SOURCE: "Mediation and Multiple Narrative in Love Medicine," in North Dakota Quarterly, Vol. 59, No. 4, Fall, 1991, pp. 229-41.

In the following essay, Ruppert explains the ways in which Erdrich allows readers of Love Medicine, both Native and non-Native American, to experience the Native perspective in the text.

Love Medicine is a dazzling, personal, intense novel of survivors who struggle to define their own identities and fates in a world of mystery and human frailty. In her writing, Louise Erdrich both protects and celebrates this world. To assume effectively the roles of protector and celebrant, Erdrich must mediate between two conceptual frameworks, white and Native. But as a contemporary Native American writer, she appreciates and utilizes both epistemological codes. Erdrich has at her disposal both Native American and white codes at any moment in the creation of the text. This dual vision allows her either to use one code to...