flew back where they kept her skin.

He got back to the house

before she did, they say.

There he lay down,

and soon his wife lay down beside him, cold.

(Ghandl 2000, pp. 85–86)

It is impossible not to relate to such a moment, of intimate partners finding out secrets of the other, and of the flush of cool skin making contact with a warmer body. Robert Bringhurst compared Ghandl’s classic with Velazquez’s “Supper at Emmaus”, in which the resurrected Jesus Christ sits at a table, sketchily painted in the background, while in the foreground a maid prepares supper. Bringhurst writes, “What dawns on us as we stand in front of the painting is what is dawning on the woman in the kitchen: one of the three men sitting in her restaurant died three days ago, yet there he is, elbows on the table, talking with his friends. In that instant of recognition, the real world and the mythworld collide, much as they do in Ghandl’s story when the woman goes out of the house at midnight to eat eelgrass, dressed in the skin of a goose, and comes back in to life beside her husband in the form of a human being” (Bringhurst [1999] 2011, p. 47).

The great Tlingit storyteller Deikeenaak’w (Figure 3), a contemporary of Skaay and Ghandl, also sprinkled his stories with penetratingly relatable moments. He tells of Khaakéx’wtí, whose entire town was wiped out, and he was the only survivor.10 His storytelling was deeply consoling as I was struggling with and steeling myself for less contact with other human beings. Khaakéx’wtí, after the loss of his people, found himself walking in the mountains:

• Yú gheeyáx’ yanaxh yeikh uwagút,
• Yakwdeiyéet anaxh.
• Lingít awgaxhsiteenéet áwé yakghwagútk.
• Awsiteen yú lingít Laakh’ásgi X’aa yoo duwasáakw.
• Tlaxhdei ash ée lit’aanée lingít awsiteení.
• Ch’u tle a yinaadé ghunei uwagút.
• Yú awsiteení téik’ sáani lingít yáxh.
• Adaxh wughaadaa téik’xh sateeyí sh lushk’idéin yei xh’ayakháa,
• “Xhach téik’ sáani lingít yáxh awsiteen”.
• Tsu yanaxh dáakh uwagút Aalseixh sháakde.
• Wáa yúkoogóok sáwé naaléiyi yéi dáakh góot.
• He went down to a bay.
• Through Canoe Pass.
• So he could see people was why he went there.
• He saw people at what they call Seaweed Point.
• He was desperate to find people.
• So he began to go to the side.
• He saw a little rock that looked like a person.
• When he came upon the rock he said in disappointment,
• “Here it was a little rock that looks like a person”.
• He again went up to the head of the Alsek.
• He walked a great distance up there.

Again, who does not relate to such a moment, in this case one of loneliness, of missing people so deeply that one’s mind begins to play tricks with oneself? Deikeenaak’w’s grand, ancient myths feel as if they are happening before one’s eyes, or even that the listener is inside the story, participating? Also note that Khaakéx’wtí traversed “the head of the Alsek”, and picture Nora Dauenhauer’s beautiful vision of it. As I listen and read, I delight in moments when the myth surprisingly and wonderfully expresses eerily relatable, distinct, and particular feelings. These moments and images percolate in the mind as we work, as we tend to the household, prepare foods, as we create our arts.

Visual artists also create moments where everyday life interacts with the myth. The great Haida artist Bill Reid described his approach to the Dogfish, drawing inspiration from observing dogfish in nature (See Figure 4 for one of Reid’s Dogfish designs):11

You have to look at the dogfish in a special way. And I saw it in this aspect first at the Vancouver Aquarium, when one was swimming toward me, and I was looking through the glass. And from his underside he looked something like this. He’s long and narrow. And he has some wrinkles under his nose, for some reason or other. And you can see part of his gill slits. And the pectoral fins, and of course the rest of him, his body. And I began to get a clue as to how this abstraction was arrived at. If you turn him over on his belly and you can see his back, and split him right through the middle—that’s right through the body so he’s only attached by the skin on the front side—and open him up, you would get something that looks vaguely like this.

