48 pages • 1 hour read
Richard WagameseKeeper'n Me
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1994A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Book 2Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Book 2: “Beedahbun”
Book 2, Pages 87-106 Summary
Four months pass after Garnet’s return. He needs time to connect with his surroundings as he does not speak Ojibwe or know Ojibwe practices, but people make him feel at home. He also lives with his mother. He spends time with the community, often sitting around a fire while Wally Red Sky sings country songs.
One day, a woman notifies Garnet that Keeper wants to see him. Garnet knows that Keeper had an alcohol addiction, but he went away to rehab. Many people doubted his ability to recover. Alice tells him that she and Keeper were friends and went to residential school together. Keeper now lives in the old cabin of Garnet’s grandfather, Harold.
Garnet visits Keeper in the cabin. Keeper knew Harold since he was a kid. Harold was a traditional man and the last to know about Midewewin, “the people’s guardians” (98). Midewewin protected the community through ceremonies and knew all about the world. People changed after the arrival of white people and were “distracted” by white culture and were no longer seeking traditional teachings. However, more and more feel like they are missing something. Keeper tells Garnet that very few people know the Midewewin tradition.
Keeper shows Garnet a drum given to him by Harold. The drum belongs to the Ojibwe, and it is Keeper’s responsibility to keep it. He reveals that Harold was his teacher and told him about the Midewewin, other Ojibwe stories, and the importance of plants and animals. Keeper stresses that the drum is sacred and “holds the heartbeat of the people” (102). The keeper of the drum knows how to pray and bless the people. Keeper felt guilty when he distanced himself from Harold’s teachings, and people called him Keeper as a joke. He thought that he could never overcome his alcohol addiction, but Alice encouraged him. He says that Garnet reminds him of himself.
Keeper suggests that they be each other’s guides. He praises Garnet’s courage to return home, saying that both need to find their way back by spending time together. Garnet agrees.
Book 2, Pages 107-132 Summary
Keeper narrates how the Ojibwe lost their traditional faith after the arrival of the missionaries. Prayer was always important for the Ojibwe and a reminder to be good to each other and respect the Earth. Keeper and Garnet start practicing traditional prayer, smudging themselves with burned cedar, and Garnet finds a part of himself that was missing. Keeper notes that prayer helps one find their truth. He was lost just like Garnet and understands him. Praying helped him reconnect with his inner self.
Garnet learns more about Ojibwe tradition from Keeper and practices a “sunrise ceremony” with him. Garnet understands that “being Indian is living with respect” (113). Praying with Keeper in the morning brings him closer to nature, and he enjoys their early mornings together. Keeper tells him that Beedahbun means first light. Garnet also learns more about the people and structure of the reserve, meeting several of his relatives. White Dog is an isolated community where all people know and are friendly to each other. The bond of the community is “a big source of pride” for the tribe (119). Garnet criticizes the Canadian government’s many unfulfilled promises and notes that the tribe depends on welfare. Tourism is a main source of income for the community. Garnet also notes that humor is characteristic in the tribe. He learns from Keeper that humor is “the way they’ve survived everything and still remained a culture” (125).
Spending time with Keeper helps Garnet reconnect to the place, and he begins to change. However, he knows that people may distrust him. Being Indigenous is more than performing traditional practices or wearing regalia, and Garnet is still trying to find himself. Keeper tells him that after cultural loss, it takes time to reinstate “Indian heart” and find a place within the community. Gradually, however, Garnet learns to cope with people’s different reactions, and people become comfortable with him. However, the “brooding silence” of Jackie troubles Garnet. Jackie does not speak to his brother and they behave like strangers.
Book 2, Pages 133-162 Summary
Garnet sits in a circle around a fire with his mother, brothers, sister, Keeper, an uncle, and an auntie. Keeper plays the drum and they all dance, except Jackie. When Garnet attempts to play the drum and fails to get the rhythm, Jackie tells him “he ain’t no Indyun” (135).
Stanley explains to Garnet that Jackie is more “intense.” Garnet notes that Jackie spends much time with Stanley, who is passionate about social work. Stanley says that Jackie spent much time with their grandfather and their father, and their death traumatized him. He is “wild inside” and always a strong man, who as a kid hated their foster homes. Garnet realizes that Jackie experiences “a different kind of pain” than he himself does (139).
Garnet learns a lot from Jane, who has a strong memory. Jane explains that Jackie was involved in the American Indian Movement and became a significant leader, supporting Indigenous values and fighting for the tribe’s rights. Jackie is angry just like their father used to be and bears his trauma.
