Permanent Astonishment

Growing Up Cree in the Land of Snow and Sky

De: Tomson Highway

Narrado por: Jimmy Blais

Capricious, big-hearted, joyful: an epic memoir from one of Canada’s most acclaimed Indigenous writers and performers

Tomson Highway was born in a snowbank on an island in the sub-Arctic, the 11th of 12 children in a nomadic, caribou-hunting Cree family who traversed the tundra by dogsled and lived off the land. In Permanent Astonishment, one of the greatest writers of our time animates the magical world of his northern childhood, paying tribute to a way of life that few have experienced and fewer still have chronicled.

Growing up in a land of 10,000 lakes and islands, Tomson Highway relished being pulled by dogsled beneath a night sky alive with stars; sucking the juices from roasted muskrat tails; and singing country music songs with his impossibly beautiful older sister and her teenaged friends. Surrounded by the love of his family and the vast, mesmerizing landscape they called home, his was in many ways an idyllic far north childhood. But five of Tomson’s siblings died in childhood, and Balazee and Joe Highway, who loved their surviving children profoundly, wanted their two youngest sons, Tomson and Rene, to enjoy opportunities as big as the world. And so when Tomson was six, he and Rene were flown south by float plan to attend a residential school and begin the rest of their education.

In 1990, Rene Highway, a world-renowned dancer, died of an AIDS-related illness. Permanent Astonishment is Tomson's extravagant embrace of his younger brother's final words: Don’t mourn me, be joyful.

Infused with joy and outrageous humor, Permanent Astonishment offers insights, both hilarious and profound, into the Cree experience of culture, conquest, and survival.

©2021 Tomson Highway (P)2021 Doubleday Canada

Reseñas de la Crítica

Winner of The 2021 Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize For Nonfiction

Nominated for The 2022 Evergreen Award

Named one of the best books of 2021 by The Globe and Mail • Winnipeg Free Press • CBC

"Permanent Astonishment is a mesmerizing story rich in detail about growing up in a Cree-speaking family in Northern Manitoba and later in a residential school. Highway’s writing delights in tales of eating muskrat tails, speaking Cree (and learning English), preparing for a Christmas concert, and listening to Hank Snow on a transistor radio. While unstinting about the abuse he and others suffered, Highway makes a bold personal choice to accentuate the wondrousness of his school years resulting in a book that shines with the foundational sparks of adolescence: innocence, fear, and amazement." (2021 Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for Nonfiction jury)

"Mesmerizing." (The Globe and Mail)

"Exquisitely written and both hilarious and painful, Permanent Astonishment is a testament to the power of culture, language, family and the land." (Winnipeg Free Press)

Beautiful, joyful memoire.

I love Tomson’s ability to write about the joy and beauty in his life alongside the hardships and tragedy of the residential school environment. His description of his way of life in Northern Canada is magical. His attitude towards life is inspiring.

great listen!!

I put off finishing this because I was enjoying the stories so much. Highly recommend.