Symbolism In Leslie Marmon Silko's Ceremony

Trevor Coulombe

10/28/16

Kristin Dawley

American Studies

Symbolism in Ceremony

The book Ceremony written by Leslie Marmon Silko is the story of a young man named Tayo. After returning from the war in Japan, Tayo experiences PTSD and hopes that he can heal himself by reconnecting with his native culture. Along the way, Tayo encounters many people who share their wisdom and ultimately help Tayo begin to feel whole again. To follow Tayo’s healing process, we must understand the significance of colors - in particular yellow, blue and white - and what they symbolize throughout the story.

Color for Tayo’s people (Laguna) was extremely important. Yellow, blue and white appear in the ceremonies performed by Ku'oosh, Betonie, and Ts’eh, but also in nature.

On his healing journey, Tayo eats blue cornmeal and Betonie the medicine man paints yellow, blue and white bear tracks on the ground. Ts'eh uses all three colors as well when she pairs stones and plants. Yellow represents healing and rebirth while blue is the color of clarity and serenity. White, a color which not born of nature, is a color that is above nature and the animals.

An example of white being a color of death, can be seen in the tree that was slowly dying in the bar. “The big tree was dying. Thick limbs at its center were brittle and white.”(95) White being the color of death and decay. Tayo refers to himself as white smoke during his hospital stay and after. “For a long time he had been white smoke. He did not realize that until he left the hospital, because white smoke had no consciousness of itself. It faded into the white world of their bed sheets and walls; it was sucked away by the words of doctors who tried to talk to the invisible scattered smoke”(13) He feels that he is not really anyone or anywhere. He does not feel. I think that Tayo referring to himself as “white smoke” may be him hinting that he felt like he was