Black Elk Speaks Summary
John Neihardt

Everything you need to understand or teach Black Elk Speaks by John Neihardt.

Black Elk Speaks Summary & Study Guide
1 Encyclopedia Article
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Black Elk Speaks Summary

Black Elk Speaks (1932) is the story of an Oglala Sioux medicine man who lived with his people on the Great Plains through most of the second half of the nineteenth century—an age that saw many bloody conflicts between American Indians and white soldiers and settlers. As a child, Black Elk experienced a vision that he thought would help lead his people through the hardships they were just beginning to endure. Unfortunately, Black...

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Encyclopedia Articles (1)

Black Elk Speaks

4,373 words, approx. 15 pages

Black Elk Speaks by John Neihardt Acollaborative effort, Black Elk Speaks was the result of a series of interviews between Nick Black Elk, an American Indian from a Sioux tribe, and John Neihardt, ... Read more

John Neihardt Biographies (3)

John Gneisenau Neihardt

1,357 words, approx. 5 pages

John G. Neihardt is most widely known for his book about a Sioux holy man, Black Elk Speaks (1932), but he considered himself a poet and designated as his masterwork the five-part epic, A Cycle of the... Read more

John Gneisenau Neihardt

4,074 words, approx. 14 pages

John Neihardt's reputation rests on five historical epics begun in 1912, completed in 1941, and collected in the 656-page volume, A Cycle of the West (1949). The heroes are the white trappers who open... Read more

John Gneisenau Neihardt

6,270 words, approx. 21 pages

Throughout his seventy-five-year career as a writer, John G. Neihardt's aspiration was to be the epic poet of the American West; he is remembered chiefly, however, for his work as an editor. His ambit... Read more