38 pages • 1 hour read
Tomson HighwayThe Rez Sisters
Fiction | Play | Adult | Published in 1986A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
Names and Naming
One motif in The Rez Sisters is naming. There are several nicknames used among the sisters and, at several points, the inaccuracies of these nicknames are brought up. For example, Philomena is called “Philomena Moosemeat” (107) behind her back and to her face. Annie has to correct herself, saying “Philomena Moosemeat…I mean, Moosetail” when asking to borrow a record player from Philomena (115). Philomena is the comedic character, so this nickname is played for laughs, in counterpoint to a more serious name change.
Zhaboonigan is listed as such in the cast of characters (xiii); however, her adoptive mother Veronique argues that this is merely a nickname. Zhaboonigan is named Marie Adele (40), according to Veronique. While talking to Nanabush, Zhaboonigan mentions the origins of her nickname. Zhaboonigan, she believes “means needle” (48) and refers to the screwdriver that was used by the boys who sexually abused her. She is named for her trauma, and she names the boys who traumatized her at several points in the play: “Nicky Ricky Ben Mark” (48, 93). Her naming of her abusers becomes a metaphorical way of holding them accountable for their violence. In the absence of justice, Zhaboonigan nonetheless accuses and condemns her attackers. This is a much darker look at naming, which necessitates a comedic counterpoint like Philomena.
Naming and identity are also closely connected in Emily Dictionary, who insists that she earned her abusive ex-husband’s name “Dadzinanare” by learning “to fight back” against him (53). The confusion of “Dadzinanare” for “Dictionary” symbolizes both how Emily’s real identity is concealed from her sisters for much of the play and how Emily struggles to reconcile her private life with her public perception.
Animals
In the play, animal symbolism is used in matters of life and death as well as in matters of sibling rivalry. While Marie-Adele tries to shoo away Nanabush in his disguise as a seagull, she only accepts his guidance to heaven when he appears as the nighthawk. Highway describes this disguise as “the dancer in dark feathers” (xiii) in the list of characters, and when this costuming appears the second time, a stage direction states that “Marie-Adele meets Nanabush” (103). In this moment of perception and acceptance of Nanabush’s guidance toward heaven, the symbolism of the nighthawk seems closest to the trickster’s spirit form. Nanabush, according to the author’s note, straddles the human world and the world of “God, the Great Spirit” (xii). While the actual seagulls circling Marie-Adele’s house are present when she is dying and leave after her death, the less common nighthawk is the symbolic creature that Marie-Adele responds to.
Again, balancing the darkness in the play (Marie-Adele’s cancer) with some comedic moments, Highway uses animal symbols when the sisters insult each other in Wasy’s general store. Some insults carry the connotations of the animal with them, such as “evil no-good insect” (47), “some kind of insect, sticking insect claws into everybody’s business” (45), and “maggot-mouthed vulture” (47). Other insults leave the symbolic interpretations aside, like the stand-alone “Cockroach!” (45). In this context, insects symbolize invading a community and only negatively contributing to the life of the community. This symbolism is developed by the addition of a bird: insects are associated with spoiled food, such as food a vulture would eat. In other words, to call someone an insect—or a bird that eats food infested with insects—is to say they are making the community unappealing.
Music
Another motif in The Rez Sisters is music. Annie and Emily help fundraise for the trip to Toronto by performing at the Anchor Inn, bringing in “$330 at the door” (76). The lyrics of the song they sing are included in Highway’s script. Their song is written by Emily in memory of her dead female San Franciscan lover, Rose. It’s called “Thinkin of You,” and includes lyrics like “If time can heal up our partin’ / Then love can remove all this pain. / If love is the secret of livin’, / Then give me that love, shinin’ light” (75). These lyrics speak to Emily’s private suffering over the loss of her beloved before she comes out to Marie-Adele as bisexual later in the play.
In addition to original music, The Rez Sisters includes famous music by Patsy Cline. Annie’s package from the general store is a “record. Patsy Cline” (53), and Emily sings a Patsy Cline hit song while Annie drives Eugene’s van toward Toronto; a stage direction notes Emily “Starts singing [...] ‘Crazy’ [...] all the way through Annie’s next speech” (83). These moments show the connections that women have on the reservation to mainstream music. Notably, Cline is also a watershed figure in country music who often sang about the disappointments and struggles of women, especially in love.
Additionally, there are some snippets of songs, such as “I’m a little Indian who loves fry bread” (82), which have a lighter tone than most of the country music that Highway includes. These songs balance the dark tone of many moments in the play while engaging with Indigenous identity as formed through stereotype and self-determination.
Related Titles
By Tomson Highway
