Orange's Interlude in "There There" - Unfamiliar Concepts in a Real-World Context

The interlude of Tommy Orange’s There There is an insight to the lives of contemporary Native Americans not just as characters in the novel, but as real people in the world we live in. The interlude takes a break from the story to openly address the issues facing Native Americans in twenty-first century America, while relating them back to the plot of the story. 

The section of the interlude entitled “Blood” is, in my opinion, what resonates the most. The “Blood” section begins with an analysis of actual, physical blood, saying that while it must flow freely inside of us, “blood is messy when it comes out. It dries, divides, and cracks in the air.” Orange uses physical blood as a metaphor for ancestral blood, which is notorious for causing division between Native Americans and white settlers in America. While blood courses through all of our veins and makes us human, it is also what drives us apart. 

The sections called “Powwow” and “Big Oakland Powwow” are what truly connects the dots between the novel and real life. Powwows are real events held by North American tribes to connect with each other and honor their cultures. They draw in Native American people from all over, regardless of background or what personal reason they have for going. In There There, the novel’s characters are all going to the Big Oakland Powwow, of which Orange writes in the interlude, “We all came to the Big Oakland Powwow for different reasons. The messy, dangling strands of our lives got pulled into a braid -- tied to the back of everything we’d been doing all along to get us here.” Much like hairs in a braid, the separate individuals all come together at the Powwow to create something beautiful. No matter who they are or what tribe they come from, the Powwow is there to welcome them as one community of people.

Orange’s interlude in There There showcases not just his profound skill with metaphor, but with relating a story to the real world, and therefore to the reader. The interlude allows readers that have never been exposed to Native American culture (and how Native Americans have been treated in the US) to see a new point of view in a real-world context.