(Our group appreciated the many details about the Indigenous situation from which he originated and the broadening of our perspective about the residential experience.)
As one who grew up in England, this book helped fill a gap in my knowledge of the residential schools and the suppression of the Indigenous people’s culture. The book was fascinating and the story of Tomson’s birth gripping. The scale of his accomplishments in adulthood is astonishing considering the challenges of his early life.
Loved the book! It was very interesting even if sometimes there was too much explanation. The ruggedness of the life was amazing. It provided an insight into how bizarre the residential experience must have been for these indigenous children even in the best of circumstances. It was refreshing to learn about the positive aspects of the residential school experience and that the author was able to transcend the negative with his joie de vivre. While conveying a sense of its rugged magnificence, it included so much about a land that is largely unseen by us. I was amazed by how huge the Subarctic is and by the Indigenous people’s understanding of their environment.
Loved the book! An example of why I get pleasure from the book club, i.e., I get to read interesting books that I would not have read otherwise. I plan to make gifts of this one. It needs to be owned. It can’t be read quickly. Each chapter is an episode to be savored on its own. Although the book was rich with detail, it was surprisingly light on the sexual abuse. It is amazing how Tomson became so enthralled with music.
While he came from a family that had no formal education, they were clearly of superior intelligence, skillful, hardworking, and successful in business. The parents seemed to be loving people who gave him a good foundation for life, and a sense of togetherness and belonging. Generally, being two spirited seemed mostly to be treated as special rather than abhorred. Highway did a masterful job of communicating his connection with and love for the land; his writing was joyful, humorous, and quirky. I enjoyed reading about the travails of the priest and the nomadic lifestyle. The information about language and names was intriguing.
The author described a way of life that was completely alien to me. Some of his memories may be warped and not actually true. But that’s no secret as he tells us at the beginning of the book, “this is a shape-shifter book, residing in the space between fact and fiction, the fantastical place of memory and dream”. His words are shrouded in positiveness—a quality he likely inherited from his father whom we were told always found a ‘silver lining’.
I really liked the book; a friend disagreed saying it was too pollyannaish. My thought was that with everything else we have heard recently, “Give me Pollyanna”. I liked the positivity, the portrayal of his family and the apparent equal partnership between the parents. It was interesting that the Dene and the Cree lived close together but spoke different languages and did not embrace Catholicism to the same degree and so the land was their commonality. The writing was delightful, containing many wonderful descriptive passages.
Having lived and worked in Manitoba, I really enjoyed the book as it was like going back into the past. I am aware that some consider it a book about a “fantasy” Manitoba. I was familiar with his father who periodically flew to Winnipeg to take part in dog sledding competitions. And I have traveled to the Northern area and witnessed the stunning landscape. My first awareness of Tomson Highway was as an author of children’s books which were marked by a playful kind of writing. A style that persists into this book and one not typical of others writing about the residential school experience—not everybody is on the same page. He covers a lot of topics —some familiar and some needing more discussion, and some about which we know little.
Permanent Astonishment is for me important because of the author’s knowledge of the Cree language and his use of it throughout the book in the text, though this does slow the reader down. His memories of his residential school are diverse and balanced including sexual abuse. Seasonal activities, language games, bullying, the role of lay brothers, parental support for education and grief for dead children are all dealt with in ways others have not. Tomson and his brother Rene were among the brightest students ever to attend these schools and it is of interest to see how they progressed. The book does become somewhat tedious in its descriptions of the Northern characters.
His humour permeated the book—within and between chapters. One example that I particularly enjoyed was the contrast between his description of how his family fished through the ice and the methods used for tourist fishers. His language was a remarkable blend of linguistic and cultural influences containing an ability to deploy truly experiential descriptions—magnificent word painting. There was some repetition in the details; however, this rendered the text readily readable as episodes.
Our rating:
