Lulu Nanapush Lamartine is a symbolic and admirable Chippewa woman in Love Medicine by Louise Erdrich. As a Native woman character, Lulu reclaims and redefines the space that is usually occupied by unfair stereotypes using her unashamed beauty and compassionate sexuality. Margaret Galloway argues that Lulu, as one of the most distinctive female characters in Native American fiction, is "the unrevealed and undefined future of the Indian woman... Because literature constitutes a fundamental aspect of cultural experience, the representation of Indian women should be of paramount importance." .” Lulu's character breaks free from the Westernized norms that have impacted her community and culture. Lulu unapologetically lives a sensual, passionate life that fulfills parts of her female experience: lover, daughter, friend, and political figure. Taking into account the concepts of feminist scholarship, along with the representation of female characters in literature, I will analyze these specific roles in her life, explore how her lifestyle does not fit social norms, and clarify the ways in which she claims space by working against pressures patriarchal. .Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay The social norms surrounding Lulu force her to be judged for her perceived sexual deviance. He tells us: “No one understood my wild and secretive ways. They said Lulu Lamartine was like a cat, she didn't love anyone and only purred to get what she wanted. But that's not true. I was in love with the whole world and everything that lived in its rainy arms. Lulu has loved many, her love is seen by the other characters in the book as easy and perhaps even manipulative. But what most people misunderstand about Lulu is that sex and men aren't all she wants; it's the love and passion that comes from it. It is the intimacy and beauty that comes from the soul and complexity of people's lives. She is "in love with the whole world" and all the emotions that inhabit it: anger, sadness, jealousy, pain and desire. Lulu's relationship with men is an expression of her sexuality that reinforces her identity. His love for the world gives substance to his character and favors his numerous sexual relationships and marriages. Many women are judged as reckless, erratic, and incapable of stable relationships when they have had multiple sexual partners. Lulu's character transcends these judgments with her appreciation for all the men she has been with. His relationships are not careless flings. They can be magical, passionate and tender. Jeanne Smith writes: “The lively and powerfully self-aware Lulu is the best illustration of how the elimination of physical boundaries can strengthen identity. Lulu has an exceptional ability to blend into her environment and absorb it… Even the men she is famous for are largely just part of her ability to absorb its beauty.” But men are not just helpers for Lulu, and Lulu is not helpers for men. She reflects: “There were times when I let them in just because they were part of the world.” Lulu's love is a gift; he shares his love so that others can feel the passion, kindness and generosity that his love can offer. When Lulu sleeps with men, she shares these very pieces of herself with them. Rushes Bear, Lulu's mother figure, once told Lulu that “Woman is complete. Men must pass through us to live." Lulu lets men live through her, and she lives their experience together. Two men in particular who love and live with and through Lulu are Nector Kashpaw and Moses Pillager.These relationships are examples of how Lulu's bond with men is not artificial, and it is not her selfishness that leads her to be with many of the men she has been with. Lulu knows what people say about her, but they only see and judge what they see on the surface, which doesn't translate into what she really is. What she really is, are her relationships with men who have passion, self-respect, understanding and pain. When Lulu is young, she falls in love with a mysterious, timeless man named Moses Pillager who lives on a small island in the "darkness in the center of a wide irritation of silver water." She is intrigued by the parts of him that others don't understand or appreciate. To others he appears to be sick, lonely and dangerous. There are even stories about how he "ate his wife." Lulu knows he is much older than her and in a close relationship, but that doesn't stop her from willingly seeking him out on her own: "Dark, longing, I felt my power awaken." She gains power by choosing to find him, by choosing him as the handsome, ageless man he is; "too good to be real." His power extends to Moses, invisible from birth. “His people talked to him further. No one has ever revealed his real name. Nobody saw him. He lived invisibly and survived. But Lulu sees him, and Moses comes alive and is visible again after Lulu enters her dark world. Together, Moses and Lulu can live in the moment, separated from the world of linear time, rules, and judgments. They swim and sleep in the cave, they make love with each other and with nature. Lovers create space for each other to work through their past and get to know who they are as people with each other and with themselves. But the world Lulu and Moses created cannot last because Lulu will not leave the rest of the world that extends beyond the island, the world she longs to immerse herself in. Lulu's first attempt to leave the island ends up causing the most pain. Moses does not let her go and, with unwelcome