Dec 21, 2009

The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven | Summary and Analysis: Distances and Imagining the Reservation

New Characters
Tremble Dancer: an Urban Indian who is the love interest of the narrator in the first story.

Summary
“Distances” is the story that Thomas tells during the bus ride to the state penitentiary after his trial. It is a visionary tale of an apocalypse that kills the majority of the white population and spares much of the Native American community. The narrator imagines that this event is the result of a Ghost Dance—an attempt to bring back the ancestors and old times—that finally worked.

The action begins with the survivors’...