Reflexões Nostálgicas em Kiss Of The Fur Queen (1998) de Tomson Highway

Abstract

This article aims to analyze the novel Kiss of the Fur Queen (1998) by Tomson Highway (1951), an Indigenous Canadian author of Cree ethnicity. It is a work written in English, with elements of indigenous cultures such as storytelling, mythology, humor, non-linear time and expressions in the author's mother tongue. It is intended to observe aspects of nostalgia present in the novel, based on reflections by Boym (2017), Huyssen (2000) and Hutcheon (1998). As a specific objective, we intend to investigate the type of nostalgia present in the plot, according to the strategies that seek to understand the contemporary nostalgic experiences proposed by Boym (2017). The theoretical framework also includes concepts about postcolonialism from Bhabha (1998), Bonnici (1998) and Brydon (2004). Considering that nostalgia is an intrinsic relationship between memory and identity, the theoretical support of Bergson (1999), Halbwachs (2004) and Hall (2006) is also used. It is concluded that the protagonists have a mostly reflexive nostalgia, as they yearn for a return home, even knowing its impossibility. Finally, it is argued that nostalgia, both from the oeuvre itself and in the experiences of the characters in the plot, is a form of indigenous resistance to the violence of colonialist policies in Canada