“You Could Be White, But It Hurt Like Hell.” Browning the Apple in Eric Gansworth’s Apple: Skin to the Core

Abstract

[eng] This paper analyses Apple: Skin to the Core, a Young Adult memoir-in-verse composed by the Onondaga writer and visual artist Eric Gansworth and published in 2020. The aim of this dissertation is to make a close reading of Apple from a postcolonial perspective in order to discuss the impact of boarding schools on Native American communities as experienced by the author. Through Apple, Eric Gansworth calls for Native peoples to embrace their roots as the way to heal from the past, presenting his journey of reconnection as a source of comfort and hope for the achievement of a brighter future for Native Americans. The slur “apple,” around which the whole work revolves, is essential to understand the author’s position and his explorations of identity. Furthermore, the book’s genre will be discussed in relation to the author’s intentions of writing a book to raise awareness of boarding schools among young adults. The analysis allows me to conclude that Apple represents an act of protest against colonisation and assimilation policies, as well as a recognition of the suffering and resilience of the author’s community, and a declaration of hope in this particular context.