Once you see the design as if it is two sides of the face flattened out, you cannot un-see it. I never thought of Bill Reid’s observation before, but now it seems so obvious. Reid observed this through life, by viewing real dogfish. Additionally, he spent years studying Northwest Coast art in museum collections and copying from the masters such as his relation Charles Edenshaw.12 This seemingly simple observation offers up insight into the internal structures of the art. Bill Reid’s subtle, astute observation may now illuminate much of two dimensional Northwest Coast design. Each side, which is often symmetrical, is seen from the side perspective from each point of view, rather than a head-on depiction. His observation has encouraged me to view Northwest Coast artworks in a new light, testing the observation far beyond the Dogfish design. It offers a different way to see, an alternate sense of perspective with different sets of rules than the eye navigating three-dimensional space.

An artist’s character flows through their art. The character of an artist who closely observes dogfish in an aquarium will be reflected in their art. The character of a storyteller who paid close attention to their Elders will be reflected in their art. Frank Johnson, Táakw K’wát’i, was such a storyteller, and much more besides. He was a civil rights and land claims leader through his work with the Alaska Native Brotherhood and the Tlingit and Haida tribe. He was also an educator. As a teacher at the grade school in Kake, Johnson produced a series of pamphlets on Tlingit culture for the Indian Studies program. They are intellectual fruits of the self-determination era during which Native peoples took control of their education.13

In one pamphlet, Johnson describes Tlingit education, particularly boys’ education since that was what he knew. After detailing the mental and physical strength training that boys undergo and which is centered on cold water bathing outside, Johnson describes the centrality of storytelling in Tlingit education:14

Alone, a strong body does not make a leader. It was and still is the development of a keen mind that makes a man great. In the old days the more respected elders with intimate knowledge of clan history and legends told the young people the stories and would test them often. The boys who listened carefully were closely watched. Those that did not come or listen or failed to remember, were also noted. The lecturers were sometimes rough on their students. Some boys would leave disgusted or insulted. These boys were ignored and no one forced them to come back. They were just not sharp enough.

I’ve often heard that those who listened carefully to the Elders, especially during storytelling time, were the ones who were selected to be leaders. I remember, for example, Florence Sheakley teaching young people about this at a culture camp in Haines. This pre-requisite to leadership is the equivalent of a PhD in oral literary studies. Such intellectual competence and ability perhaps rivals what was expected of Elizabethan playwrights, for instance. One recalls Ben Jonson’s jibe about William Shakespeare knowing “small Latin and less Greek”. A Tlingit Elder would know the extant corpus of Tlingit oral literature, and often was fluent in other languages and well-versed in the oral literatures of neighbors, in particular the Haida and Tsimshian. Tlingit oral literary artists are regional artists, and indeed, Northwest Coast artists, if you like.

A storyteller must possess great felicity with their chosen art. A painter with the brush, a writer or storyteller with words. Those words can reach great linguistic complexity, as the action amps up, as the psychology becomes more acute. Frank Johnson’s vigorously paced telling of Dukt’ootl’, the “Strong Man” of Tlingit tradition, demonstrates such felicity (Dauenhauer and Dauenhauer 1987). Johnson deftly and beautifully unfolds every important theme of the story, such as the Northwest Coast oral literary theme of the encounter with the spirit of Strength, or Latseen in Tlingit. Oral formula and theme—which are the primary building blocks of oral literature in the same way that the eye motif, or the flicker feather design, are primary building blocks of the visual art—can be artfully and skillfully employed by an individual literary artist, or it can be less skillfully employed in the hands of a less skilled literary artist. Those who did not listen carefully could not have retained, much less competently told with great artistry, such complexity as demonstrated in Johnson’s telling of Dukt’ootl’, in which the hero, who had been training for strength alone at night, reveals himself as the strong man that he is, and walks through the boat. This passage begins after the Noowkakháawu, the “Man on the Fort”, a giant sea lion, kills Ghalwéit’, Dukt’ootl’’s uncle and the leader of the clan:

Ách áwé wé káa ku.aa

Atkaháas’i yóo wtwasáa

wé l ushnéek’ich

áwé tle wudiháan.

