The Light in The Forest - Part I

The Light in The Forest by Conrad Richter is an example of a classic adventure story. It tells the story of a frontier boy raised by Indians. As a fan of American history, I found this story very interesting and even captivating. From this story I learned a lot about native culture and much more about the Indian’ perspective of white people.  The entire story is in itself a culture clash. However, numerous separate culture-based clashes appear throughout the plot. I found the background to the story very interesting. Although not all white men did this, they became notorious for killing any Indian they came across, including children. So when Indians retaliated they would occasionally capture and then foster a white child to essentially replace the child who had died. This is what happened to the main character of the story, John Cameron Butler. As a young boy, John was taken and adopted by a Lenni Lenape Indian warrior, he was renamed True Son. He was raised to think, feel, and fight like an Indian.  Then came the first major plot twist, at fifteen, True Son was ordered to go back to the white man after the Indians had made a treaty and agreed to return all their white captives. For True Son who absolutely detested the white men this was a nearly impossible task. He never considered himself white for a second. He was even convinced that he had an Indian heart, an Indian mind, and Indian blood.  A lot of problems are provoked by the fact that he could not understand that his people were white and not Indian. He hated his new father, his new house, his new family. He even loathed his name and every part of his white culture. He argued with his white father and uncle and disagreed with many of their views simply because the Indian’ views were different and in his opinion made perfect sense. After living with his white family for a while and slowly being forced into their customs and way of life I thought that the story would end with True Son accepting white society and culture. But when some of his old Indian friends show up at his home, his uncle kills one of them and True Son flees with his cousin. His eventual return to his Indian family is a happy section of the story, but In the end it is obvious that living with his white family has affected him even if he does not want to admit it.