force, forces her to stay longer than she is comfortable with. The tension that ends up causing her forever remains a thorn in her heart. After many years he still feels this feeling: “Even today I still suffer. I must have been rolling in the wild rose beds, because the tiny thorns - small, yellow - pierced my skin. Their poison is desire and it has dissolved in my blood. Nector Kashpaw is also gifted with love for Lulu. His life is measured by pleasure, and when he comes to Lulu, she satisfies him like no one else can. Nector's love for his wife, Marie Lazzare, is everlasting, but he cannot resist returning to Lulu. She is what drives him to live. Nector feels alive with Lulu, feels important and useful, and says that Lulu "... brought my youth back to me." Nector feels helpless in his home with Marie, where he is an alcoholic and Marie does most of the work, which mainly consists of taking care of Nector and bringing his health back from the bottom of the barrel. But even Marie's generosity and love do not allow Nector to ignore his relationship with Lulu. Their “passion overwhelmed them”; and Nector "...found true love with her." Nector brings love and, with that love, pain into both his and Lulu's lives. They are each other's first loves and struggle to be together throughout their lives. However, Nector's indecision and reluctance to commit to Lulu lasts throughout their relationship together. At one point, he tries to commit to Lulu, but as he leaves Marie and finds Lulu to give her a note promising his love, "until hell freezes over...", he accidentally burns his beloved and hard-worked for home. There are many men that Lulu attracts into her life, lets into her life, and many that are left behind or leave her. Lulu's sexuality is not a tool she uses tomanipulate men or for men to manipulate her. She is, as Smith says, a “vision of a totally transpersonal state of being.” Smith talks about how Lulu's relationships are examples of how her female character "questions even the possibility of imposing boundaries." Lulu's story and character make it clear that she is not in love with the world just for its excitement and sex. Gracefully welcomes all the painful and joyful aspects of relationships. Lulu tells us that "I was in love with the whole world and everything that lived in its rainy arms." Therefore, her character overcomes the stereotypical boundaries that judge women as incapable and manipulative characters. What makes the character of Lulu so effective in her way of reclaiming space as a liberated, sexual woman is her refusal to apologize. Lulu declares, "And so when they tell you I was heartless, a shameless man-hunter, don't forget this: I loved what I saw." She owns her body and her spirituality and when society puts her in a category she doesn't fit into, she rejects it and will not apologize for a life she lives as best she can. Love Medicine is an empowering piece of literature for the Native woman who proudly expresses her sexuality and is not inhibited from her true self. Most of the characters in Love Medicine are related in one way or another, and from the looks of Lulu's family tree, she lives downtown. She has nine children with six different men, whom she loves or has loved. However, they are only men who come from that center where Lulu resides. Where are the women in Lulu's life? Growing up, Lulu and her mother's relationship didn't last. Furthermore, none of the other mother figures Lulu encounters support her. Because of this lack of nurturing relationships, Lulu does not easily trust or connect with other women. Sara Ahmed, a feminist theorist, describes how women who grow up without a support system are often judged to be disobedient and rightly seduce men because they hate themselves. Women who correspond only with men are usually placed in the coward category and exclusively threaten other women. However, Erdrich provides a life story that gives Lulu space to reclaim her identity. Ahmed believes that all women “…have a story to tell. This story can be treated as a teaching tool, as well as a way to teach us tools.” It's not attention or competition in men that Lulu is looking for, it's the mother she never had that she wants to find. Lulu growing up without a mother and other female influences give readers insight into how women enter into relationships with men. “I never grew out of the curve of my mother's arms. I still wanted to anchor myself to her. But she had detached herself from the course of my life like the bank of a river. She had disappeared, a large surrounding beach, leaving me to spill out alone. his daughter. Instead of leaving Lulu alone or with other family members, Fleur sends her to state school, which marks the beginning of Lulu's resentment towards her mother. “It was on that bus to the government school that Lulu Lamartine cried all the tears she would ever cry in her life.” From then on Lulu encounters only discouraging female influences ranging from abusive teachers to her hostile aunt. Where did she learn to be the resilient and courageous woman she is? When Lulu is old enough to live on her own, she seeks out men to replace her mother's lost love with the physical and spiritual validation she gets from them. The only person in her life who raised her was a man, her uncle Nanapush. Lulu says, "I kept him close as if I were a father, the role model for all the other men." The only other womanin Lulu's life growing up it was Margaret Kashpaw, also known as Rushes Bear (Nanpush's wife) who Lulu hated and states, "I never forgot how difficult it was to live under the stones of her will." Lulu may have resented it. figure her mother, but as she grows up, she realizes how similar she is to them as a "passionate", "power-hungry", and independent woman, just as Rushes Bear and Fleur were. “I needed my mother as I became like her: a kind of woman with a sudden body, fierce and sincere desires, an amazing heart.” Even with this awareness, Lulu pursues the motherhood that has never been granted to her in her entire life. She has been robbed of the sense of belonging, evaluation, and validation that a daughter should receive from her mother and other feminine influences. So Lulu seeks these needs in her own way, staying with one lover after another. Lulu hints that she “wanted to fill in her mother's footsteps, but luck ran out of holes. My desires were worn soles.” She wants to feel strong and beautiful and she knows she can find it in the way men treat her, in the way they see her. Lulu knows it, accepts it and tells us: "I had noticed how the eyes of adult men stared at me... Dark, impatient, I felt my own power stirring." Immediately after running away from school, Lulu begins her journey to find Moses Pillager; in search of his mother's stolen touch. She even tells Moses that she came to the island because, “I was looking for my mother.” Lulu wants Moses to love her, cherish her, and validate her femininity, just as a daughter might receive from her mother. Lulu's character is full of empowering forces that deconstruct stereotypes. In her growth story, she can be seen as an incompetent and disobedient woman because she is a rebellious child and grows up without a mother. When in reality his character is proving the opposite. Ahmed argues: “When girls exercise their will, they are judged to be willful…designated as a problem child (a girl who is unwilling to obey) such that if there is a problem, she is assumed to be the one behind it ". , the patriarchal dome of shame would blame Lulu for not having a mother and accuse her of being a man-hunter. Lulu's awareness and brazen intentions to find affirmation in men do not invalidate her experiences with her lovers. Her need for motherhood does not imply that she did not love these men with all her heart or that she limited herself to them to find her mother or to please only herself. Her successes as an independent woman, a mother, and her friendship with Marie Lazzare towards the end of her life, are positive examples of Lulu's character dismantling the female stereotypes that one might place these ideas with no mother in mind. Lulu's motherhood is described as protective, loving, and proud of her children. One of Lulu's lovers, Beverly Lamartine, observes that: “Lulu could make the younger boys obey perfectly. While the older ones adored her so much that they couldn't tolerate anything else from anyone else." Unlike Lulu's mother, there are multiple scenes where Lulu risks her life and happiness for the sake of her children. For example, when Lulu runs back into the burning house to save her youngest son, Lyman. Marie and Lulu's relationship after Nector's death finally gives Lulu the chance to fill her void regarding female solidarity and motherhood. After nearly a lifetime of Lulu not shedding a tear after losing her mother, Marie enters Lulu's next life as a mother figure creating a space where the tears Lulu needs to shed are encouraged and they cry together. At that moment, Lulu feels that “for the first time I sawexactly how another woman felt.” With the strength and compassion provided by both women, they are able to see each other for who they are and in their grief for the man they both loved, friendship blossoms. The empowerment that develops from Lulu and Marie's relationship continues when Lulu admits that her love for Marie's husband is not a burden and is not something she will hide. In their budding alliance Lulu and Marie courageously share their individual experiences with Nector. Lulu admits that "it took Marie to grow him." and how it transformed him from "drunk" to "tribal president" and "that handsome, distinguished man" Lulu fell in love with. As Marie begins to understand Lulu's position in sleeping with her husband and Lulu understands Marie's position as a wife, together they find harmony in each other. Karah Stokes writes that many women portrayed by Eurocentric ideas in literature and film are never given mutual solidarity. Stoke writes: “Erdrich turns this model in a different direction… focusing… outward, on the internal development of each woman and the connection of both with the land. Lulu Lamartine and Marie Kashpaw are the women whose relationship gives a different shape to Love Medicine.” Relationships between women are primarily familial and most women are portrayed as jealous of each other and almost always joined by a man in their life. The man is usually the object of desire that women fight over, which indicates that men are the center of everything and women cannot work together. Well, Marie and Lulu are in fact brought together by a man, even if their relationship takes place without a man. While women are often victims, Lulu and Marie are not. Lulu loved Nector, but she wasn't controlled by him and after he burned down her house she stopped seeing him. Even though she loved him, she let him go. Marie knew that Nector wanted to leave her for Lulu, but this did not destroy her and she continued to be the