Áwé tle yéi x’adutee,

“Aadóoch sá daak xwaaxút’.

Xáach xáa wé daak xwaaxút’.

Aadóoch sá aawax’aa yá aas

yá Aanka.aasí?

Xáach xáa wé”.

Áwé tle yaa nagúdi áwé tle yaakw yíx daak nagút.

Yá yaxak’aawú

a t’éit kawlyáas’ tle du xées’dei l’éex’.

Áwé

kei wushk’éini áwé

taakw laakásgi yóo toosáakw nuch aa kutstee.

Áwé yá téix’ yáa teeyí

kax’il’k’ nuch.

Tle kei wchk’én ch’a aan tlél x’uskawushx’éel’.

Tle kei nagút.

But that’s why that man,

he was named Atkaháas’i

because he didn’t keep himself clean,

stood up.

They imitate him saying,

“Who do you think pulled out the Village Nose?

It was I who pulled it out.

Who do you think split this tree, the Village Tree?

It was I”.

Then as he went, he went up walking through the boat. The thwarts broke as his shins hit them.

As

he jumped up out of the boat

there was what we call winter seaweed.

When it’s on the rocks

they’re slippery.

But when he jumped on them he didn’t even slip.

He kept on going up.

(Dauenhauer and Dauenhauer 1987, pp. 146–47)

Knowledge and felicity with language are important skills in oral literary artistry. Johnson moves from the high drama of Dukt’ootl’ revealing himself to be the strong man that he really is, to the deft action of walking through the boat and breaking the thwarts as his shins hit against them, and then jumping onto slippery rocks covered with slippery seaweed yet not slipping. The action crescendos with the killing of the Noowkakháawu.

In the way that Dukt’ootl’ reveals his strength, so too does Frank Johnson as a master storyteller. That is a literary moment which can only be achieved through many years of intense study and practice. Such knowledge, precision, and competence on many levels, such as an ability to richly develop given themes, are required in the visual and literary arts alike. It takes years of refinement, learning how to work with—to make it sing—such supple, rich, malleable forms. Indeed, such refinement could be found in depictions of Dukt’ootl’ splitting the sea lion in half, such as the masterful Dukt’ootl’ Gáas’, House Post, for the famous Yáay Hít, Whale House (widely seen through early 20th century photographs by the photographers Winter and Pond),15 completed by the great carver Khaajisdu.áxhch. The Dukt’ootl’ Gáas’ captures the same dramatic moment Frank Johnson masterfully builds toward and unfolds, with a similar, palpable tension and excitement.

In the visual arts, there is not a bit of space that is wasted. Sometimes, those who are not schooled in the arts comment that certain parts are “fillers” or “purely decorative”. Rather, there is tension and grace in the line, in the shapes.16 There is an interplay of themes, which encapsulate thought and meaning. The so-called “salmon trout head” reveals the spirit of a joint, demonstrating strength. The “trigon” that seems to be “filler” holds the parts together. The faces and bodies on the outer edges may be spirits accompanying the main crest. Similarly, in the literary arts, the building blocks of thought and meaning are in the oral formula, or phrasings—the thought breath expressed in textual form as a line, in the themes that build up to stories, and in the stories that contribute to a story ecology. They are like fractals which spiral and grow, constituting a forest.17

Artists undergo years of training, working through the themes, learning to get the eye form just right, for example, or developing a feel for utilizing just the right oral formula for certain parts of the story. Elders teach them a craft and work with them throughout the day, and then, in the evening, they all listen to the stories. Two examples of Tlingit Elders telling of their apprenticeships include Ruth Demmert recounting how she was instructed in songs, and Jennie Thlunaut detailing how she learned the art of Chilkat weaving. It is best to hear directly from Elders speaking in their own language in order to illuminate a clear picture of the cultural life and the intellectual traditions, so we’ll directly quote from Demmert’s and Thlunaut’s short stories about their educations.

