The best way to savor quality chocolate is to take tiny bites.
The best way to savor a book is to take it a page at a time, sometimes just a paragraph, although the temptation to devour it whole may be strong.
I want to share with you the open heart of John Lame Deer as told to Richard Erdoes. Theirs is a synchronistic and quirky alliance which you'll read about in the introduction that follows. Have you noticed the recurring relationship between American Indian wisemen and European (white) writers? It is a spiritual symbiosis that happened so often as to constitute a pattern.
Without the red man, the happiest Way of Earth would never have existed in humans. Without the white man to transpose the thoughts of the great Chiefs on paper, transmission of the Way would have ceased two centuries ago, forever and ever stilled. These in-the-flesh partnerships speak of Great Mystery's compassionate manner of fulfiling a need.
I invite you to absorb, in wonder and awe, with tears and laughter, the roughly faceted diamond which is Lame Deer, and his incontestable view of the world, of life, love, money, drink, sex, himself -- and us. It shines through eternity no less than the timeless utterings of his own forefathers.
I will now cut to the chase, as they say, only here it's the Indian chasing the white mind out of the canyons of death and into the boundless field of sanity, peace and life. Enjoy !
*********~~~~~~~~~~~**********
JOHN (FIRE) LAME DEER AND RICHARD ERDOES
Lame Deer, Seeker of Visions
THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO:
Frank Fools Crow, Peter Catches, George Eagle Elk, Bill Schweigman, Leonard Crow Dog, Wallace Black Elk, John Strike, Raymond Hunts Horse, Charles Kills Enemy, Godfrey Chips.
CONTENTS
LAME DEER, SEEKER OF VISIONS
1. Alone on the Hilltop
2. That Gun in the NewYork Museum Belongs to Me
3. The Green Frog Skin
4. Getting Drunk, Going to Jail
5. Sitting on Top of Teddy Roosevelt's Head
6. The Circle and the Square
7. Talking to the Owls and Butterflies
8. Two in a Blanket
9. Medicine, Good and Bad
10. Inipi - Grandfather's Breath
11. Yuwipi - Little Lights from Nowhere
12. Looking at the Sun, They Dance
13. Don't Hurt the Trees
14. Roll Up the World
15. The Upside-Down, Forward-Backward, Icy-Hot Contrary
16. Blood Turned into Stone
Epilogue: Inyan Wasicun, the White Man with the Rocks
Glossary
Suggestions for Further Reading
Index
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~************~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
INTRODUCTION
Lame Deer and Richard Erdoes first met in the 1960s. Erdoes came to America in 1940 when he was twenty-eight years old. Of Jewish and Catholic descent, he escaped from Vienna during World War II. Trained as an artist in Berlin and Paris, he found work as a freelance illustrator and graphic artist in New York. He married Jean Sternbergh, an art director at Time. Their three children traveled with them when Erdoes was on assignment in the West. When Life magazine sent him to do a photo essay on Indian reservations, he was befriended "by an old and almost totally illiterate Sioux medicine man." This was Lame Deer.
In 1967, Lame Deer took a delegation of fifteen Sioux to Martin Luther King, Jr.'s peace march in New York City. Afterward, they had dinner at Erdoes's apartment, where Lame Deer sang the Sioux national anthem and accompanied himself on his drum. Little did Erdoes expect what was to come. As he later wrote:
John reappeared a few weeks later, Indian style -- unannounced and uninvited,
ringing our doorbell, standing there with a cardboard box containing his worldly
possessions, saying with a broad grin: "I liked you. I think I'll stay for a while."
He stayed about two months that time.
Lame Deer wante Erdoes to write his life story. Although the artist protested that he was not a writer, he finally yielded to Lame Deer's insistence, "and so began the strangest of collaborations. What made it work was that we both had a sense of humor." The book they produced together changed both of their lives. Lame Deer, Seeker of Visions went on to be translated into seven languages, including German, French, Dutch, Japanese, and Norwegian, and made Lame Deer a well-known personality.
