26 pages • 52 minutes read
Heart Berries
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Chapters 1-2Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 1 Summary: “Indian Condition”
Mailhot tells the story of her life in brief, lyrical snippets that exist outside time and space. She begins by saying “my story was maltreated” (1) and proceeds to describe the mistreatment of her body and her story by men who see her story, which depicts incredible pain, as a “solicitation” (1), or a way of using pity to ask for hand-outs. Mailhot begins to share her stories with women. She writes about the Indian condition—a deep grief and drive for survival. Most of her memories revolve around the life and death of her grandmother, a nursery teacher who dewormed Indian children on the reservation using laxatives. After she dies, Mailhot’s mother calls in psychics to exorcise Mailhot’s grief and cure her tuberculosis. Mailhot lies about communing with the spirit of her grandmother. She foreshadows the pain of leaving the reservation with glimpses into her young adult life: she marries as a teenager, her husband Vito takes her first son Isadore after a battle in court, and she gives birth to another boy, Isaiah, in the same month as the custody trial. She leaves the reservation soon after and begins to take writing courses.
Chapter 2 Summary: “Heart Berries”
Mailhot falls in love with her professor. They begin their affair in a motel room, and then don’t speak for a few weeks. Mailhot is overcome by the physical urge to be near him. While waiting to hear from her lover, Mailhot takes a trip with another suitor and finds the weekend unsatisfying because she is bothered by his constant presence. As a result, she becomes demanding and rude. During this trip, her teacher calls and explains that he left his girlfriend to be with her. She rushes home and they begin a tumultuous affair unlike any she has had before. Casey, her lover, thinks of her as an equal. He is kind to her seven-year-old son. Unlike many suitors, he doesn’t yearn to please Mailhot. But there is a strange power dynamic; Mailhot feels as if she is losing herself in the deep love she has for Casey. The racial and cultural differences between them lead to miscommunication: “I knew better. White people are brutally awkward, even you” (9). Mailhot recounts the story of the first medicine man, Heart Berry Boy, who had to give himself up entirely to Bear to learn the secrets of healing. Eventually, unspoken pain and conflict get in the way and the relationship ends.
Chapters 1-2 Analysis
Mailhot begins her memoir with an exploration of storytelling, which sets the stage for the way she will tell her life story. She is concerned with a larger eternal narrative and connection to the traditional storytelling of her people, in which there is no past. She recounts her own history in a similar way, with few time signatures or names. She uses a non-linear framework, repeats herself, and speaks to larger themes rather than rely on a plot arc. She explains this style in the first chapter, as she discusses her philosophy on story and power.
The themes of love and agency are also relevant here and repeat throughout the essay collection as Mailhot struggles to retain a sense of self through her love affair with a White professor. She tells the story of the Heart Berry Boy, who gives himself up to learn the secrets of healing. Like Heart Berry Boy, Mailhot surrenders herself and discovers a space to heal and find herself in the pain of her struggles. This story is reflective of not only her healing journey, but also her struggle with self-sacrifice and self-hatred.
Finally, Mailhot introduces concepts of traditional healing, including those used by her grandmother and the mystics brought to her home after her death, to set the stage for the duality of her healing journey. She is institutionalized in a Western hospital but maintains her traditional roots. This duality first appears in her childhood after her mother brings home a White healer, and Mailhot foreshadows the continued struggle between traditional and Western healing methodologies she experiences in regard to her mental health.
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