76 pages • 2 hours read
Richard WagameseIndian Horse
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2012A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Quiz
Reading Check, Multiple Choice & Short Answer Quizzes
Reading Check questions are designed for in-class review on key plot points or for quick verbal or written assessments. Multiple Choice and Short Answer Quizzes create ideal summative assessments, and collectively function to convey a sense of the work’s tone and themes.
Chapters 1-10
Reading Check
1. Who is Aki?
2. Who is Shabogeesick and what did he bring to his people?
3. What are the “spirits” referred to in Chapter 3?
4. Who finds Saul and his family when they are living in Redditt?
5. What traumatic event happens at the “dancing of the rice?”
Multiple Choice
1. In the first paragraph, Saul shares that “They say that our cheekbones are cut from those granite ridges that rise above our homeland. They say that the deep brown of our eyes seeped out of the fecund earth that surrounds the lakes and marshes. The Old Ones say that our long straight hair comes from the waving grasses that thatch the edges of bays.” What does this quote imply about his relationship with his ancestry?
A) that he is ashamed of the folklore
B) that his roots are tied with the technological advancements of the region
C) that nature is interwoven into the stories of his people
D) that the “Old Ones” are not revered in his community
2. In recalling his mother in Chapter 4, Saul notes the following impressions: “My mother seemed almost weightless by now. I was always surprised that she left footprints. There was nothing to her but air. Her eyes were empty and she walked bent over like an old woman.” Which of the following literary terms are used in this quote?
A) simile
B) anaphora
C) personification
D) allusion
3. These lines appear in Chapter 5: “We needed to go where the government men could not find us, my grandmother said. We needed to get back to living in a proper way. We needed to take Benjamin to a place where the air and the land could ease his spirit.” Which of the following literary terms are used?
A) metaphor, personification
B) simile, allusion
C) onomatopoeia, allusion
D) anaphora, personification
Short-Answer Response
Answer each of the following questions in a complete sentence or sentences. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. Saul begins his story from The New Dawn Centre. Describe this place as well as his reason for being there.
2. How did Saul’s family receive the last name “Indian Horse”?
3. In Chapter 3, Saul writes of the “Zhaunagush” and the fear they brought to his people. Define this term and describe their actions. How was his sister involved?
4. Describe why Saul and his family leave their people. How did this journey affect Saul?
5. In Chapters 6 and 7, Saul describes a vision he has using powerful imagery. Summarize what he sees and explain his conclusion of the events.
6. Discuss the disagreement in Chapter 8 regarding the burial. What is the inner conflict of some of the family members?
7. What are the events surrounding Saul’s grandmother’s death?
Chapters 11-22
Reading Check
1. To which school is Saul sent in Chapter 11?
2. What does Saul get up early every morning to do?
3. What is Father Leboutilier’s advice to the team at their first match?
4. According to Saul in Chapter 21, in what ways are he and his peers treated “like stock” at their school?
5. What were the “nighttime invasions?”
Multiple Choice
1. Which of the following words best describes the mood of Chapter 12?
A) harrowing, due to the vignettes of child mistreatment and death
B) penitent, due to the theme of reflection and forgiveness
C) ironic, due to the reunion of Saul and his grandfather
D) shameful, due to the description of sexual assault by Saul’s peers
2. Which of the following emotions best characterizes how Saul feels when he skates?
A) fulfilled
B) tortured
C) displeased
D) free
3. “I’d never heard from my parents. Maybe they couldn’t find me. Maybe their shame over abandoning us in the bush was too great. Or maybe the drink had taken them over as easily as hockey had claimed me.” Which of the following best summarizes the intended effect of this quote?
A) The use of an allusion provides the structure of repetition to Saul’s emotions.
B) The use of a simile compares his parents’ alcoholism to Saul’s love for hockey.
C) The use of personification characterizes Saul’s time at his school.
D) The use of sensory imagery highlights the qualities of drug addiction.
Short-Answer Response
Answer each of the following questions in a complete sentence or sentences. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. How is the use of language restricted at Saul’s new place of residence? What effect does this have on him as well as his peers?
2. Compare Father Gaston Leboutilier to his colleagues. How does he ameliorate Saul’s suffering during his school years?
3. In Chapter 18, Saul discusses a turning point in his passion for a particular sport. What is this turning point? How is he now viewed by his peers?
