Student Question
What are some examples of Metafiction in "Goodbye Snauq" by Lee Maracle?
Quick answer:
"Goodbye, Snauq" is an example of metafiction because the speaker is acutely aware of the textuality of her experience, and the experience of those Indigenous peoples who came before her, conceiving of it as a story. She is especially concerned with "finish[ing] the story" in a way that feels emotionally resonant to her. She has inherited "context" and she must attempt to find "freedom" in the story she's inherited by finishing it: this is the purpose of the text.
Metafiction refers to a fictional text in which the speaker alludes to the fact that he or she knows that the text is a text, perhaps by parodying certain traditional narrative conventions. In "Goodbye Snauq," the narrator refers to stories, saying that "stories prepare us for [transformation]" and that one should "Find freedom in the context [they] inherit—every context is different." She is aware, evidently, of the text she creates and of the context in which she creates it.
Further, she is aware of the emotional weight of songs as texts, as she claims, "Christ, our songs are sad, even the happy ones." Here, she seems to refer to songs written by Indigenous artists, and she notes that even the songs that seem to be happy are actually quite sad, a not dissimilar truth about her own story. She struggles to come to terms with the intergenerational trauma experienced by...
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herself and other Indigenous peoples, claiming to have "joined the ranks of ancestors [she] was trying not to think about" as she tried to quell her rage resulting from the Squamish Nation's settlement with the Canadian government over Snauq, and she thinks of the story of her forebears as a story that she has inherited.
When the narrator describes the life of Khahtsahlano, she talks about it as though it is a story. She calls him "a serious rememberer who paid attention to the oracy of his past, the changing present, and the possibility of a future story." In the end, after passing out in front of her students, she says, "We need to finish this story." The lives before hers, her own life, and the life of her text/story are one, and her awareness of this—the discussion of it in the text itself—renders this an example of metafiction.
How is metafiction used in "Goodbye Snauq" by Lee Maracle?
Metafiction is a sophisticated literary technique employed by writers to call attention to the fact that the story being told is fiction. It's almost as if the author steps outside the primary story with a comment or reference to remind readers that the story has been created, sometimes blurring the lines between the narrator and the author.
We see this employed early in "Goodbye Snauq," especially early in the story. The second paragraph places the setting firmly in modern times, using details such as "bright white fluorescent bulbs" and "bright white envelope" to solidify a sense of time and place. (Coincidentally, we also see a repetitive usage of the color white here, which will grow in symbolism as the story develops.)
Yet a few paragraphs later, we are immersed into the world of Khahtsahlano and Swanamia. Consider this passage:
Swanamia does her best to choke back the tears, fingering each garment, weighing its value.... Her mind watches her husband's hand sharpening his adze, carving the tops of each piece of cutlery, every bowl and box. She remembers gathering cedar roots.
There are several layers of fiction here. The narrator of the story has transported us into another setting, presenting Swanamia as the focus of the narration. In doing so, she has also transported us into the very thoughts of Swanamia, while we are simultaneously aware that the narrator stands outside this time, in halls which are lit by fluorescent bulbs. As readers, we know that the author is blurring the timelines of her story through the techniques of metafiction.
Later while looking at her class, the narrator has another "memory" that she claims for Chief George, Chief Khahtsahlano, and her own Ta'ah. In this "memory," the narrator recalls the drying racks and smoke shacks of the old village. She sees children clutching their long, woven skirts. She recalls the beauty of the camas fields in bloom. The imagery is beautiful, but we are reminded that this memory is not the narrator's own experience but the compilation of her work to research and remember through the experiences of others.
This ability to blur the lines of setting is an important tool of metafiction that Lee Maracle employs to establish the importance of ancestral lands to modern Indigenous people. Because the narrator feels tied to the land of her ancestors, their experiences do hold great significance to her and their memories do become representative of her own emotional struggles to reconcile the present with the past.