Eds. note: AICL is pleased to publish Allie Jane Bruce's review of Laura Ingalls Is Ruining My Life, by Shelley Tougas. It was published in 2017 by Roaring Book Press (Macmillan). To read the introduction to this review, go to Allie's post at Reading While White.
Here's a description of the book (from the Macmillan website):
A life on the prairie is not all its cracked up to be for one girl whose mom takes her love of the Little House series just a bit too far.
Charlotte’s mom has just moved the family across the country to live in Walnut Grove, “childhood home of pioneer author Laura Ingalls Wilder.” Mom’s idea is that the spirit of Laura Ingalls will help her write a bestselling book. But Charlotte knows better: Walnut Grove is just another town where Mom can avoid responsibility. And this place is worse than everywhere else the family has lived—it’s freezing in the winter, it’s small with nothing to do, and the people talk about Laura Ingalls all the time. Charlotte’s convinced her family will not be able to make a life on the prairie—until the spirit of Laura Ingalls starts getting to her, too.
****
Laura Ingalls Is Ruining My Life, by Shelley Tougas.
Roaring Brook Press.
Reviewed by Allie Jane Bruce.
NB - I read, and used page numbers from, a galley of this book.
At
the outset of Laura Ingalls Is Ruining My Life, twelve-year-old Charlotte makes
it clear that she finds her mom’s obsession with Laura Ingalls irritating. Any time Mom or Rose (Charlotte’s younger sister) reference the Little
House books or Laura Ingalls, Charlotte’s reaction is somewhere in the ballpark
of “Seriously?” or “Ugh.” On page 8, Charlotte thinks:
Realistically, I
was stuck with Laura for a year. I had to deal with her the way you deal with
an upset stomach. You wait it out. Eventually you puke and feel better.
On their move from Lexington, Kentucky to Walnut Grove, Minnesota, Mom decides they must stop and eat at a diner they see, called "Prairie Diner". When Mom starts to engage a waitress on the subject, Charlotte thinks (p. 9):
I
needed to shut this down before Mom launched her crazy spirit-of-Laura
explanation.
It is important to note, however, that Charlotte’s
negative reactions have nothing to do with any inkling that the books, or Laura
herself, are racist or problematic. Charlotte is irritated because she is a
snarky, often pessimistic character, and the idea of Laura’s spirit calling out
to Mom’s creative soul rubs her the wrong way.
On
page 34, in her new classroom, Charlotte notices (p. 34):
There were twenty-four
students in our new class, including Julia [their landlady’s granddaughter],
Freddy [her twin brother], and me. Six were Asian. Julia was the only Hispanic student, as far as
I could tell. Everyone else was white.
I wondered, upon reading this,
whether all those White kids were actually White, or whether Charlotte might be
misidentifying someone; many people present, or pass for, White but in fact
identify as Native, Latinx, or multiracial. I wondered more about this on
page 36, as the kids are being given an assignment. Mrs. Newman (her teacher) says:
“You will write about how Laura Ingalls and her story have
influenced our community and affected your life. [...] You don’t have to be a fan.
I know there are students who haven’t read the books, which saddens me greatly,
but if you live here, there’s no getting around Laura’s influence. Even if you
haven’t read the books, which truly saddens me, you are aware of how she’s
shaped our town, and if you’re not aware, that is heartbreaking.”
I
tried to imagine myself as a Native kid reading this passage, or to take it a
step further, as a White-presenting Native kid in Charlotte’s class. How
would this talk about not reading the books, and not being aware of how Laura
Ingalls shaped their town, as “saddening” and “heartbreaking” land with me? Reading it with this mindset, it made me angry. Native people were
subject to genocide and forced relocation because of the invasion of people
like Laura Ingalls; but what’s really heartbreaking is if someone hasn’t
read or appreciated her books?
Charlotte
finds the assignment annoying, but not problematic. She writes an essay
titled “Laura Ingalls Is Ruining My Life” and describes how angry she is that
her flighty mother moved them to the town of Walnut Grove to chase Laura’s
creative energy.
Soon
after, Charlotte gets sick and has to stay home from school for several days. Mom reads to her from the Little House books, which Charlotte likes. Charlotte describes how much Ma hates Indians, the first reference thus
far to any racism or problematic content in the Little House books (p. 46):
And Ma, who is the sweetest character in the book, hates Indians,
and I mean hates hates hates them. Maybe it was because the Ingalls built their
cabin on Indian land, and the Indians weren’t too happy about it. In the end,
both the Indians and the Ingalls pack up their stuff and move. The Indians are
forced to leave their hunting grounds, and the Ingalls end up on the banks of
Plum Creek near Walnut Grove, because all Pa wants to do is move.
Charlotte
offers all of this without editorializing or offering her opinion on Ma’s
opinions, which I found strange, since Charlotte offers her opinion on everything,
especially if she finds it annoying. Are we to conclude that Charlotte
doesn’t find Ma’s bigotry annoying? At best, she is dispassionate about
it.
On
page 52, Charlotte’s mom changes her mind about her writing project. Where she’d previously intended to write an historical fiction about an
orphan girl moving to the prairie, she now wants to write about (p. 52)
...twins who
sneak aboard this space shuttle that’s going to colonize Mars... Mom says it’s
the same story because it’s about exploration and pioneers. So we’re still here
for Laura. She still needs Laura’s spirit.
This
is interesting, because I’ve seen outer space exploration and aliens used as
metaphors for colonialism and invasion before, in books like The Knife of
Never Letting Go, Landscape With Invisible Hand, and The True
Meaning of Smekday. I have mixed feelings about them. I
appreciate the emphasis on interrogating invaders; and, I think it’s
problematic to draw a parallel between aliens and Native humans, or to cast
Native and non-Native people as equal parties in any story about colonization. I think Mom’s idea for a Mars book, which rests on an analogy in which
White pioneers are to humans as Native people are to literal Martians, is
deeply problematic. Over the course of Laura Ingalls Is Ruining My
Life, Charlotte and others question whether the Mars book is a good idea,
but not for the reasons I state above.
Charlotte
reads an essay on Manifest Destiny, and soon after that, on the
Transcontinental Railroad. About the Manifest Destiny essay, Charlotte
thinks (p. 79-80):
The essay, “Manifest Destiny and America’s Expansion,” was long
and boring. If you’ve heard people say something is as boring as watching paint
dry, well, the Manifest Destiny essay would bore the paint. [...] The essay went like this: After colonists won independence from
England, American leaders thought it was destiny for our country to grow. If
ordinary Americans could own land, not just rich people, then they would be
committed to making the country strong and the best in the word. So the
government bought land around Louisiana from France and fought with Mexico to
get even more land. And pretty soon the country stretched “from sea to shining
sea,” just like the song “America the Beautiful” said.
Charlotte’s
only problem with the essay is that she found it boring.
On
page 82, Charlotte discusses the Transcontinental Railroad with Rose (her
younger sister) and we get our first inkling that she’s starting to see some of
these problems. After describing the hardships in The Long Winter, Rose
says (p. 93-94):
“Finally spring came and the trains arrived with supplies. So many
pioneers would’ve died without trains bringing stuff from the East. Trains were
lifesavers.”
I flopped on my bed. “Tell that to Chinese workers. Tell that to
the buffalo.”
“What do you mean?”
“The railroad company hired workers from China and barely paid
them and had them do all the dangerous work, like blowing up tunnels. Lots of
them died. When the trains were up and running, men would sit in train cars and
shoot buffalo for fun. They didn’t even eat the meat. The buffalo just rotted
and pretty soon buffalo became almost extinct.”
I
like this exchange, although I wonder why we haven’t heard more of Charlotte’s
inner thoughts about this--she seems to be reevaluating her initial take on
Manifest Destiny.
Next,
Charlotte learns about the U.S.-Dakota War (although the book doesn’t call it
this). She reads about the “Dakota Sioux Conflict”. Her teacher
says (p. 114-115):
“I want you to start with the Dakota Sioux Conflict because it was
essentially a war that happened right here in southwestern Minnesota. The whole
thing was overshadowed by the Civil War, so most people know very little about
it. You’ll make some connections between it and the Ingalls family.”
“Like Ma hating Indians?”
