Literature of the Americas Literature of the Americas 2541-7894 2542-243X IWL RAS https://www.doi.org/DOI%2010.22455/2541-7894-2018-4-240-252 Articles Louise Erdrich’s Trilogy of Justice 2018 Copyright © 2026, IWL RAS 2026 In three novels Louise Erdrich explores issues of justice involving the dominant white culture and Native Americans. A Plague of Doves and The Round House concern the aftermath of unpunished crimes committed by whites against Native Americans. In A Plague of Doves the movement of the narrative suggests that the decline of the white town where the crime occurred is retribution for the lynchings of the innocent Ojibwe. The Round House was at least loosely inspired by an actual case where a powerful white political figure raped a young Native American babysitter. The crime was immediately reported and investigated but covered up. Erdrich may be too close to the emotional subject of white rape of Native American women: her fictional rapist is melodramatic and unbelievable. Because the judicial system is unable to render justice, a thirteen-year-old boy kills the white man who raped his mother–– clearly an unsatisfactory solution. LaRose, instead, focuses on a tragic accident rather than a crime, and it occurs within a community where whites and Native Americans are mixed. The conclusion demonstrates that the two cultures are now so intertwined that reconciliation rather than vengeance should be the response in issues of justice. This seems to me to express Erdrich’s own view. 1. Amnesty International. “Maze of Injustice”: The Failure to Protect Indigenous Women from Sexual Violence. (2007). Online at https://www.amnestyusa.org/pdfs/mazeofinjustice.pdf 2. Banks, Dennis, Erdoes, Richard. Ojibwa Warrior: Dennis Banks and The Rise of the American Indian Movement. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2004. 3. Erdrich, Louise. LaRose. New York: HarperCollins, 2016. Erdrich, Louise. Love Medicine. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1984. Erdrich, Louise. The Plague of Doves. New York: HarperCollins, 2008. 4. Erdrich, Louise. The Round House. New York: HarperCollins, 2012. 5. “Louise Erdrich Interview.” Online at https://www.democracynow.org/2008/6/6/native_american_writer_and_independent_bookseller 6. “Louise Erdrich: A Reading and a Conversation.” Montgomery Fellow Lecture. Dartmouth College. May 22, 2012. Online at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vK9G0ydx12M 7. Matthiessen, Peter. In the Spirit of Crazy Horse. New York: Viking Press, 1983.