From Alienation To Sanity

In her masterpiece Ceremony,Leslie Marmon Silko successfully presents how the witchery is over in the storytelling of Indian myth and how the alienated protagonist gets cured by ceremony in the prose with the application of frame narrative.She explores a profound philosophical truth about balance,change and regeneration by explaining the relationship between the traditional myth and the recovery of Tayo.This thesis mainly applies the alienation theories of the distinguished humanistic psychoanalyst Erich Fromm to analyze the protagonist Tayo's despair,helplessnes,rootlessness in his self-alienation plight when confronted with the alienation both from the traditional Indian culture and the mainstream American culture,and his way from alienation to sanity through performing the Indian ceremonies.Through a text-based analysis of Ceremony,this thesis will systematically analyze the causes,classification,symptoms and the solutions of Tayo's alienation problem.The alienated Tayo in a dilemma gets cured by the changing and growing ceremony of the Indian medicine man Betonie.In Betonie's ceremony,Tayo reconstructs his ties with himself,with Indian culture and with American culture.In the end,Indians accept Tayo as the hero of the Laguna tribe by listening to his storytelling.Tayo's storytelling mixing with Indian myth will also protect the land and its people.Tayo finds his root in performing Betonie's Indian ceremony,and herealizes his conformity to others when he takes refuge in Indian beliefs.Tayo finally can feel both individuality and integrity brought by love and he succeeds in regaining his sense of identity in the Laguna tribe.And he transcends his passivity as a half-Laguna,half-white person by developing an open view of world and nation.So far,Tayo has successfully overcome his alienation from himself,from the Indian culture and from the white culture by satisfying human's needs as a sane person with the help of Indian rituals.