Ruth Demmert told her story to other Elders during a “Healing Language Panel” organized by linguist Alice Taff at the “Clan Conference” in 2017,18 about how she apprenticed under her grandfather, Johnny C. Jackson, Ghooch Éesh, learning the art of singing and leading a dance group. He was a well-known and widely respected Elder. Ruth is a shí daakeit, a “song box”, someone who retains many songs and who can properly sing them for many occasions:19

• Wé
• kei xhat nawádi áwé
• haa Lingít khusteeyí
• hél yéi khut shuwuxeexí.
• Wé Celebration yakghwaxeexí haa tóo daat kei uwaxíx.
• Ách áwé axh léelk’w xhánde yei xhwagút ch’a tlákw yagiyee.
• Tsú atxhaayí du xh’éis yan xhasaneech.
• Du xhánx’ xhwagootch.
• Axh ée latéew yóo axh daayaxhakhá axh léelk’w.
• Ghooch Éesh yéi dusáagun axh léelk’w.
• Áwé
• du xháni xhwanúkch gwál déixh táakw kaanáxh.
• Yéi xhat daayakhá,
• axh léelk’w
• du éek’w áwé.
• Du xhánx’ xhwagoot.
• Áwé axh ée latéew nuch.
• “Hél ayáxh utí wa.é i éex’ lateewú.
• Ch’as wa.é khu.aa khaa yáxh daak neegútch.
• Ldakát yáa shéex’ i éex’ kkhwalatéew.
• I toowú ayáxh”, gíyá yéi xhat yawsikhaa.
• “Ayáxh i toowú litseen, axh toowúch.
• Ách áwé i éex’ kkhwalatéew ldakát yáa haa sheex’í”.
• Gwál tleikháa kha gooshúkh sheex’ gíwé axh éex’ awlitéew,
• du xhánx’ xhwagoodí.

And in English translation:

• As
• I grew up
• with our Tlingit culture,
• it hasn’t been lost.
• As Celebration was coming up we became worried.
• That is why I went to my grandfather every day.
• I also cooked food for him.
• I went to him.
• My grandfather taught me what to say.
• They called my grandfather Ghooch Éesh.
• So
• I was with him for maybe two years.
• He told me,
• my grandfather’s
• younger brother.
• I went to him.
• He would teach me.
• “It isn’t right that I am teaching you.
• But it is only you who comes out like a man.
• I will teach you all of the songs.
• Your feelings are right”, is maybe what he said to me.
• “Your feelings are right and strong, is my feeling.
• That is why I will teach you all of the songs”.
• He taught me maybe 29 songs,
• as I went to him.

Richard Dauenhauer often spoke of how one can “savor” the words of the Elders. I savor the straightforward mastery expressed by a contemporary Tlingit Elder of our times. Ruth Demmert speaks with such felicity, utilizing the storage cache of phrases that have been developed over millennia and making them her own, telling her own personal story. One notes the delicate interplay and negotiation between generations and genders. Johnny C. Jackson clearly had immense knowledge to share, and while custom would direct that he share his knowledge with young men, Ruth was the one from her generation who had the skills and abilities to retain such knowledge and to eventually pass that knowledge on herself, which she does with so much grace and impact. As her grandfather was before her, Ruth Demmert is an anchor for her community, teaching many generations of singers and dancers the songs and dances from their heritage, speaking such beautiful Tlingit, and teaching by example, demonstrating the character and values of a true Tlingit Elder.

