Black Robe Analysis

The novel Black Robe by Brian Moore, follows the stories of many individuals but places a focus on the characters, Father Paul Laforgue, a priest who came to America to become a martyr, Daniel Davost, a young Frenchman who falls in love with an Algonkin, and Annuka, the Algonkin woman who struggles between her love for Daniel and her love for her people. This narrative follows their journey from the fur trading center of Québec to the distant village of Iwanchou that is in desperate need for a new priest to replace the ailing Father Jerome. Along the way, each of these characters will face trials including the loss of the Christian faith, starvation, sickness, and even the threat of other Native American tribes such as the Iroquois. In Black

Some key facts that point towards this are his inability to understand why Frenchmen like Mercier would abandon French civilization and religion in favor of the Native American lifestyle. Another is why Natives such as Chomina would rather die and experience the Land of the Dead than become a Christian and live eternally. This can be seen during Chomina’s final moments, “Laforgue looked at the Savage, ill, suffering, waiting for death. And, despairing, thought of God’s mercy denied him” (BR, 185). On the other side of this discussion, the French character who seems to demonstrate the most understanding for the Native Americans would be Daniel Davost. While it seems that he only showed interest in the Native way of life due to his feelings for Annuka, by the end of the novel it is shown that while he will remain a Christian, he has adopted the attire and lifestyle of the Native Americans. A scene that shows his understanding for the Algonkin’s beliefs is

Some more specific examples of how their lives were transformed include the Native’s new dependence to the Europeans for items such as rifles, kettles, tobacco, and many other goods, the European’s desire to convert the Natives, and the way that Native American warfare was transformed forever. Due to the European’s strong desire to obtain animal pelts and other goods, they were more than willing to trade rifles and commonplace kettles to the Natives in return for their help in acquiring these pelts. These goods that the Natives received transformed their life, but not entirely for the better. Prior to this engagement, they were an autonomous society that lived from the land. With the introduction of European goods, there was more and more dependency on these goods which, in the end, led to events such as King Philip’s War and the deterioration of the Native American way of life. An example of this dependency can be seen from Chomina during their time as Iroquois prisoners. He tells Laforgue, “It is you Normans, not the Iroquois, who have destroyed me, you with your greed, you who do not share what you have, who offer presents of muskets and cloth and knives to make us greedy as you are. And I have become as you, greedy for things. And that is why I am here and why we will die together” (BR, 165). These gifts of guns as well as the English and French seeking