Susan Kalter presents seventeen previously unpublished short stories by John Joseph Mathews and skillfully intertwines literary analysis, author biography, and archival research with his journals and personal correspondence. Mathews is considered one of the founders and shapers of the twentieth-century Native American novel, yet literary history has largely ignored his work. An Osage writer from Oklahoma, Mathews also spent time in Los Angeles and Europe. The stories in this volume were written at the dawn of the nuclear age by an author who exposed the social dynamics of an emerging world order, an author who had also published explicitly about the ways he observed the East Coast establishment suppressing southwestern writers. This work shows us the aesthetics we missed out on as a result. Topics range from adulterous murder to Cherokee removal, from the thrill of the hunt to the cultural impasses between U.S. citizens in Mexico and their hosts, from the modern Middle East to the fantastical future. The stories bear the consciousness of a postwar world-its confusions and regrets, its orthodoxies and hypocrisies-as well as the mark of a practiced and prolific writer. The Short Stories of John Joseph Mathews, an Osage Writer sheds light on the complexity of Native American experiences of the last century and the ripple of these stories today.

When John Joseph Mathews (1894-1979) began his career as a writer in the 1930s, he was one of only a small number of Native American authors writing for a national audience. Today he is widely recognized as a founder and shaper of twentieth-century Native American literature. Twenty Thousand Mornings is Mathews's intimate chronicle of his formative years. Written in 1965-67 but only recently discovered, this work captures Osage life in pre-statehood Oklahoma and recounts many remarkable events in early-twentieth-century history. Born in Pawhuska, Osage Nation, Mathews was the only surviving son of a mixed-blood Osage father and a French-American mother. Within these pages he lovingly depicts his close relationships with family members and friends. Yet always drawn to solitude and the natural world, he wanders the Osage Hills in search of tranquil swimming holes - and new adventures. Overturning misguided critical attempts to confine Mathews to either Indian or white identity, Twenty Thousand Mornings shows him as a young man of his time. He goes to dances and movies, attends the brand-new University of Oklahoma, and joins the Air Service as a flight instructor during World War I - spawning a lifelong fascination with aviation. His accounts of wartime experiences include unforgettable descriptions of his first solo flight and growing skill in night-flying. Eventually Mathews gives up piloting to become a student again, this time at Oxford University, where he begins to mature as an intellectual. In her insightful introduction and explanatory notes, Susan Kalter places Mathews's work in the context of his life and career as a novelist, historian, naturalist, and scholar. Kalter draws on his unpublished diaries, revealing aspects of his personal life that have previously been misunderstood. In addressing the significance of this posthumous work, she posits that Twenty Thousand Mornings will challenge, defy, and perhaps redefine studies of American Indian autobiography.

When John Joseph Mathews (1894-1979) began his career as a writer in the 1930s, he was one of only a small number of Native American authors writing for a national audience. Today he is widely recognized as a founder and shaper of twentieth-century Native American literature. Twenty Thousand Mornings is Mathews's intimate chronicle of his formative years. Written in 1965-67 but only recently discovered, this work captures Osage life in pre-statehood Oklahoma and recounts many remarkable events in early-twentieth-century history. Born in Pawhuska, Osage Nation, Mathews was the only surviving son of a mixed-blood Osage father and a French-American mother. Within these pages he lovingly depicts his close relationships with family members and friends. Yet always drawn to solitude and the natural world, he wanders the Osage Hills in search of tranquil swimming holes - and new adventures. Overturning misguided critical attempts to confine Mathews to either Indian or white identity, Twenty Thousand Mornings shows him as a young man of his time. He goes to dances and movies, attends the brand-new University of Oklahoma, and joins the Air Service as a flight instructor during World War I - spawning a lifelong fascination with aviation. His accounts of wartime experiences include unforgettable descriptions of his first solo flight and growing skill in night-flying. Eventually Mathews gives up piloting to become a student again, this time at Oxford University, where he begins to mature as an intellectual. In her insightful introduction and explanatory notes, Susan Kalter places Mathews's work in the context of his life and career as a novelist, historian, naturalist, and scholar. Kalter draws on his unpublished diaries, revealing aspects of his personal life that have previously been misunderstood. In addressing the significance of this posthumous work, she posits that Twenty Thousand Mornings will challenge, defy, and perhaps redefine studies of American Indian autobiography.

Susan Kalter presents seventeen previously unpublished short stories by John Joseph Mathews and skillfully intertwines literary analysis, author biography, and archival research with his journals and personal correspondence. Mathews is considered one of the founders and shapers of the twentieth-century Native American novel, yet literary history has largely ignored his work. An Osage writer from Oklahoma, Mathews also spent time in Los Angeles and Europe. The stories in this volume were written at the dawn of the nuclear age by an author who exposed the social dynamics of an emerging world order, an author who had also published explicitly about the ways he observed the East Coast establishment suppressing southwestern writers. This work shows us the aesthetics we missed out on as a result. Topics range from adulterous murder to Cherokee removal, from the thrill of the hunt to the cultural impasses between U.S. citizens in Mexico and their hosts, from the modern Middle East to the fantastical future. The stories bear the consciousness of a postwar world-its confusions and regrets, its orthodoxies and hypocrisies-as well as the mark of a practiced and prolific writer. The Short Stories of John Joseph Mathews, an Osage Writer sheds light on the complexity of Native American experiences of the last century and the ripple of these stories today.

The nine short stories in this collection by distinguished Osage author John Joseph Mathews are sure to be recognized as classics of twentieth-century nature writing and the wildlife conservation movement. The characters in Old Three Toes and Other Tales of Survival and Extinction are coyotes, mountain lions, deer, owls, sandhill cranes, prairie chickens - and human beings, who sometimes kill their prey but are often outsmarted by the largest and smallest animals. Mathews shows us the world through the animals' eyes and ears and noses. His convincing portrayals of their intelligence recall the fiction of Jack London and Ernest Thompson Seton. Like these literary ancestors, Mathews originally intended his nature stories for boys, but the stories transcend boundaries of age, gender, and geography. Mathews writes not just to inspire his readers with nature's beauty but also to demonstrate the interrelatedness of humans, animals, and the landscapes in which they interact. Timely and relevant to discussions of ecology and the environment, his stories will reach a wide audience today, more than fifty years after they were written. These stories show Mathews's ability to write precise descriptions - of a coyote catching a field mouse, a crane eating a frog, a mountain lion playing. A hunter himself, Mathews understood both the animals' readiness to fight and man's instinct to survive. And he let readers share the dignity of the animal characters and their refusal to acquiesce to their own extinction, particularly in the face of human ignorance and carelessness. Susan Kalter's afterword provides a poignant portrait of Mathews and traces the inspirations for the short stories in this collection. Thoughtfully annotated, these stories are the only published examples of Mathews's hitherto unknown short fiction and will add to his stature as an important American Indian writer.