Jennie Thlunaut delivered a welcome speech sharing Chilkat weaving history, and her education in the art, at a weavers workshop organized in Haines in 1985. The speech is a short tour-de-force in history, autobiography, philosophy, and as a motivational tool for learners. Here is Jennie’s telling of her education in Chilkat weaving. It began, as she says, in 1901, when Jennie was ten or eleven years old: 20

Shux’áanáx

1901

áwé ax tláa

ax éeshch áwé akaa koowakéi.

Ax tláak’w yéi duwasáakw

Saantáas’.

Áwé

yéi wé dulgeis’ín:

fifty dollars

one blanket.

Yéi áwé x’alatseenín.

A jeet aawatée

wé fifty dollars ax tláak’w jeet.

Aagáa áwé ax tláa ee awlitúw.

1901.

Tlél yeedadi yáx.

Shaax’sáani

át luwagook ch’áakw.

Gwál ch’a xát giwé yéi xat wuduswáat.

“Haagú!”

Any time you start it.

“Haagú”.

Áyá du déix’i kanúkch.

I am watching what they’re doing.

1908 áwé woonaa ax tláa.

Aagáa áwé yan akawsinéi yóot’aa yáx,

black and yellow.

All mine.

Ax éeshch

ax jeet uwatée.

Dei kwá xashigóok.

I know how to weave.

Aanáx áwé

ax léelk’w

ax léelk’w du tláa

hooch áwé

shux’áanáx ax ée awlitúw.

1908,

Porcupine gold mine-ix’ tle all summer áwé

yan kaxwsinéi,

tléix’ kutaan.

Yawdi.aa wéit’át; it’s a slow job.

Axoo yú lingít

two years x’áak aksané.

Aa yei gaxyisatéen aadéi lich’éeyagu yé.

And in English translation:

In the beginning,

in 1901,

my father paid

for my mother’s instruction.

My maternal aunt was named

Saantáas’.

Then

they used to pay this much for it:

fifty dollars

for one blanket.

This was the dollar value.

He gave

the fifty dollars to my aunt.

This was when she taught my mother.

1901.

It wasn’t like now.

The young girls

didn’t run around long ago.

Maybe it was only me that was raised this way. “Come here!” they’d say

every time they began weaving.

“Come here!”

I would sit behind her.

I’d watch what they were doing.

My mother died in 1908.

This is when she finished weaving it, like that one, black and yellow.

All mine.

My father

gave it to me.

I already knew how to weave.

I knew how to weave.

After this

my grandmother,

my father’s mother,

was the one

who first taught it to me.

In 1908,

at Porcupine gold mine I weaved all summer

and finished it

in one summer.

Those things take time; it’s slow work.

It takes some people

two years to weave one.

Now you’ll all see how slow it is.

Jennie already knew how to weave, one of the most complex weaving traditions in the world, by watching, before she was taught. Jennie’s method of learning by observation is a very common Indigenous pedagogy. It is also nice to see the relationships that brought Jennie’s education to fruition, with her parents and aunts. Jennie’s maternal aunt Saantáas’ is also a well-known weaver in the history of Chilkat weaving. Jennie’s paternal aunt, Deinkhul.át, was also a well-known weaver of the time.

Also note where Jennie Thlunaut suggests that sometimes it takes two years to weave one Chilkat robe. Consider Thlunaut’s prodigiousness and precociousness in weaving her first robe, and first major commission, in one summer. Thlunaut would go on to weave a vast body of work. Her apprentice, the late Clarissa Rizal, who attended the workshop in 1985 and who then underwent a six- week apprenticeship with Thlunaut, beautifully described Thlunaut’s amazing output in one of her blog posts, “Apprenticeship with Jennie Thlunaut”:21

Jennie Thlunaut was truly the grand master of Chilkat weaving (although she would not ever say that about herself; in fact, she laughed at the statement.) Not only was she the last Chilkat weaver left in the Chilkat Valley, but she was by far the most prolific of all the old weavers. She had created some 50 Chilkat blankets during her lifetime, in addition to over 6 Chilkat tunics and numerous smaller weavings. (To put this number in perspective, a typical weaver spends one year, full-time, to create a Chilkat blanket. Jennie had produced almost 60 major pieces in addition to raising a family, living her subsistence life-style, and holding a full-time job!)

