On Silko's "Lullaby"

Silko’s short story “Lullaby” is told from the perspective of an old woman. Ayah is looking back over her life and reminiscing about events that have transpired. We learn in the first paragraph that, “She was an old woman now, and her life had become memories” (Silko). We soon learn about how her husband was taken advantage of by his white employer, how her son dies in the Army, how her husband speaks English (and how it is endangering to speak the white man’s language) and why she seemingly resents him for it. Ayah, like many other American Indians has watched as her life has endured many intrusions from white men. She offers her story of lost tradition and lost lives; loss that is associated with white America. At the end of her story, she sings her dying husband the lullaby an act of perpetuating tradition.

She begins her reminiscing trying to avoid thinking about a blanket that she is wrapped in which we later learn was a gift from her dead son Jimmie; an Army blanket. We learn that in contrast to the green army blanket with faded color and unraveling edges that her Grandmother’s blankets were soft and so tightly woven that rain ran right over them (Silko 95). Ayah’s Grandmother’s blankets are a product of tradition. Of a communal effort to create something that would provide warmth and protection from the elements. Yet the Army blanket has become tattered and faded and is something made by white men in contrast to the blankets woven traditionally by her grandmother. The blankets are an example of the vast differences between the traditions of the American Indian and the intrusive ways of the white man.

Class Question:

Why was Ayah’s relationship with her husband so distant? Does you feel she supports his decisions?

Silko, Leslie Marmon. "Lullaby." Barbara Roche Rico, Sandra Mano. American Mosaic. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2001. 95-98.