Eddie Rose Analysis Paper free essay sample

The Independence of Eddie Rose starts in a house on Indian reservation. The very first things we get see is the destructive house hold that Eddie Rose, his mother Katherine Rose, and little sister Theia live in. It is early in the morning and Katherine has just finished yelling and kicking out her boyfriend Lenny Sharb. After which Eddie is left alone with his mother where they get into a bit of an argument and Katherine tries to kiss Eddie. Katherine upset that Eddie did not want her goes to her room. Aunt Thelma comes over then we see Eddie packing a sack of food. Thelma told Eddie that he was lucky that he was getting to go to school, explained to him that she and Katherine never had that chance. At that point Eddie asked Aunt Thelma to take Theia while he was gone because he could not be there to protect her. At this time Theia is left alone with her mother and Aunt Thelma. Katherine gets aggressive with Theia and Thelma tells her to stop, we also learn Telma had a son, but he was taken away. At this time we see Eddie leave his sack out side by his grandmother’s grave. Eddie goes to visit his friend Mike Horse who is in jail, waiting for his mother to pick him up. Sam the guard that works there is a pedophile and has been bribing people for sexual favors. Mike is so scared of Sam that he plans and escape with Eddie from the jail. Then we see a scene with Eddie, Theia and Aunt Thelma. In this scene Eddie promises to Theia that Thelma will take her even though Thelma has not agreed, scene ends with Eddie back at the graveyard. After Eddie gets high, his Aunt Thelma comes and teaches him how to deal with problems with a ritual her and Katherine used as girls. Eddie comes home and Lenny is back and Eddie tells his mother he is going to call the cops, so he runs to get help. On his way to get help Eddie runs into Mike hiding in the park, Eddie tells Mike he can not run away and they go there separate ways. Mean while at home Lenny gets mad and hurts Theia before Eddie can come back with help. The last scene Eddie is talking to his mother about giving up custody and she says no and does not want to give up the only things she has in this world, but agrees to do it. Then Eddie offers her the ritual to do with him but she just laughs at him and says it is for girls. The social climate in the play is very grim. No matter where you are in the play there are always characters who are suffering. This may be understood as the people in the play are representing the Indian Americans who lived on reservations all over America, and most of them went through suffering. Another social climate is the desire to escape there current situation. Eddie does not want to leave his sister alone, but he is tired of living on the reservation that he would rather be dead. Aunt Thelma tells Eddie how life could have been better if she could have escaped, and had a chance at an education. Mike dreams of leaving and being taken care of by his aunt. Even Katherine dreams of leaving the reservation to find a better place for her kids. There were many other social climates such as pain, depression, destructive habits, and lack of role models. There are no real role models in this play that the kids can look up to. Even Aunt Thelma has lost her child, so it is not the best example to live by. One of the biggest Cultural climates in the play was alcoholism. Indian Americans are commonly known to have drinking problems, and in the play there is no shortage of that. Katherine and Lenny both drink day and night, and then after they are drunk they cause trouble around them. Once Katherine begins drinking she looses sight of what is most important to her, the two kids. Aunt Thelma tells Eddie that his grandma did not drink, yet she told Aunt Thelma to forget about her child when he was taken away, she did not deal with the pain with using alcohol. Another interesting cultural climate was the lack of culture. The characters were tired of being who they are they wanted to be out side of this place. In a way they wanted different lives; out side the reservation and the pain. The political climate that I felt was the lack of authority. The only person in the play that was a good authority figure to Eddie and his sister was there Aunt Thelma and she could not be around them all the time. Eddies dad did not want him and abused him as a child then left, Lenny the adult had a drinking problem and only cared about having sex, his own mother made a move on Eddie, Sam Jacobs a guard at the jail was pedophile. So no matter where we look we can see that there is no one to help Eddie and guide him or assist him. The authority in the play only cares about its self. I understood this as the writer was making a point that the Indians who relied on the authority of America kept getting screwed over, much like the children in the play. The one time Eddie went to get help from the police, they came late. So we can see recurrent political climate of the lack of authority. The economic climate in the play is dire. None of the characters were shown with jobs besides Sam the guard at the jail. Even Katherine her self says all she has is a box she lives in and her kids, there is no income on the reservation for her. When Katherine did make a little money selling Indian jewelry, it was stolen by Lenny. This can be understood as the Americans had stolen what little things the Indians had just for pockets full of coins, leaving the Indians hungry and miserable. When Eddie and Mike plan to run away, Eddie had to sell some weed for money. But instead of selling it Eddie smoked it all alone. This may mean that the Indians were bad at managing money, or they put there substance abuse before there need for money. People say that money does not buy happiness but in this case with out money there is no real family. Everyone is to busy trying to survive day by day to worry about love. The dramatic purpose of the theme was supposed to show the severity of life on the reservation. The theme to me is misery, and the author made this really clear with the suffering of Eddie. Eddie at age 16 had been abused mentally, physically and sexually by his own father and mother. The suffering that Eddie goes threw has really opened my eye to how bad life on the reservation is. Life on the reservation was misery and that is why the characters try to leave. Even if its one person it does not make it ok and it should not happen. The play stays in the tragic reality, but there are parts where characters connect with the spiritual. One of the times that we first leave reality is when the first time Eddie goes to the graveyard and asks his grandma to watch his stuff. It was interesting seeing Eddie trying to connect to the spiritual world. When Eddie comes back for his stuff and he gets high by the grave of his grandmother and he goes to her to seek help and guidance, it shows how the characters in the reality could not help him with his problems. Another, very spiritual thing that happened was Aunt Thelma teaching Eddie about the burning of the hair to make all of the bad go away. When Eddie tries to use the spiritual practice with his mother she just laughs in his face for dealing with his problems like a girl. The way that the characters dealt with there problems in the play was with the abuse of alcohol or running away. A stereotype that Indian’s drink too much was shown not true. Because Thelma told Eddie that his grandma never drank. Because Eddie’s grandma never drank he still uses her for guidance even though she has past away he still tries to connect with her and see what she would do. I did not find anything else. The things I find that people dealt with problems with either drinking or running from them. The play writer William S. Yellow Robe, Jr. is a enrolled member of the Assiniboine/Nakota nation. Mr. Yellow grew up on a reservation where he has got a lot of his inspiration for his works. Mr. Yellow has written 27 plays and thought theater at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe. The writer was not making plays to make money instead he was making them to grab attention. With the Independence of Eddie Rose he has sure grabbed my attention. Mr. Yellow has showed me that life on reservation is not like a twilight movie; life on a reservation was not like dancing with Indians, but from his perspective life on a reservation was pain and suffering. With such a controversial topic this play is sure to grab people’s attention. Mr. Yellow himself says on the reservation there was a lack of learning about the tribe it was more about American mainstream culture. This is why I had such a stuff time finding things that had culture in it, because on a reservation there was a lack of it. The school Mr. Yellow went did not help him learn about his tribe and culture even though they donated the land to build it.