“In a way,” she said. “No doubt she’d heard about Indians killing
settlers in southwestern Minnesota, and she was afraid.”
“It’s not like she could call 9-1-1.”
“Indians were afraid of the settlers, too. The government broke
treaty after treaty. They didn’t give the Indians supplies that were promised,
and the Indians were afraid they’d starve that winter.”
A
few pages later, Mrs. Newman assigns Charlotte an essay on the Trail of Tears (p. 126):
She handed me an article. I glanced at the title—something about
Native Americans and a Trail of Tears. “Here’s one more thing I want you to
read. You can take your time, but I do want to discuss it.”
On
page 132, Charlotte and Julia (their landlady’s granddaughter) have a
conversation in which they talk about how “perfect” Pa Ingalls was as a dad
(conveniently omitting his blackface performance). Julia also says,
describing what she wrote about in her award-winning essay on Laura Ingalls (p. 132):
“The Asians here are Hmong, which is like Vietnamese, but not
exactly. Tons of them came to Minnesota after the war in Vietnam.”
“Seems kind of random.”
“It’s like a new group of settlers came to the prairie.”
I
cringe at several things here--casually describing Hmong people as “like
Vietnamese, but not exactly” (how would that land with a Hmong child reading
it?), “random” (in the large picture, Hmong people living in Walnut Grove isn’t
any more “random” than Charlotte, or any White people, living in Walnut Grove,
but this casts them as “other” and somehow different). As for “a new
group of settlers came to the prairie” -- to equate Westward invasion and
Manifest Destiny with the experiences of immigrants of color living in a
White-dominated society is simply inaccurate, and troubling, in that it ignores
the power dynamic Hmong people face and erases the fact that White people
invaded Native lands (if White people invading the West were “immigrants” the
way that Hmong people are immigrants in this context, Native people would have
no legitimate grievances).
There’s
an argument, of course, that Julia is twelve years old and doesn’t understand these dynamics;
I do not, however, get the sense that Tougas recognizes the problems with what
Julia says (at least, she does not recognize them in the text) or is presenting
this conversation as a teachable moment, as she never counters Julia’s ideas. On the contrary, I get a strong feeling that we as readers are supposed to be
learning and taking in what Julia says here.
In
this same conversation, one of the more interesting things in the book happens. Julia describes another classmate, Lanie, whose essay was passed over for
an award (p. 134):
“She [Lanie] wrote that we should have a museum for Native
Americans because they lived around here first, and they had these battles with
settlers. She said the early farmers shouldn't be called settlers because
the land was already settled. They were more like invaders.’ Julia leaned
forward and whispered, ‘My grandma heard Mrs. Newman liked Lanie's essay
because it showed critical thinking, but Gloria and Teresa said no way.
Basically I was the second choice.”
(Gloria
and Teresa run the Laura Ingalls museum, where Julia and Charlotte work after
school.)
I
would so, so have loved to see this line of thought extended. Proposing
the word “invaders” instead of “settlers” is a big deal, and an important
conversation. Alas, this language is never revisited; Charlotte and Julia
encounter some mean boys, and further solidify their friendship. Charlotte doesn’t comment on the settlers/invaders question, internally
or overtly. This scene factors into my conclusion that Laura Ingalls
Is Ruining My Life evolves, rather than interrupts, racism. More on
that later.
The
Trail of Tears essay, which Mrs. Newman assigned to Charlotte on page 126, is
next referenced, briefly, on page 169, when Charlotte asks Rose if she’s seen
the essay (Rose took it to read it). On page 173, Charlotte and Mrs.
Newman have a brief conversation about it; Mrs. Newman brings it up again on
page 226. Charlotte still hasn’t read it.
On
page 198, police show up at Charlotte’s house with the news that someone
vandalized the Ingalls museum (spray painted “I hate Walnut Grove I hate Lara”);
they suspect Charlotte. This plotline dominates the rest of the book, and
culminates in (spoiler) Rose confessing that she did it. Some relevant
passages I pulled (p. 206-207):
Everyone in Walnut Grove was proud of the town’s history. When
they drove by the museum and saw those ugly words, they’d feel angry and sad.
But that didn’t explain my feelings, either. They went even deeper
than that. I realized I felt terrible for Laura [...] after living on the
lonely Kansas prairie, the Ingalls had found civilization in Walnut Grove. They
had a real school, a nice church, and good neighbors. [...]
“Mom, I think I’m feeling Laura’s energy—for real. She’s sad
about what happened to the museum. [...] Whoever did it couldn’t even spell her
name. They’re stupid and mean.’”
I
paused at this. Are spray painted words on the side of the Ingalls museum
uglier than the existence of a museum glorifying participants in Manifest Destiny?
I
had similar thoughts regarding this exchange between Charlotte and Mrs. Newman (p. 225-226):
“I know I wrote a negative essay, but I was mad when I wrote it.
I’ve spent a couple months in Laura’s world. I like her. [...] Maybe the person who
did it doesn’t even hate Laura Ingalls. Maybe they just wanted to destroy
something that makes other people happy.”
“Unfortunately, there are people like that in the world.”
Then,
there’s this conversation between Charlotte and her mom (p. 207-208):
“There’s something about our country and the West,” she said in a
dreamy voice. “It’s romantic. [...] we have this sense of pride in conquering the
Wild West.”
“When they built the railroad, men would ride the trains with
shotguns and kill buffalo just because it was fun, like an old-fashioned
version of a video game.”
“That’s terrible,” Mom said.
“Westward expansion stunk if you were Native American.”
“I know.”
This is never followed up on. Mom never accounts for why, if she knew all along that Westward Invasion "stunk" for Native people, she felt comfortable talking in a "dreamy" voice about the "romance" and "pride" of "conquering" the "Wild West". I conclude from this that Mom values Native lives less than she values the romantic story she tells herself about American history. I wondered if Tougas ever considered having Charlotte ask something like, "Well, if you knew, why did you say what you just said?" and I wonder what Mom would reply. "Because I weighed the injustice of the atrocity of Westward Invasion against the mental discomfort it would cause me to let go of my romantic vision of history and decided to prioritize my gooey feelings," perhaps? Or maybe a simple, "Because I know, but I just don't care that much about Native people."
On
page 275-278, Rose comes clean and admits to vandalizing the Ingalls museum. Her speech is the closest the book comes to actually interrogating
racism, and I’m sure will be referenced by many as evidence that Laura Ingalls
Is Ruining My Life is, in fact, anti-racist. Mom puts lavender oil in a diffuser to help them relax and stay focused on why she did it. Here’s what Rose says (275-278):
“I read Charlotte’s school assignment about the Trail of Tears. The
article was about how settling the West destroyed the Indians. They literally
had to walk hundreds of miles so the pioneers could have their own land. And
they got sick and there wasn’t enough food and the weather was terrible, but
the government didn’t care and the pioneers didn’t care. The Indians had to
keep marching, and tons of them died. Tons!”
At that point, Mom dabbed the oil behind her ears.
Rose said, “We have museums all over the United States bragging
about how great we are because we built a new country. We have books and movies
and songs. But our stories are wrong.” Her shoulders slumped. “Can I try some
of that oil?”
I put a drop on my finger and rubbed it on Rose’s wrist. Freddy
said, “I know what you mean, but I’m glad we’re here. I’m glad there are fifty
states and roads and the Internet and that I get to live in this country.”
“If you’re glad, then you don’t know what I mean,” Rose said.
[...]
“So you decided to spray-paint Laura’s building because the
government was terrible to the Indians?” Freddy said. “Am I the only one who
thinks that’s ridiculous?”
“No. I think it’s ridiculous,” I said.
“Let her finish,” Mom said. “Go on, Rose.”
Rose frowned. “Here’s something I bet you didn’t know. In the
first version of Little House On the Prairie, which came out almost one
hundred years ago, Laura described the prairie like this: ‘There the wild
animals wandered and fed as though they were in a pasture that stretched much
farther than a man could see, and there were no people. Only Indians lived there.’
I memorized it.”
Freddy thought for a minute. “So? What’s your point?”
“She said no people. Only Indians. She basically said Indians
aren’t people.”
Slowly Freddy’s face registered her point. Mom said, “I don’t
remember that. I’ve read that book a dozen times.”
