Ceremony Summary and Analysis

Plot:

During Leslie Silko's novel Ceremony, the protagonist, Tayo suffers  from the distress of war and the discrimination of being of mixed race. Tayo was left by his mother when he was young, and his Auntie took him in. She is a very Christian woman and treated Tayo as a disgrace rather than a son. She attempted to keep him and her son, Rocky apart, but because they grew up together they continued to become as close as brothers. Tayo lost Rocky in the war. As Tayo attempts to heal, he has other friends, Harley, Leroy, Emo, and Pinkie, who all self-medicate with alcohol. It was suggested to Tayo for him to get assistance from a couple medicine men who guide him in certain "ceremonies". As he continues to fulfill his ceremony, he crosses paths with different characters, including Night Swan with whom he has an affair. Eventually, his journey comes to an end and the ceremony is complete.

Characters:

Tayo is the protagonist in the novel. He has many obstacles to face within himself and the outside world, including discrimination of his mixed Indian and White race. He seems to be quite observant and although he suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder from the war, he finds ways to overcome.

Auntie is a practicing, Christian woman and has a very specific view of the image of her family; anyone who comes in and disrupts this image is disgraced (like Tayo). She cherishes her son Rocky, and has a strong love for her immediate family and seems to be quite uptight.

Josiah helps communicate with Tayo and teach his the Native American ways. He is a strong believer in that culture and depends heavily on it. However, he runs off with a Mexican woman which is not the usual for their culture.

Style, Symbolism, Motifs:

Silko's style relied heavily on the use of storytelling and poetry that was intermixed within the text. She used Strong symbols and multiple motifs to provide diction, imagery, details, language, syntax. Every paragraph seemed to have some part of DIDLS, and quite in depth. Her language was descriptive and gave insight into the ideas and setting of the characters and plot, and her details were important to the addition of imagery throughout the work.

There were many motifs that I noticed including: colors, time, direction, wind, dreams, and stories.
Many of her descriptions included color symbolism and provided the piece with specific imagery in the piece. She included quite specific times because the time of the novel continued to swtich from flashbacks to reality. 
Tayo had many dreams and relied on stories to stay connected with his Indian culture, and they were important to his life and the way that he lived.

Theme:

Silko's writing gives readers an insight into the importance of storytelling by including poetry within the prose and by creating specific description within her words.