Elders often suggest that it is because of khusixhán, love, and wooch isxhán, love for each other, that the arts are created and shared. To demonstrate such khusixhán and wooch isxhán, Elders offer up as an illustration the story of the Khei.á Daakeit, the Box of Daylight, when the Raven called for the boxes of Khei.á, Daylight; Dís, the Moon; Khutxh.ayanahá, Stars; and Ghagaan, the Sun (see a representation of the story in the form of a carved headdress in Figure 5). His grandfather, Naas Shagiyéil, gave him the boxes because of his love for him. It is this love for grandchildren that Robert Zuboff attributes to the spreading of the arts. Many of our art forms, such as the shakee.át, the headdress, and the ghangóosh, the abalone shell headdress, came from the Tsimshian, according to Zuboff. Zuboff then suggests that it is because of our love of our grandchildren that the art forms spread across Tlingit country, likening such love with the Khei.á Daakeit story:22

• Ách áyá
• tlél áyá aadéi,
• khaa dachxhán,
• jeedé yaa at naxhdujigéiyi yé.
• Ch’u ch’aagudáxh,
• yáa Yéil,
• yáa khutx.ayanahá aghasgháaxh du léelk’w éexh aghaxhooxh.
• Du jeet wuduwatée.
• Du léelk’w éexh aghaxhooxh yáa Dís Daakeit.
• Du jee wuduwatée.
• Wáa yú at kudayeigí sáyá
• a káa daax’ xh’awditán
• yá Khei.á Daakeit,
• «Grandpa, I want that Daylight Box.
• Grandpa, I want the Daylight Box.»
• Wáa dusxhán nuch sáyú
• yú kháa dachxhán,
• yáa yadujigéiyi
• dáanaa tlén yagéi
• khaa dachxhán jeex’ duteech.
• Yéi áyá yan haa kawdiyaa
• ch’u tle ldakát yáa whole Southeast Alaska gagéi yáa khaa jeex’ shakee.át. A kaaxh khu.a haa toowú yak’éi.
• Haa toowú kalighéi
• a káa daat.

In English translation:

• That is why
• there is no way
• our grandchildren
• can be refused anything.
• Long ago,
• the Raven
• would cry for the stars and ask his grandfather for them.
• His grandfather gave them to him.
• He asked his grandfather for the Moon Box.
• He gave it to him.
• However it happened,
• he talked about
• the Box of Daylight.
• “Grandpa, I want that Daylight Box.
• Grandpa, I want the Daylight Box”.
• However much
• a man loves his grandchild,
• what is too valuable to give away, a great amount of money,
• a person gives to his grandchild.
• That is how we are,
• with all of the whole Southeast Alaska, the headdress is given.
• We feel good because of it. We are proud
• because of it.

These deeply embedded values demonstrated here call to mind “yaa dujigéiyi át”, which roughly translates to “what is too valuable to give away”. Ruth Demmert’s grandfather Johnny C. Jackson chose to teach her, even when it was not the norm by traditional Tlingit standards, because such precious knowledge must be passed along to the next generation, and she showed the ability to become a knowledge bearer. Also consider the web of familial relationships which spurred Jennie Thlunaut to learn the art of Chilkat weaving, starting with her father paying her aunt Saantáas’ to teach Jennie. The art is called forward, created, and shared because of love for future generations. The younger generation, the grandchildren, have “cried” for the arts to be continued, to be displayed, worn, and shared, and the grandparents, because of khusixhán and wooch isxhán, gave yaa dujigéiyi át to the grandchildren.