House Made of Dawn
N. Scott Momaday (1968)
“A Pueblo veteran returns from World War II unable to speak, unable to pray, unable to run with the dawn — and discovers that the land remembers what he has forgotten.”
Short Summary
Abel, a young man from the Jemez Pueblo in New Mexico, returns from World War II shattered and silent. He cannot reintegrate into the ceremonial life of the pueblo or function in the white urban world of Los Angeles. After killing an albino man he perceives as evil, Abel is imprisoned, relocated, beaten nearly to death, and spiritually hollowed out. The novel traces his circular journey from the pueblo to prison to the city and back again, ending with Abel running at dawn in the landscape of his childhood — not healed, but running.
Detailed Summary
House Made of Dawn opens on February 28, 1952, with Abel running alone across the Jemez Pueblo landscape at dawn. The image is the novel's first and last: a man running in the half-light, the land enormous around him, the act of running inseparable from prayer. The rest of the novel explains how Abe...