REVISITING SACRED PLACES IN N. SCOTT MOMADAY’S THE WAY TO RAINY MOUNTAIN

Abstract [English]

Native American literature consistently portrays the ancestral belief in the harmonious organization of the cosmos. [2] N. Scott Momaday through his works broadens the notion of the journey by encompassing culture, imagination, and individual histories. [1] In the Way to Rainy Mountain, he recounts the expedition of Tai-me, the revered Sun Dance doll, and the experiences of Tai-me's community through three distinct perspectives: the mythical, the factual, and the modern. Moreover, the work entails the individual odyssey of the storyteller (Momaday), who embarked on a pilgrimage to the burial site of his Kiowa grandmother, retracing the path earlier travelled by his ancestors. During this journey, Momaday confronted his Kiowa lineage. He elucidates that he holds a deep ancestral belief in the sacredness of all living beings and avers that our minds are inevitably drawn back to certain places; towns and cities, plains and mountains, that, once observed, explored, and inhabited, even for a brief period, remain fixed in our unconscious memory. [3] They become important part of our life; helps shaping our identity, and thus declare, “I am who I am because I have been there, or there”. This paper seeks to examine how the narrator's journey prompts the characteristics of the environment, the progression of time, and the resilience of the human spirit.