Sanderson holds a master of fine arts degree in fiction writing and is an independent writer. In this essay, Sanderson examines Donald Barthelme's use of historical figures and events in his short story.

Numerous critics have noted that Donald Barthelme's stories are filled with the everyday bits and pieces of modern life. Tony Tanner summarizes this phenomenon well in his book City of Words: American Fiction 1950-1970, noting that Barthelme's writing is "packed with the detritus of modern life: it seems like an unbroken stream of the accumulations and appurtenances which we see around us" and that, somehow, Barthelme is able to turn these familiar collections into "strangeness."

Yet, in his short story "The Indian Uprising," Barthelme moves beyond this effort to expose the material garbage heap of our lives; he has his eye set on our accumulated history as contemporary Americans. According to Barthelme, we are...