Alienation
Following an increase in the number of Indigenous authors and literature published in the 1970s and 1980s during the Native American Renaissance,[9] Native American literature as a genre diverged from preceding Native American works with the thematic inclusion of alienation.[8] Paula Gunn Allen details the prevalence of alienation in contemporaneous Native American poetry and prose as an "experience of the single individual; it is a primary experience of all bicultural American Indians in the United States-and, to one extent or another, this includes virtually every American Indian."[8] According to Allen, the unnamed narrator endures a lifetime of alienation due to his lack of a "clear sense of belonging to a people, a tradition, or a culture, resulting in a deeply fractured sense of self, showing both the degree of his lack of power and the extent of his self-estrangement."[8]
Fragmented Identity
Random House notes how Welch obscures the narrator's identity to emphasize his disconnection to his family and the outside world.[1] The narrator says, "I felt no hatred, no love, no guilt, no conscience, nothing but a distance that had grown through the years"[2] and proceeds to exist in an inebriated state throughout most of the novel, constantly reliving old memories. Allen states that the narrator is so "out of touch with himself that his long past relationships with his dead brother and father have more meaning for him than any of his contemporary ones, and he is adrift in a life that lacks shape, goal, understanding, or significance."[8]
Andrew Horton argues that the narrator is separated between two perspectives and two worlds, which explains why the narrator is never named and why the plot is told in non-linear or “episodic” fashion. Welch has explained that his intention with the "episodic" narration was to create a circle; "the plot of the book continued around until the story came back to the same area at the end of the book as the beginning." According to Professor William "Bill" Bevins, the narrator's relationships with various characters throughout the novel also embody opposing realities.[10] Though Welch has gainsaid autobiographical connections in his works, Horton notes that Welch's existence between two tribes made him straddle the line between those two worlds, a circumstance which Welch experienced with a uniquely disillusioned perspective.[11] Kathleen M. Sands describes the narrator as someone who is "ineffective in relationships with people and at odds with his environment, not because he is deliberately rebellious, or even immaturely selfish, but because he has lost the story of who he is, where he has come from."[12]
Recovery
Allen observes that the nameless narrator carries physical injuries and emotional trauma engendered by the death of his brother and father.[13] Louis Owens writes that, "without an identity, the narrator is frozen in time, caught up in a wintry dormancy as he moves tentatively and tortuously toward a glimmer of self-knowledge."[14] As he travels to find Agnes, the narrator undergoes an abstract recovery. Owens states that, "following the momentary response to life, the narrator begins to recount the events leading to his brother's death" and relives memories of his deceased father, First Raise.[14] The narrator statement, "[i]t was beginning to get light," signals a movement towards healing, according to Owens.[14] The novel continues a pattern of having traumatic triggers engender moments of reflective recovery with the "wild-eyed cow," Agnes, Marlene, Malvina, and Bird all contribute to the narrator's repeated regressions and violent outbursts.[14] Owens writes, "as he has moved toward full remembrance of Mose's death, which took place when the narrator was twelve, he has been regressing toward childhood, in order to come to terms with his brother's death and his own guilt he must go back and begin again from that moment."[14] His final moment of recovery, as represented in his conversation with Yellow Calf, is precipitated by memories of previous confrontations and re-livings of past events.[14] Owens states that "the narrator's rebirth and reawakening, such as it is, comes to fruition in this scene as he says, 'Some people, I thought, will never know how pleasant it is to be distant in a clean rain, the driving rain of a summer storm. It's not like you'd expect, nothing like you'd expect.'"[14]
Assimilation
Jennifer Kay Davis analyzes the shifting settings of Winter in the Blood in relation to the novel's preoccupation with assimilation and identity.[15] Winter in the Blood explores both themes through the narrator's journey towards the rediscovery of his Blackfeet heritage.[15] Davis' dissertation analyzes the novel's deviation from, "other Native American literature in which the main character simply returns to his or her native culture and leaves the white world behind." Return or assimilation represents a way of "resolving a psychological crisis-- but they modify these traditional patterns for modern, and specific personal, needs."[15] In Davis' understanding, the novel follows the narrator as he navigates between assimilation and alienation. She states: "it is even more important that they feel a part of the culture to which they choose to belong-- i.e., they are not alienated."[15]
