Tayo In Leslie Marmon Silko's Ceremony

Decent Essays
In the fictional novel Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko, Tayo is a half Anglo, half Laguna Indian who recently returned from the Philippines where he fought in WWII and survived the Bataan Death March; as he is of mixed descent, Tayo does not fit in anywhere and is frequently sneered at by his peers, constricting his chances of being the traditional hero. During his hospital visit shortly after his return from the war, Tayo tells the doctors, “He can’t talk to you. He is invisible…He cries because they are dead and everything is dying” (Silko 27). Unlike the epic hero, Tayo lacks courage and chooses to live in ignorance, as evident by the fact that he refers to himself in the third-person; by doing this, Tayo is able to distance himself

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