Louise Erdrich’s The Round House is a serious story which presents to the reader a white man’s rape of an Indian woman in the Indian reservation, her name is Geraldine. In addition to this rape case in the story, it describes three people’s deaths: Mayla, Coppy, and Linden. That’s why the main character Joe, a thirteen-year-old boy, try to help his mother to get out situation of the hurt by Linden. He did the justice by himself to kill the Linden, which brings the history of the tribal law problems to the reader.
Of course, all the deaths caused by Linden make him a bad man, but the law could not to bring him to the justice. After his mother, had been raped by Linden,Joe saw his mother every day, depressed and unhappy. His family looked like cover by black cloud, no one laughed any more. All this sad feeling which made the main character Joe so upset and sad. The tribal law could not help his mother; this made him get angry about the legal system. As we know Joe’s mother was attacked by the man Linden near the round house. Joe tried to learn the tribal law from his dad, who was a judge working on the Indian reservation.when Joe knows the tribal law, he was totally lost: “Took from us the right to prosecute non-Indians who commit crimes on our land” (Erdrich 229). This means Joe’s family could not depend on the justice system to get the bad guy. The problem was the police arrested Linden, but the law could not keep him in the jail.Linden soon was set free, then kept harassing Joe’s mother again and again. No one could do anything to get him put in the jail. All this bad happened to make Joe’s dad have a heart attack. Luckily Joe’s dad recovered in the hospital.
Until now Indian reservation law could not do anything to protect Indian women. Joe’smother tells her thirteen-year-old son she will kill Linden to stop him from continuing to rape women in the tribal land. Over all Joe wanted to defend his mother who had been hurt by law. Joe thinks if he kills Linden, the law will be light on him, because he is only thirteen-year-old boy. That’s why Joe decided to bring the justice by himself with his friend Coppy’s help to kill Linden.
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