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Foreshadowing
Chapter 5
Explanation and Analysis—Manitou Gameeng:
Naomi regales Benjamin and Saul with the story of Gods Lake as they leave their tent village behind. During their trek in Chapter 5, she explains the site’s haunted origins, which forms a frame story within the main timeline of the novel:
The people called the place Manitou Gameeng, and it became Gods Lake when the Zhaunagush missionaries heard the tale. No one could stay there; whenever anybody tried, a powerful presence would overwhelm them and they would run away.
What follows is a frame story about the family’s connection to Gods Lake. The reader listens in as Naomi explains how Solomon had entered the site, prepared a feast, and offered sacrifices to the land. She chronicles his dream and rituals, the process of reserving a special space all for themselves.
Indian Horse invests this story with special significance. Saul remembers how “the story spooked us” and even silences the adults. It becomes something of a symbol throughout the novel as well. Manitou Gameeng—the feared, haunted space—becomes a refuge for the family. It is land that is “ours alone,” protected by unknown guardian spirits and opening itself only to Saul’s family.
Saul searches for that same sense of comfort throughout the rest of the novel. He grows close to Father Leboutilier, takes up hockey, and moves in with the Kellys. For a while, hockey—like Manitou Gameeng—is the “secret place that no one else knows how to get to.” Saul joins the Moose and scales the peak of local fame, only to lose it all again. Naomi’s story hangs over his nagging sense of placelessness as he runs from one city to the next, knowing that “I would always continue running because I’d learned by then that it was far easier to leave if you never truly arrived in the first place.” Only after Saul makes peace with his past does he re-discover his own Manitou Gameeng through hockey.
Related Themes:
