Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in House Made of Dawn, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Home, Belonging, and Identity
Nature
Religion, Ceremony, and Tradition
Storytelling
Connection vs. Isolation
Summary
Analysis
Abel wakes suddenly to a silent room and knows at once that Francisco is dead. He dresses his grandfather in bright ceremonial clothes and winds his hair with yarn. He sprinkles meal in the four directions, and then he lays ears of colored corn, sacred feathers, pouches of pollen and meal, and a ledger book around Francisco’s body. He wraps his grandfather in a blanket.
Having returned to Walatowa, Abel is once again able to participate in his people’s rituals and traditions. He honors Francisco as the traditional old man would have wanted, in a final act of duty and care for the man who cared for Abel all his life.
Themes
Before dawn, Abel travels to Father Olguin’s rectory and informs him, seemingly without emotion, that Francisco is dead. Father Olguin is annoyed that Abel woke him up. He tells Abel that he understands how he feels, and when Abel leaves, Father Olguin continues shouting into the darkness, “I understand!”
Despite his personal growth, Abel continues to present himself as stoic and reserved to other people. His interaction triggers something in Father Olguin that the story never fully explains, in another instance of the narration itself proving Tosamah’s point about the Native American tradition of using few words.
Themes
Instead of returning to Francisco’s house, Abel walks to the edge of town, removes his shirt, and rubs his arm and chest with ashes. As the sun rises, he sees a group of runners in the distance. Behind them, a cloud stands over the black mesa. Abel approaches the group, and they abruptly begin to run. He joins them, running for the sake of running and for the land and the dawn. He continues running even as it begins to rain, stopping only when his legs buckle, and he falls in the snow. He looks at his broken hands, gets up, and runs on. He sees the landscape around him, and he begins to sing of the house made of dawn. The story concludes with the word “Qtsedaba,” the Jemez equivalent of “the end.”
The end of the book returns to the prologue, finally explaining Abel’s run across the plains. The race of the dead is a tradition that Francisco taught Abel about, and Francisco held an unyielding pride in his past as a runner. When Abel joins the race of the dead, he connects with his late grandfather. That connection then deepens, allowing Abel to form a connection to the land of Walatowa, just as Francisco did. Abel honors Ben by singing of the house made of dawn, which also establishes this moment as a religious one. Finally, the story finishes by acknowledging that it is, in fact, a story, just as it began with that same acknowledgement.
Themes
