Green Grass, Running Water Literary Elements

Indigenous fiction; satire; political critique; magical realism

The realistic portions of the novel are set in Alberta, Canada in the 20th century. There are many allusions to historical events of the 19th and 20th centuries, and also non-realistic sections that take place outside of chronological time.

The novel does feature an unnamed character who acts as a first-person narrator for some sections. This narrator is not, however, always present, and other sections are narrated in the third-person perspective. The point of view changes frequently so as to give the reader insight into the perspectives of different characters.

The tone of the novel is often playful, funny, sarcastic, or teasing. Various characters joke with each other, make humorous comments about their lives, or become playfully exasperated with each other. Although many of the topics are serious, such as racial injustice, oppression, and gendered violence, they are often presented through sarcastic critique or dark humor.

There is no dominant protagonist in the novel, but Eli and Clifford Sifton are one pair of characters who exist in a protagonist-antagonist relationship.

The central explicit conflict of the novel is over the construction and use of a huge dam located on Native lands. A large corporation and the government are in favor of the dam because of the potential profit, but Eli is adamantly opposed to it and has been using legal action to stall the project for years. The conflict encapsulates a deeper struggle between Aboriginal traditions, practices, and land rights, and Western colonial forces seeking to dominate them and wipe out these traditions.

The climax occurs when a giant earthquake takes place, breaking the dam and sending the waters spilling forth in a huge flood.

The earthquake is foreshadowed when the elders first disappear and Dr. Hovaugh expresses his anxieties that every time they vanish, a natural disaster takes place. There is also subtle foreshadowing when the elders remind Coyote to be careful to mind his behavior, since he seems to have a habit of accidentally causing trouble. Finally, the earthquake is foreshadowed by the rainfall that takes place shortly beforehand, disrupting the plans of the various characters.

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Allusions are used constantly throughout the novel, referring to everything from popular cowboy and Indian films, to Biblical stories, to well-known works of literature by authors ranging from Herman Melville to Shakespeare. Characters tend to be given names linking them to either literary or film characters, or to individuals involved in the historical interactions between Native peoples and white settlers; for example, Clifford Sifton shares the name of a Canadian politician who encouraged European immigration to Canada and the expansion of those immigrants into the Prairie regions, thus disrupting the lives of Native peoples in those regions.

See section on Imagery

The most striking use of paradox in the novel is that endings are always simultaneously presented as beginnings. Every time one of the creation stories seems to have reached a conclusion, a new version of the story begins again. This paradox prevents a reader from assuming that one version of events is the only perspective, and suggests that there is always more that could be said about a given topic.

Parallelism is used repeatedly in the novel to suggest the ways in which the stories interconnect, and in which history tends to repeat itself. Each of the four creation stories roughly parallels the others in that a female protagonist moves from Sky World into Water World, encounters various kinds of danger and oppression from Western, male figures, and eventually fuses into the figure of one of the elders located in Fort Marion, Florida. The repetition of parallel elements suggest patterns and also allow for the stories to become intertwined, showing how experiences and individuals are always interconnected with each other. Similar parallelism also occurs in the personal histories of the contemporary characters. Latisha and Alberta, for example, both experience disappointing and frustrating marriages, while Eli and Charlie both navigate ambivalence between their cultural heritage and their status as educated professionals. These parallel plots suggest that while the characters exist as individuals, they also experience shared challenges as a result of their Native American identities.

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