compassionate and strong mother and wife that she wanted to be. As their relationship grows, Lulu tells us: We mourned him the same way together. That was the point. It was enough. For the first time I saw exactly how another woman felt, and it gave me deep, surprising comfort. It gave me the knowledge that whatever had happened the night before, and in the past, would finally be over once my bandages were off. In the tender moment when Marie helps Lulu remove the bandages from her eyes so she can see again, Marie shares her infinite love as a mother. As she removes the bandages from Lulu's eyes, Lulu is seen by Marie "as a mother must look at her new-born child." After a life spent isolated from women and searching for her mother in her surrender to men, Lulu is able to find refuge in Marie's yielding, forgiving, motherly embrace. In “An Eco-Feminist Reading of Love Medicine” Ting Bo magnifies the patriarchal forces that have become embedded in Native culture and specifically in the lives of Native women. Bo writes: “In Love Medicine, the land and the female characters are not persecuted by the patriarch, in other words, the patriarchy is the original cause of the oppression of nature and women on reservations.” Bo defines patriarchy as the source of most of the oppression that occurs in the United States; the systems surrounding patriarchy under Euro-American influence objectify women and nature above all. Bo talks about the passivity that affects Native women and how the Entitlement Act has destroyed people's sense of self, land and everything at the hands of the imposition of patriarchal ideas of male leadership and the "nuclear family on many societies maternal natives, in which property and descent are dominatedby women." Again and again, readers witness Lulu's character pushing back against these patriarchal and colonizing walls by being the powerful, non-conforming, political woman that she is. Lulu is seemingly helpless by her community who speak of her as if her multiple husbands and lovers make her helpless and unreliable. “…for much of her life Lulu was known as a flirt. And that was an understatement. Less kind tongues had more hurtful things to say.” Her community creates a superficial perception of Lulu when in reality, little do they know that she holds together many moving parts of the reserve's financial securities. His son, Lyman Lamartine, with Lulu's help, becomes the head of the Tomahawk factory. The factory brings many jobs to the Chippewa community and begins to create some financial stability on the reservation. Lulu guides Lyman on how to run the facility smoothly and keep the workers and community happy. It helps him understand how to offer and equitably distribute jobs to reservation families and quickly establish equal pay. Lyman describes his mother as: “You know Lulu Lamartine if you know that life is made up of three kinds of people: those who live it, those who are afraid to, those in between. My mother is the first. She's not afraid, and that's what's wrong with her. Lyman is frustrated with Lulu because she controls the situation when in reality he is just frustrated with the responsibility of holding the factory together and having his mother, a woman, the one who is actually in charge and knowing that she is incompetent. Lulu's political stance, confidence and admirability are not common themes that Eurocentric Americans have stereotyped about Native women. Galloway argues that the stereotype of the Native woman is usually divided into two roles; the squaw and the Indian princess. These roles are based solely on the white male gaze that sees Native women as either the domestic Indian woman who does all the cleaning and cooking for her husband, or the Indian princess who needs to be saved from her tribe by a white man who will keep her rich and safe.[46] Galloway talks about it in his articles and states that Love Medicine demonstrates: …the ability of Indian women to survive in adversity. It is argued that the image of Native American women was dictated by the Western European male to satisfy his cultural understanding and desire for dominance. Until Native American women overturn the superficial stereotypes that have served as their image, their voices will be lost in the continuing history of a people. The character of Lulu takes on the role of hyperfemininity that is very often sexualized, objectified, and undervalued and replaces the superficial stereotype with a competent woman who is sexually uninhibited, politically involved, and is anything but a squaw or an Indian princess. Lulu has always fought for her rights. From the day she ran away from her state school, to refusing to leave the land where her home stood after Nector burned it down, and finally to working for her Chippewa community. Not only does he fight by living his true identity, bringing people together and refusing to meet society's standards, but he also knows who he is fighting for and who he is fighting against. After opposing the sale of her land and the move, she says, “I've never let the U.S. Census come through my door, even though they say it's good for Indians. Well, quote me. I say that every time they counted us they knew the precise number to eliminate." In her struggle to try to stay in her land and in her continuation of fighting against the oppressor, it is obvious that the character of Lulu created by Erdrich is breaking the unfair pattern of historical reputation that has been given to 1999): 89-105.