“Someone wrote to the publisher, and they changed the word people
to settlers for the next printing. Laura felt terrible above it. She
didn’t mean it the way it came out. Still, it bugs me. I can’t stop thinking
about it. That’s why I quit reading the biography.”
“I had no idea,” Mom said. “How did I not know this?”
“That’s the way people were back then,” Freddy said. “It’s not
right to blame people now for what happened one hundred years ago. Laura
Ingalls didn’t force the Indians to move. The museum ladies didn’t force them
to move, either. Do you want us to demolish all our cities and make it buffalo
land again?”
“That’s not the point!” Rose yelled. “You got me all
side-tracked.”
I
love what Rose says. Of all the characters in the book, she’s the one who
interests me most, because what she learns about Manifest Destiny, the
Transcontinental Railroad, and the Trail of Tears is real for her. She has, at this point, learned that a societal sickness leads to
dehumanizing Native people, and to a museum celebrating Manifest Destiny--and
upon learning this, she actively changes. Early in the book, Rose is
downright tickled to be living in Walnut Grove, and wants to be Laura in the
annual town play (p. 94). Upon learning that her prior version of reality
is wrong, Rose changes her mindset and her behavior. Is she right to
spray paint the museum? Of course not, but that act of vandalism is
trivial compared to the larger systemic and cultural problems with which she is
grappling.
Unfortunately,
Charlotte’s reactions, and the ultimate note on which the book finishes, undo
much of the good work Rose does in these few pages (and make me wonder if it’s
possible for an author to write a character--Rose, in this case--who
understands the world better than the author does).
On
page 288, Charlotte and Mrs. Newman again discuss the Trail of Tears article,
which, again, was introduced on page 126. Charlotte still hasn’t read it,
but lies and says she did. Mrs. Newman isn’t fooled, and they talk about
why Charlotte hasn’t read it (p. 288-289):
“Did you read the article about Native Americans?”
“The Trail of Tears article?” My eyes went wide, and I stumbled
through an answer, trying to remember what Rose had said about it. “Yes. It was
interesting and fascinating. And very sad, too, which is why the word tears is
in it. Because it’s so sad.”
[...]
“Why? Why haven’t you read it?”
I shrugged.
[...]
“I don’t need to read it to know it’s really, really bad. I’ve
read enough about westward expansion.”
“Reading and understanding are two different things.”
“I know terrible things happened to Native Americans. And terrible
things happened to the Chinese with the railroad and poor white farmers in the
Depression and all the people fighting over who owned Texas. I’m twelve. I can
only take so much sad stuff and guilt before I get Prairie Madness.” Mrs.
Newman didn’t respond, so I said, “I will read it. I promise. But not for a
while.”
Mrs. Newman thought for a moment. “You have the intellectual
capacity to think critically about history. I didn’t consider how overwhelming
it might be.”
“I don’t want to hate Laura Ingalls or pioneers or America.”
“That’s absolutely not my intention. It’s just that our country’s
story is more complicated than most people realize. Laura’s story is more
complicated.”
My heart sank when I read this. My hopes were up so high, after
Rose’s awakening, and then… sigh.
The
effect of this passage--especially after Rose’s speech--is to recenter
and re-prioritize Whiteness at the expense of Native people.
Let’s
unpack. Charlotte says the Trail of Tears is “sad… which is why the word
tears is in it.” It’s supposed to be funny, a moment of lightness and
humor. Four thousand people died on the Trail of Tears. Charlotte, and
Tougas, trivialize their deaths in this passage. And, ultimately,
Charlotte makes an active and conscious decision to prioritize her own comfort
over all else. Children younger than Charlotte died because of the 1830
Indian Removal Act (Trail of Tears); Charlotte decides she can’t even read
about that, and Mrs. Newman comforts and her affirms her fragility in this
moment.
Read
this again from the point of view of a Cherokee, Choctaw, Seminole, Creek, or
Chickasaw child who has heard about the Trail of Tears since infancy. That child does not have the luxury of waiting until they’re older to
understand the concept of genocide. How would Charlotte’s joke about the
Trail of Tears, and her decision to wait to read the article until she can
handle it better, land with that child? What about Charlotte’s, and Mrs.
