It’s no surprise that film-maker John Sayles is also an author. His latest book, To Save the Man, is a broad-reaching, meticulously researched depiction of the events in Native American history that took place in the final months of 1890, culminating with the Massacre at Wounded Knee.
At the novel’s start, we meet a group of children arriving at the “Carlisle Indian Industrial School” in Virginia. It was founded and run by US Indian Wars veteran Richard Henry Pratt, whose motto was “to save the man, you must kill the Indian”, hence the title. Antoine is a smart Ojibwe boy, good at English; Makes Trouble is a young Lakota warrior with no knowledge of white culture. Wilma Pretty Weasel is from Crow Nation, forced to the school against her will.
In addition to telling their story, Sayles cleverly connects each of the children back to members of their respective tribes in the West, thereby giving us voices at source through which we learn developments with the “Ghost Dancing” phenomenon. This was a peaceful movement based on a prophecy that the white man would be destroyed and the native nation restored if the dance was performed. It generated widespread panic among settlers and government alike.
To this construct, Sayles adds the further voices of an extended cast of characters, managing, with singular dexterity to acquaint the reader with the various official (and unofficial) acts of betrayal suffered by Native American nations historically. We meet misguided Catholic priests, cruel government agents, genocidal racists and buffalo soldiers. When Clarence, one of the pupils at Carlisle, returns home after Christmas to the Pine Ridge Reservation near Wounded Knee Creek, we see his own family trying to survive on decimated lands, Lakota warriors trying to balance the honouring of tradition with the fire power of the US army, and the story is brought to its dreadful end.
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Sayles, as his work in film has consistently proved, has earnestly and excellently explored American social and historical issues throughout his career, and this work is no exception. While the author makes it clear that he himself is not Native American, he has researched and written a powerful book that embraces an astonishing sweep of historical events and personages. Cinematic both in its scope and its narrative construction, To Save the Man demonstrates all of the sincerity and passion we have come to expect from Sayles as an activist and an artist.
