Antelope Woman

Content Warning: This guide contains discussions of the source text’s depictions of sexual assault, domestic violence, suicide, and substance abuse disorders.

Bezhig begins with an epigraph that describes a set of twins, already very old, beginning to craft a piece of beadwork that will become the world.

Scranton Roy, a soldier in the United States Army, sees a dog run out of the village with a cradle board strapped to its back. In the cradle board is an infant, and attached to it is a string of blue beads. Horrified by the battle in which he is fighting and ashamed of having just killed an innocent old woman, Scranton takes off after the dog, following it deep into the woods. When Scranton kills a rabbit, the dog approaches him for handouts, and he is able to remove the child from the dog’s back. The child, a baby girl, is too young to eat rabbit, and at first, Scranton gives her only water. Her crying intensifies, and he puts her to his own nipple to quiet her down. He is successful and keeps her there for days. Eventually, to his surprise, Scranton begins to produce milk.