Chapters 23-28
Reading Check
1. Who is Fred Kelly?
2. What does Manitouwadge mean?
3. Who supports Saul in his studies?
4. What did Fred call the team Saul’s second year as a part of the Moose?
5. Which unexpected visitor does Saul see at a game in Chapter 28?
Multiple Choice
1. Which of the following best describes the hockey team as they entered the new season in Chapter 23?
A) faster, due to Father Leboutilier’s new skating regime
B) stronger, due to the summer trainings with Saul
C) more calculated, due to the strategic planning sessions
D) more determined, due to their previous defeat by the local town’s team
2. Which of the following descriptions best summarizes Saul’s first game with the Moose?
A) defeating
B) astounding
C) embarrassing
D) educational
3. Based on Saul’s description of his games with the Moose, which of the following phrases characterizes the emotions of the supporters from the reservations?
A) competitive aggression
B) distaste for a “white” sport
C) spirit of community
D) unawareness and apathy
Short-Answer Response
Answer each of the following questions in a complete sentence or sentences. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. In Chapter 23, Saul experiences a racist encounter. Describe this event and the outcome.
2. Compare and contrast Saul’s relationship with hockey before and after leaving the school. Does his love for the game change?
Chapters 29-36
Reading Check
1. Why does Saul finally agree to skate against Kapuskasing?
2. In which region were the Moose particularly hated?
3. What are the two results from the tournament in Espanola?
4. Who is Jack Lanahan?
Multiple Choice
1. Which of the following best describes the reaction of the non-Indigenous people to the end of the Kapuskasing game?
A) dismayed and aggressive
B) supportive and applausive of the Moose
C) filled with racist and violent threats
D) ashamed of the outcome
2. Why does Saul believe there was less joy in the hockey trips after the Kapuskasing game?
A) because they frequently lost their matches
B) because the opposing teams harassed them
C) because they did not earn enough prize money
D) because the atmosphere in the arenas was different
3. Jack Lanahan muses on the power of the sport, noting that “Hockey’s grace and poetry make men beautiful. The thrill of it lifts people out of their seats. Dreams unfold right before your eyes, conjured by a stick and a puck on a hundred and eighty feet of ice.” Which literary term is NOT used in this quote?
A) personification
B) hyperbole
C) metaphor
D) simile
4. Which of the following best describes Saul’s sentiments regarding being scouted?
A) proud and entitled
B) concerned for his teammates
C) fearful of disappointing his mentors
D) ashamed of his heritage
Short-Answer Response
Answer each of the following questions in a complete sentence or sentences. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. What is the outcome of the game against Kapuskasing?
2. Describe the harrowing encounter between the Moose team members and the racist men in Chapter 31. What happens in this situation? How is the team left feeling?
Chapters 37-39
Reading Check
1. Supply the missing word in this quote: “Toronto was a [______], I thought as soon as I saw it.”
2. Who are the Sheehans?
Multiple Choice
1. Which of the following statements best describes how Saul is treated during his time at the rookie camp?
A) He is largely revered by his competitors, who openly applaud his talents.
B) He is jeered and mocked for his scrawny size.
C) He is befriended by one player, who supports him during the elimination round.
D) He is for the most part ignored.
2. Which of the following statements best explains why Saul states, “That was the end of any semblance of joy in the game for me” in Chapter 38?
A) He is progressively failing with his new team.
B) He experiences a significant increase in racist remarks and behaviors.
C) He realizes his passion for the game resulted from his time as a Moose.
D) He becomes increasingly competitive with a desire to only make money.
Short-Answer Response
Answer each of the following questions in a complete sentence or sentences. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. According to his reflections in Chapter 38, how is Saul treated by his new teammates on the Marlboros?
2. Chapter 39 detours from the primary narrative to share a memory from Saul’s past. Briefly summarize this narrative. Why do you think this chapter was placed here?
Chapters 40-48
Reading Check
1. Where do most people work in Manitouwadge?
2. What does Saul do the year he turns 18?
3. What effect does alcohol first have on Saul?
4. Who is Ervin Sift?
5. What happens to Saul in Winnipeg?
Multiple Choice
1. Which of the following statements best describes how the “blackness” affects Saul’s love of hockey?
A) He withdraws completely from the game.
B) He approaches the game in a depressive state.
C) He is fueled with an anger that deters his teammates.
D) He loses his eyesight after a particularly awful injury.
2. Which of the following words best describes Ervin Sift’s treatment of Saul?
A) cautious
B) compassionate
C) cruel
D) callous
Short-Answer Response
Answer each of the following questions in a complete sentence or sentences. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. Chapter 41 details Saul’s experience working at logging camp. How is he viewed by his colleagues? What does he find solace in?
