In To Save The Man, one of America’s greatest storytellers sheds light on an American tragedy: the Wounded Knee Massacre, and the ‘cultural genocide’ experienced by the Native American children at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School.
LitStackers! Line up for this one. In presale now, Melville House Publishing will release To Save The Man by John Sayles on January 21, 2025. Early word suggests an immersive and exciting novel. While details remain scarce, the publisher’s description and the cover art hint at a reading experience that will linger long after you turn the last page. Here’s the scoop and early praise on this next must-read. Dip into the book fund for this one!
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In This Spotlight On To Save The Man
About To Save The Man
In September of 1890, the academic year begins at the Carlisle School, a military-style boarding school for Indians in Pennsylvania, founded and run by Captain Richard Henry Pratt. Pratt considers himself a champion of Native Americans. His motto, “To save the man, we must kill the Indian,” is severely enforced in both classroom and dormitory: Speak only English, forget your own language and customs, learn to be white.
As the young students navigate surviving the school, they begin to hear rumors of a “ghost dance” amongst the tribes of the west—a ceremonial dance aimed at restoring the Native People to power, and running the invaders off their land. As the hope and promise of the ghost dance sweeps across the Great Plains, cynical newspapers seize upon the story to whip up panic among local whites. The US government responds by deploying troops onto lands that had been granted to the Indians. It is an act that seems certain to end in slaughter.
As news of these developments reaches Carlisle, each student, no matter what their tribe, must make a choice: to follow the white man’s path, or be true to their own way of life.
Praise for To Save The Man
“In To Save The Man, John Sayles has given us a harrowing story that not only deserves to be read but also reckoned with.”—Richard Russo, author of Empire Falls
“(Sayles’s) latest wrenching, masterful novel (is) a virtuosic performance by a gifted storyteller.”—Booklist, starred review
“To Save The Man takes us inside the Carlisle School, the most famous of 19th century residential Indian schools, where piously confident white teachers ruled isolated Indian children with a regimented brutality wrapped in good intentions. With kaleidoscopic empathy, John Sayles takes us by turns into the minds of those teachers and of the students whose resistance to bewildering tyranny is both heartbreaking and magnificent. Historically accurate, devoid of sentimentality, beautifully written and structured, To Save The Man is, hands down, the best book I’ve read in years.”—Mary Doria Russell, author of The Sparrow
“Set in 1890, the year of the Wounded Knee Massacre, John Sayles’s novel, To Save the Man, is a story of a culture taken. At the Carlisle Indian Industrial School, young Native Americans find themselves having to negotiate the demands of assimilation against the ways of life they’ve always known. A master storyteller, Sayles reminds us of the cost of history on the individual life. This blend of fact and invention makes for an unforgettable read.”—Lee Martin, author of the Pulitzer Prize Finalist, The Bright Forever“John Sayles is one of the most important public historians of our generation.”—William Cronon, President of the American Historical Association
About John Sayles, Author of To Save The Man
John Thomas Sayles is an American independent film director, screenwriter, editor, actor, and novelist. He is known for writing and directing the films The Brother from Another Planet, Matewan, Eight Men Out, Passion Fish, The Secret of Roan Inish, Lone Star, and Men with Guns. For Eight Men Out, Sayles was nominated for the USC Scripter Award.
He has twice been nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay, for Passion Fish and Lone Star. At the 56th Golden Globe Awards, Men with Guns was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film. His directorial debut, Return of the Secaucus 7, as well as Matewan were added to the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress in 1997 and 2023, respectively.
Source: Publisher, Wikipedia
Publisher: Melville House Publishing
ISBN: 9781685891411
Pub Date: Jan. 21, 2025
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