Newman’s, declaration that they don’t want to hate Laura Ingalls or the
government forces that destroyed Native lives--how would a Native child, who feels
rightful and understandable rage, feel upon reading those words? I’d feel
minimized, gaslit, like my and my people’s concerns had been erased--for the
billionth time.
What
makes this so infuriating is that it comes on the heels of Rose’s speech about
the injustices of westward invasion. It’s like Tougas dangles a book, a
world, in which White people are forced to reckon with the ugliness of Manifest
Destiny and all that came along with it--and then snatches it away, says “Nope,
sorry, Native kids, we have to comfort and prioritize the status quo at your
expense. Again.”
Another
example of Tougas’ dangling, then snatching away, genuine equity for Native
people is in her treatment of Gloria and Teresa, who run the Ingalls museum. Remember that Gloria and Teresa rejected an essay that argued for justice
for Native people (p. 134) Julia tells Charlotte:
“She [Lanie] wrote that we should have a museum for Native
Americans because they lived around here first, and they had these battles with
settlers. She said the early farmers shouldn't be called settlers because
the land was already settled. They were more like invaders." Julia leaned
forward and whispered, "My grandma heard Mrs. Newman liked Lanie's essay
because it showed critical thinking, but Gloria and Teresa said no way. Basically I was the second choice.”
I
was sure, when I read this, that at some point Charlotte (or Rose) would hold
Gloria and Teresa accountable; that they would have to take a hard look at what
it meant to shut down, refuse to hear, a truth-telling essay, and what messages
they sent to Native kids when they refused to give a platform to a voice
advocating for a Native museum. This never happens. In fact, later
in the book Charlotte thinks well of Gloria and Teresa as support for her (p. 149):
Actually, the people who'd been my cheerleaders lately weren't my
family. Mrs. Newman. Gloria. Teresa...”
Gloria
and Teresa also serve to further the Charlotte-as-suspect plotline; thanks to a
misunderstanding, Charlotte yells at them, which lends credence to the theory
that she was the vandal. Towards the end of the book, Charlotte realizes
she needs to apologize to them.
At
the end of the day, Laura Ingalls Is Ruining My Life gives lip
service to anti-racist and anti-colonialist advocates. Their arguments
and voices are given minimal space in the book; Rose’s speech is great, but
it’s three pages in a 296-page book. The book prioritizes White comfort and
White fragility over justice and equity for Native people (who are never actually
given a voice--no tribe is named, no Native individuals are referenced or
quoted, and oh, how great would it have been for Charlotte and co. to delve
deep into The Birchbark House series?). Characters like Gloria and
Teresa who enact and perpetuate White supremacy are not held accountable, but
are framed as overwhelmingly sympathetic--nice White ladies. And
ultimately, according to Laura Ingalls Is Ruining My Life, while
it’s important for everyone to understand the complexity of history, it’s
equally important for White kids to wait until they feel up to the task of
learning about other people’s trauma, and to not hate Laura Ingalls or her
people. Indeed, the Author’s Note leads me to believe that Tougas is an
unapologetic Ingalls fan--she recommends three biographies of Laura Ingalls Wilder,
and alas, no books authored by Native people.
While
reading Laura Ingalls Is Ruining My Life, and especially at the
end, I thought over and over of this quote from The Lines We Cross by
Randa Abdel-Fattah. This line is spoken by Mina, who came to Australia as
an Afghan refugee, to Michael, a White character learning about his racial
privilege (p. 219):
“You want me to make it easier for you to confront
your privilege because God knows even antiracism has to be done in a way that
makes the majority comfortable? Sorry... I don’t have time to babysit you
through your enlightenment.”
Charlotte’s
choice to read the essay or not--to include knowledge of the Trail of Tears in
her consciousness, or wait until she’s ready to handle it--that choice is the
essence of White privilege.
We White people are getting better at making a
show of anti-racism. Our methods are becoming more sophisticated. We acknowledge the anti-racist argument, provide it lip service and
limited space, before snatching back control of the narrative and recentering
our own comfort. Read Laura Ingalls Is Ruining My Life as
the next step, the next generation, the next wave of racism. Watch
closely, especially if you’re White; racism is evolving before our very eyes.