April 20/14 (Easter Sunday... an apt day to resurrect a book of life)
The best way to savor a book is to take it a page at a time, sometimes just a paragraph, although the temptation to devour it whole may be strong.
I want to share with you the open heart of John Lame Deer as told to Richard Erdoes. Theirs is a synchronistic and quirky alliance which you'll read about in the introduction that follows. Have you noticed the recurring relationship between American Indian wisemen and European (white) writers? It is a spiritual symbiosis that happened so often as to constitute a pattern.
Without the red man, the happiest Way of Earth would never have existed in humans. Without the white man to transpose the thoughts of the great Chiefs on paper, transmission of the Way would have ceased two centuries ago, forever and ever stilled. These in-the-flesh partnerships speak of Great Mystery's compassionate manner of fulfiling a need.
I invite you to absorb, in wonder and awe, with tears and laughter, the roughly faceted diamond which is Lame Deer, and his incontestable view of the world, of life, love, money, drink, sex, himself -- and us. It shines through eternity no less than the timeless utterings of his own forefathers.
I will now cut to the chase, as they say, only here it's the Indian chasing the white mind out of the canyons of death and into the boundless field of sanity, peace and life. Enjoy !
*********~~~~~~~~~~~**********
JOHN (FIRE) LAME DEER AND RICHARD ERDOES
Lame Deer, Seeker of Visions
THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO:
Frank Fools Crow, Peter Catches, George Eagle Elk, Bill Schweigman, Leonard Crow Dog, Wallace Black Elk, John Strike, Raymond Hunts Horse, Charles Kills Enemy, Godfrey Chips.
CONTENTS
LAME DEER, SEEKER OF VISIONS
1. Alone on the Hilltop
2. That Gun in the NewYork Museum Belongs to Me
3. The Green Frog Skin
4. Getting Drunk, Going to Jail
5. Sitting on Top of Teddy Roosevelt's Head
6. The Circle and the Square
7. Talking to the Owls and Butterflies
8. Two in a Blanket
9. Medicine, Good and Bad
10. Inipi - Grandfather's Breath
11. Yuwipi - Little Lights from Nowhere
12. Looking at the Sun, They Dance
13. Don't Hurt the Trees
14. Roll Up the World
15. The Upside-Down, Forward-Backward, Icy-Hot Contrary
16. Blood Turned into Stone
Epilogue: Inyan Wasicun, the White Man with the Rocks
Glossary
Suggestions for Further Reading
Index
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~************~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
INTRODUCTION
Lame Deer and Richard Erdoes first met in the 1960s. Erdoes came to America in 1940 when he was twenty-eight years old. Of Jewish and Catholic descent, he escaped from Vienna during World War II. Trained as an artist in Berlin and Paris, he found work as a freelance illustrator and graphic artist in New York. He married Jean Sternbergh, an art director at Time. Their three children traveled with them when Erdoes was on assignment in the West. When Life magazine sent him to do a photo essay on Indian reservations, he was befriended "by an old and almost totally illiterate Sioux medicine man." This was Lame Deer.
In 1967, Lame Deer took a delegation of fifteen Sioux to Martin Luther King, Jr.'s peace march in New York City. Afterward, they had dinner at Erdoes's apartment, where Lame Deer sang the Sioux national anthem and accompanied himself on his drum. Little did Erdoes expect what was to come. As he later wrote:
John reappeared a few weeks later, Indian style -- unannounced and uninvited,
ringing our doorbell, standing there with a cardboard box containing his worldly
possessions, saying with a broad grin: "I liked you. I think I'll stay for a while."
He stayed about two months that time.
Lame Deer wante Erdoes to write his life story. Although the artist protested that he was not a writer, he finally yielded to Lame Deer's insistence, "and so began the strangest of collaborations. What made it work was that we both had a sense of humor." The book they produced together changed both of their lives. Lame Deer, Seeker of Visions went on to be translated into seven languages, including German, French, Dutch, Japanese, and Norwegian, and made Lame Deer a well-known personality.
April 20/14 (Easter Sunday... an apt day to resurrect a book of life)
