Reading Notes W15: Yellow Woman , Part A

Leslie Marmon Silko was a native American novelist, poet, memoirist, and writer.  She is known for her short stories, which, “Yellow Woman,” is one of Silko’s shortest and earliest pieces, but it occupies a still growing place in the canon of short fiction. The story of Yellow women moves from reality to myth. The story opens with the narrator, speaking in first person, waking up by the river next to a strange man that it seems apparent she has been sexually intimate with. Yet, she is smitten by him. She is trying to make sense of why she had spent the night with him.  Silva recalls that during the night when they were love making she suggested that he must be an ancestral spirit and she must be Yellow Woman. The author only hoped that the ancient story her grandfather told her was true because she could make sense of why she, as a married woman with children  had an affair with a stranger she met along her walk. Or it could be she secretly desires to live out the mythical story of Yellow Woman, which is why she slept with the stranger.  She wants to return home but finds herself back at her lover’s home. Ready to go on an adventure with him. Maybe her life as a mom and wife is mundane and therefore she is easily captivated by Silva.  She feels more alive with him, connected with nature and culture even if its only for a moment.

She returns home with the inner hope that she will see Silva again. She has decided to tell her family a boring story of being kidnapped instead of the story of the Yellow Woman. The fact that her family seemed to have not noticed or either was unaffected by her overnight absence is probably why she opted out of telling them the mythical story.