2. Describe Saul’s life with Ervin. What does he eventually decide to do?
3. Describe Saul’s vision in Chapter 48. What does this help him to do?
Chapters 49-56
Reading Check
1. Where does Saul go in Chapter 49?
2. What is Saul meant to learn at Gods Lake?
3. Where does Saul go after Gods Lake?
4. What new activity does Saul want to become involved in?
5. Where does Saul find Virgil?
Multiple Choice
1. Which of the following words best summarizes Saul’s emotions in his experience at Gods Lake?
A) cathartic
B) punitive
C) repressed
D) demeaning
2. What is one way that Saul chooses to deal with his painful memories in the last few chapters?
A) remaining at The New Dawn Centre for treatment for several years
B) finding the perpetrator in order to seek vengeance
C) returning to his prior drinking habits
D) sharing his painful story with his loved ones
Short-Answer Response
Answer each of the following questions in a complete sentence or sentences. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. In Chapter 49, Saul reveals a dark secret he kept hidden for most of his life. What is this secret, and how did it affect his love of hockey?
2. In Chapter 52, Saul has an honest discussion with two people from his past. Who are these people, and what do they discuss? What conclusion does this group come to?
3. How does Saul make a return to hockey at the end of the story? How does he feel about the experience?
Quizzes – Answer Key
Chapters 1-10
Reading Check
1. Mother Earth (Chapter 1)
2. Saul’s great-grandfather who found a horse and brought it with him (Chapter 2)
3. alcoholic spirits (Chapter 3)
4. His brother, Benjamin (Chapter 5)
5. Benjamin dies after a bout of coughing from tuberculosis. (Chapter 7)
Multiple Choice
Short-Answer Response
1. The New Dawn Centre is a treatment facility where Saul has been for one month in rehabilitation from drinking. During his time there, the counselors urge him to share his story so that he may find peace within himself. (Chapter 1)
2. “Indian Horse” is given as a family name after the “treaty men,” coming to register them see the horse with the family. (Chapter 2)
3. “Zhaunagush” are the white people who come and take his people’s children to schools. His sister, Rachel, and brother, Benjamin, were both taken from his family and sent to one of these schools. (Chapter 3)
4. Using alcohol to dull their sorrow, Saul’s mother and father become addicted and leave their area in order to look for work to buy spirits. His grandmother, Naomi, protects Saul from his parents when they drink. He spends most of his time enduring the difficulties of the situation.(Chapter 4)
5. When he is in Gods Lake with his family, he finds a remote spot in the area where he sees many people living near the lake and enjoying their days. Suddenly, a boulder crashes down and destroys the people and their belongings. He understands that this was a vision of his ancestors, who were killed on this land. (Chapters 6 and 7)
6. After Benjamin dies near Gods Lake, the family disagrees on how he should be buried. In particular, their grandmother believes that he should be buried in the old tradition, while Saul’s mother believes he should be buried in the Catholic tradition. His father sees both sides but does not know the right way. Ultimately, they take Benjamin’s body for the Catholic funeral. (Chapter 8)
7. After his other family members do not return to Gods Lake from Benjamin’s funeral, Saul and his grandmother try to go to Minaki to stay with a relative. The journey is harsh in the winter and they run out of supplies before making it. One night, she freezes to death in the snow; Saul is discovered the next day with her body. (Chapter 10)
Chapters 11-22
Reading Check
1. St. Jerome’s Indian Residential School (Chapter 11)
2. to clean the ice, but also to secretly practice skating (Chapter 17)
3. to “play it as a team” (Chapter 20)
4. They are “[f]ed, watered, made to bear our daily burden and secured at night.” (Chapter 21)
5. when the staff of the school sexually assaulted the children at night (Chapter 21)
Multiple Choice
Short-Answer Response
1. Their native language, Ojibway, is forbidden at the school; however, most of the children only know this language. Saul is seen as an outsider because he has some knowledge of English (an example of the The Tension between New and Old Ways). Saul retreats into himself during his school years. (Chapter 12)
2. Father Gaston Leboutilier brings joy and happiness to St. Jerome’s, whereas his colleagues are more focused on rule, order, and discipline. In particular, he introduces Saul to the game of hockey. Although Saul is too young to join the team, he cleans the rink. (Chapter 15)
3. Saul is a substitute for an injured player, and he surprises everyone with both his knowledge of skating as well as his understanding of the game. His peers and Father Leboutilier are impressed with his abilities, and he is no longer an outsider. (Chapter 18)
