Beyond Eden

Tonight I went to see a play that is part of the Olympiad, the cultural arm of the Winter Olympics. The play, Beyond Eden, is the story of White anthropologist Wilson Duff and Haida artist Bill Reid's 1957 journey up to Haida Gwaii (the Queen Charlotte Islands) with a team of anthropologists to harvest Haida totem poles to take back to Vancouver "to preserve their memory". The names were changed but the events did happen. I believe that some of the poles taken remain today in places such as Stanley Park, Victoria and the UBC's Museum of Anthropology.

The play focuses on the inner and outward struggle between honouring the intended purpose of the totems, to stand as markers and guardians until they are absorbed back into the earth to be recycled by Nature, or to remove them so others, White and Native, can see and learn from them and the culture be preserved in a European fashion. The specter of tourist dollars is not mentioned, but undoubtedly that was also in the minds of the corporate boards who bankrolled the expedition. Ironically the White protagonist sees the need to leave the poles where they are decaying while the Native lead is determined to preserve them. The final scene with Lewis Wilson (Wilson Duff) sitting defeated in the blue-green light of the forest amongst the downed totems was a stunning visual.

Here is a small excerpt from my novel in progress, the end of Chapter 3 of "Metlakatla":

"I remain here in Metlakatla, abandoned by my people long ago. I cannot return to my village of Gitka-ata. My people deserted it many years before they deserted me. If you visit the place where it once was you will see only the rotting house posts and totems we left to guard our home until we return.

But we will never return. Those who tried after living many years in Metlakatla learned that the River Spirits became angry with us after we deserted them. They have built sandbars so our canoes can never use their beach again. Our people had to search for a new place to build their village.

The old totems still stand at Gitka-ata. They are the only ones who remain. Some stand tall and noble, while others are leaning, beginning their return to the earth. Their faces are grey and cracked like old men left to die. Their paint has been worn away by the sun and the rain. They are lonely for the company of men.

Their big ears listen for our paddles and the sound of our canoes scraping on the pebbles of the shore, but they hear only the river and the waves. Their big eyes stare across the water, to the canyon that leads to the sea. They watch patiently for our canoes to appear around the mountainside at the end of the bay, but they never appear. They cannot see the forest behind them that has taken back the places where our houses once stood. They do not see it creeping up slowly, preparing to crush them in its jaws."