Word: kalunait
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Dates: during 1971-1971
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...story is told through the mind of Avinga, a kind of Eskimo Ishmael who finally finds himself alone after the disintegration of his community. To Avinga and his fellow Eskimos, the rescued white men are almost fascinatingly ugly. They refer to them as kalunait (literally, "people with the heavy eyebrows"), the legendary offspring of a wayward Eskimo girl and a sled dog. Yet they tolerate the white men's minor barbarities and breaches of courtesy with indulgent understanding...
...almost Homeric hunt for walrus, and a winter dance of exquisite magic and sexuality. Eventually a moment comes in the long winter when the whalers, ugly but not serious, threaten an Eskimo with knives. In his code, it is a disastrous challenge: he must either kill the kalunait or exile himself. "But killing men was not our custom," says Avinga, "and it had not been done in living memory." With no reasonable solution possible, the Eskimo simply withdraws. He is never seen again. Soon afterward, the whalers ferment some berry wine, ply the remaining Eskimos with it and so produce...
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