Chapters 23-28
Reading Check
1. Fred Kelly is an Ojibway who owns an Indigenous tournament team; he offers Saul a spot on his team as well as a place to stay in his home. (Chapter 24)
2. “Cave of the Great Spirit” in Ojibway (Chapter 25)
3. Virgil (Chapter 27)
4. “‘a war party on skates’” (Chapter 28)
5. Father Leboutilier (Chapter 28)
Multiple Choice
Short-Answer Response
1. Saul is invited to play on a team in town with 16- and 17-year-olds; however, after ten games, he is asked to leave the team. This is not only because he is the best player, but also because he is Indigenous. (Chapter 23)
2. Hockey in his school was a new discovery that allowed him to be free and escape the horrors of St. Jerome’s. After leaving the school, the game is still freeing for him; however, he begins to see more of the game and love it as its own sport instead of as an escape. Additionally, he begins to see more perspectives of this game, such as those of white people and those of people living on Indigenous reservations. Overall, his love for the game does not change, and he is continually improving his skills. (Chapters 23-28)
Chapters 29-36
Reading Check
1. because he does not “want the Moose to fail” (Chapter 29)
2. Ontario (Chapter 31)
3. making Saul a tougher player and the press clippings (Chapter 33)
4. a scout for the National Hockey League (Chapter 33)
Multiple Choice
Short-Answer Response
1. The Moose win their game and Saul is awarded the honor of first star of the game. (Chapter 30)
2. A group of racist white men challenge each of the Moose team members to a fight outside of the restaurant where they are eating. Saul is exempt because of his hockey ability and his age. After, the team is silent, and Virgil describes later to Saul that the men urinated on each of his teammates. None of the team speaks of it again; however, Saul notes that he realized when he could see one his teammates thinking about it. (Chapter 31)
Chapters 37-39
Reading Check
1. chimera (Chapter 37)
2. the family he lives with in Toronto (Chapter 38)
Multiple Choice
1. D (Chapter 37)
2. B (Chapter 38)
Short-Answer Response
1. He is considered an outsider by them; although they are not explicitly racist to him, they are “indifferent” and they primarily refer to him by his jersey number of “13.” (Chapter 38)
2. The vignette shares a memory from St. Jerome’s of the tragic death of a girl and her sister and the mourning song in Ojibway that the students sing. The scene references the idea tradition can provide comfort and solace in difficult times. (Chapter 39)
Chapters 40-48
Reading Check
1. the mines or the mill (Chapter 40)
2. He leaves Manitouwadge. (Chapter 43)
3. It eases the anger within him. (Chapter 44)
4. an older man who befriends Saul in a bar (Chapter 45)
5. He had a seizure and collapsed, then woke up in a hospital. (Chapter 47)
Multiple Choice
1. C (Chapter 42)
2. B (Chapter 45)
Short-Answer Response
1. Most of his colleagues are foreigners from outside Canada and have not seen an Indigenous person before. Saul is once again the outsider, since they harass and challenge him. Saul only finds solace in being with the land. (Chapter 41)
2. Although Saul finds stability and a brief respite of sobriety in his life with Ervin, he becomes restless and falls back into a drinking routine. One day, he realizes he is scared of someone getting too close to him, and he decides to leave. (Chapter 46)
3. One night outside of The New Dawn Centre, Saul sees a vision of his ancestors, including his great-grandfather with his horse, singing an Ojibway song. He makes the decision that he needs to leave again. (Chapter 48)
Chapters 49-56
Reading Check
1. He returns to St. Jerome’s school. (Chapter 49)
2. “to carry this place with him” (Chapter 51)
3. He returns to The New Dawn Center. (Chapter 52)
4. to coach Indigenous children in hockey (Chapter 53)
5. coaching a local team at a rink (Chapter 54)
Multiple Choice
1. A (Chapter 52)
2. D (Chapters 50-56)
Short-Answer Response
1. His mentor Father Leboutilier was sexually assaulting him for most of his time at St. Jerome’s. He used his love for hockey to repress these memories and lose himself in the game. (Chapter 49)
2. Saul returns to Fred and Martha Kelly’s house. They have an honest discussion about their years at the “re-education” schools, and Saul learns that they were raped as well as during their time there. As a group, they acknowledge that the healing process takes a long time. (Chapter 52)
3. Virgil invites Saul to the rink and invites many of the old Moose players to play a final game. Saul skates for the first time in many years and finds joy again in the game and in the unity with his community. (Chapter 56)
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