Alyssa Colleen M.

Dejan AH 4
2014 19347 Section C

Boys Eye View

Indian Camp is a short story that tells of a boys experience in an Indian village with his
father. The story begins with Nick and his father, along with Uncle George, being brought to the
said village. The author has written the story with few detailbarely enough to picture out the
entire scenario, but enough to move the story forward. I interpret this manner of writing to be done
on purpose, as the story is written in an omniscient manner, by which case, the story is told in third
person but it follows the perspective of only one person (in this case, Nick). The dialogue of the
story reveals that Nick is a young boy and at the age where he is still guided by his father.
When an event unfolds, children tend to observe only important matters. This behavior is
reflected in the writing. For example, when Nick and his father were being led to the woman, the
description was limited to how they walked up from the beach through a meadow that was soaking
wet with dew. There are no details that further describe the scenery. From this, it can be told
that the story is written to what Nick observes.
Further in the story, Nick learns that the woman is about to give birth. At first, he constantly
asks questions, but he eventually falls silent as his father operates on the woman by way of
Caesarians section. It is later revealed that this was done with a jack-knife and tapered gut leaders,
due to the lack of tools. Undoubtedly, the operation was twice more gruesome than a normal
childbirth with the appropriate materials. This scenario would have been especially unpleasant to
children. As written further, Nick did not watch his father add stitches after the delivery, and that
his curiosity had been gone for a long time. The statement exposes the unsavory effect of the
operation on Nick.
In addition, the characters discover the corpse of the womans husband, who had been lying
on the upper bunk of the bed throughout the operation. Nick had seen the head being tipped back
by his father. In the same morning, at almost the same time, the boy had seen life and death in the
very same shanty. A normal reaction to this situation would have been devastation, more so for
someone of Nicks age. However, Nick seems to react to the scenario calmly, as read from the
dialogue he exchanges with his father on their way back to the lake. The story ends with a
concluding statement, revealing that Nick was quite sure he would never die.
In the last two paragraphs, the author twice mentions that the father is rowing the boat as
they leave the village. I consider this to partly explain Nicks last thoughts. I interpret these
statements to mean that Nick is not ready to understand. In spite of his fathers words to cushion
the overwhelming events that occurred that morning, to have witnessed a childs gruesome birth
and a mans grisly death were like avalanches to Nick. I perceive the last statement to be a way for
the boy to cope with the distressing circumstances. His inability to row the boat that morning could
be a metaphor to emphasize that Nick was still a child, not ready to grasp the concept of life and
death, and Nick felt that a child like himself was not any closer to either of these.