Meanwhile, Garnet learns from Keeper the significance of stories. Stories are told during the winter, when people can listen and spend time thinking about them. Garner tells him about Jackie. Keeper relates Jackie to bears as people must learn from animals. He tells Garnet that bears play often as mother bears teach their cubs through game. For Keeper, it is a “bear thing” between Garnet and Jackie. Garnet wonders what it means.
Garnet learns that the community has a good hockey team and he wants to participate. Jackie says that he is not strong enough to play “Indyun Hockey.” Stanley tells Garnet that Jackie trains every morning, and Garnet decides to go along. As they start skating together, Jackie and Garnet begin to bond. They fall down laughing, and Jackie tells Garnet that he missed him. He tried to forget him and hated everything about whites. When Garnet returned, Jackie was afraid that he might hate Garnet for being influenced by white culture and decided to remain distant. He knows now that Keeper is teaching him well and realizes that he might understand more about whites from Garnet. The Raven family becomes closer.
Mornings with Keeper awaken Garnet. Keeper says that Beedahbun connects people to life and makes them part of everything.
Book 2 Analysis
A turning point for Garnet is the start of his relationship with Keeper, as it is Keeper who helps Garnet to understand Ojibwe culture and the Indigenous worldview. Keeper is an elder, but he was also impacted by loss like Garnet. Keeper recently recovered from alcohol addiction and lived through the traumatic experience of residential schools along with Garnet’s mother. The theme of The Impact of Colonialism on Indigenous Tradition reemerges in the background of Keeper’s life and interconnects with the theme of Indigenous Healing Through Storytelling and Community. Keeper represents the possibility of healing after experiencing colonial trauma, providing a hopeful figure that promises a positive narrative arc for Garnet.
Garnet also influences Keeper. This provides a sense of balance, a motif to which Wagamese returns throughout the novel. In Garner and Keeper’s relationship, there is no extraction but rather knowledge exchange. Keeper addresses Garnet on equal terms, acknowledging the impact of colonialism on both and their need to heal. He speaks about his past and confesses that he also distanced himself from Ojibwe culture. For Keeper, both men need to “find [their] way back” (104), emphasizing a partnership in equilibrium.
Keeper is connected to the Raven family as Garnet’s grandfather, Harold, was his teacher and guide. The community considers Harold “the last of the real traditional Ojibway” (94). The fact that Harold made Keeper the keeper of the drum, which symbolizes “the heartbeat of the people” (102), emphasizes his important role as an elder and guardian of tradition. This heartbeat metaphor connects to Garnet’s recognition of his mother’s heartbeat earlier in the novel, and again, the heartbeat represents the precolonial state of the people that cannot be destroyed. Keeper notes, relatedly, that traditional knowledge is never erased and that it was always inside Garnet.
Wagamese extends the metaphor of the heart when portraying communal acceptance for Garnet. It is not enough for Garnet to become part of the Ojibwe, as people become suspicious of those who return from the white world. For Keeper, having an “Indian heart” is key to cultural survival and requires a process of healing. This metaphor reinforces the novel’s metaphor of a heart as an internal sense of Indigenous tradition untouched by colonialism. Keeper notes that, to counter colonial trauma and find their way home, people must “learn how to be what the Creator made [them] to be” (130), furthering the novel’s sense that Ojibwe people retain their traditions inside them.
While exploring quasi-innate knowledge, Wagamese contrasts a rigid and an innate sense of temporality. Keeper initiates Garnet to the Ojibwe tradition through a ceremony of burning cedar at sunrise. The ceremony is a traditional form of prayer that helps Garnet reconnect with his inner self. The same ritual helped Keeper find himself years before. The theme of The Power of Connection to the Land reemerges as Garnet continues the practice daily, becoming more attuned to an innate sense of time in the natural world: “[p]retty soon it got to be as natural as could be and I was waking up long before the alarm clock” (114). Each morning walk makes Garnet feel “in tune with things” (114). This sense of temporality represents a decolonized mindset.
Jackie remains distant in most of this section, and Garnet feels rejected. Jackie is an angry young man who still carries the trauma of their father’s death and the experience of foster homes. The theme of Indigenous Healing Through Storytelling and Community reemerges as Keeper helps Garnet to approach his brother with a story about bears. As bears learn through playing, he advises Garnet to do the same with his brother. Ultimately, Jackie and Garnet bond over playing hockey, and their reconciliation helps both heal part of themselves. Their reconnection completes the reunion of the Raven family and signifies a new start.
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By Richard Wagamese
