"Matinee"

Susan Clements

UA, page 73

Biographical Information:

Susan Clements was born in 1950 in Livingston Manor, New York (Spratlin). Clements is of Blackfeet, Mohawk, Seneca, and European heritage. She has written The Broken Hoop, published in 1988, as well as In the Moon When the Deer Lose Their Horns, published in 1993 (UA 387). She went to Binghamton University (Spratlin). Binghamton is located in New York, as is the Seneca Nation. The Mohawk and Seneca Nations are part of The Six Nations of the Iroquois. The Six Nations are located in the northern U.S. and in Canada. Seneca Indians.com recognizes Clements as a Seneca Indian poet. The Blackfeet Nation is located in Montana, so even though Clements is not full, or pure blood, the three Indian Nations are fairly similar to one another in their locations.

Course Objectives:

Objective 4: To register the minority dilemma of assimilation or resistance—i. e., do you fight or join the culture that oppressed you? What balance do minorities strike between economic benefits and personal or cultural sacrifices? In general, immigrants assimilate, while minorities (esp. African Americans) remain distinct.

In Matinee: Takes on a twist to Obj. 4. The speaker is fighting to assimilate into the dominant culture.

Literary Term:

From The Bedford Glossary of Critical and Literary Terms:

Representation: The use of one thing to stand or substitute for another through some kind of signifying medium. New Historians have recently given the word a more specific meaning, and use representation to refer to the symbolic constructions of a given society in a specific era. New Historians view representations as both products of and the means of propagating the culture’s prevailing ideologies and power relations. In other words, representations maintain the status of the dominant class by re-presenting the belief systems and preserving the institutions upon which their status and power depend upon (407).

My Interpretation:

This poem is very straightforward and prose like, so I almost forgot I was reading a poem and not a short story. I do not believe there are any lines that are difficult to understand, so I will just discuss what I picked up from reading it. I think the poem is a sort of social commentary on society and its representation of American Indians. Clements was a kid in the 50’s and 60’s, and the poem is dated as being back then. (You can’t go to the movies now for a quarter.) Now in 2004 I think American society is much more interested in being “politically correct”. Although modern movies such Disney’s Pocahontas and Dances With Wolves may portray American Indians in a stereotypical fashion, the stereotype is a good one, as opposed to savage and nasty. The young speaker of the poem it seems has completely assimilated into the dominant culture, and is somewhat traumatized my learning she is part of a shunned minority group. I believe the author is pointing out the injustice of the dominant culture’s representation of American Indians.

Questions:

1. Lines 13 and 14 are a problem for me: “to pretend tameness when your own blood ran wild with foxes and invisible deer.” The first time I read this I though she was just a tomboy, until on the second page I realized she had American Indian blood in her. These two lines seem to conform to the modern stereotype of American Indians. (I can just picture Disney’s Pocahontas running through a forest with animals singing about how she loves nature.) If the author is interested in confronting the dominant culture’s negative stereotype of her minority’s culture, then why does she seem embrace the positive, although oftentimes unrealistic, stereotype? 

In Geri Spratlin’s 2002 interpretation of the poem, Geri stated “The speaker dislikes the game because where the friend pretends to be in a domestic situation, even though the Indian child sees herself closer to nature, she assimilates into the dominant precept.” I am wondering then if maybe the author likes the stereotype of American Indians being close to nature, and all little American Indian girls being Pocahontas-like? 

2. The only line I believe that could be up for interpretation is the last line, “You glitter as you fall”. My interpretation is she is glittering because she is pretending to be a white princess, and she is falling because it is only pretend. Does anyone else have any interpretations or comments?
   
3. Does the author writing in this “free-verse” or “prose-poem” style have any impact on the poem and the meaning it conveys?