Hasu Teen Kura Na Baho Saiko No Medeisumman Sunae Shi No Monogatari / Original Title: Hosteen Klah

[Machine Translation] The Navajo of the southwestern United States - a vast area between the Rio Grande and Colorado Rivers - has long been a wilderness where native peoples have lived, and a sacred land where the Navajo people, known as the "Masters of the Earth," reigned. The Navajo people have lived through a violent history of constant tension with other tribes, invasion by settlers and U.S. troops, forced migration, drought, and the search for harmonious coexistence under the leadership of their distinguished chief, Nabona. The book's protagonist, Hasteen Kuller, was born the great-grandson of Nabona, who eventually became known throughout the country as the greatest medicine man in history. He was the last to fully inherit the complex and unique Navajo mythology. Who was this Medicine Man who used his transcendent powers to perform rituals, paint symbolic sand paintings, speak with seers, prescribe medicinal herbs, and heal and guide people? What kind of life did Kuller experience as a wise man who knows everything about it? The author, a white woman who had earned the unshakable trust of the Navajo people and who left behind watercolors of ceremonial sand drawings from her astonishing memory, has written a book about the Kuller family's four generations. It is the story of four generations of the Kuller family's "days of heroic self-control that were filled with hardship, persecution, subjugation, and even near starvation.

アメリカ南西部ナバホ-リオ・グランデ川とコロラド川のあいだに広がるその広大な一帯は、遙か昔から先住民が生を営む荒野であり、「大地の支配者」と呼ばれたナバホの民が君臨する聖なる地であった。他の部族との絶え間ない緊張や入植者・合衆国軍による侵攻、強制移住、干ばつ、そして共生への模索-ナバホ民族は、傑出した酋長であるナーボナのもとでその苛烈な歴史を歩んでいく。本書の主人公であるハスティーン・クラーは、ナーボナの曾孫として生まれ、やがて史上最高のメディスンマン(呪医)として全米にその名を馳せた人物である。彼こそが、複雑かつ独特なナバホの神話世界を完璧に継承した最後の人物であった。象徴的な砂絵を描き、降霊した神々と語らい、薬草を処方して人々を癒し導く-超越的な力を駆使して儀式を執り行なう「メディスンマン」とは、一体何者なのか。そのすべてを知る賢者として、クラーはいかなる人生を経験したのか。ナバホ族から揺るぎない信頼を得た白人女性であり、驚異的な記憶力により儀式の砂絵を水彩画として残した筆者が本書に記したこと。それは、クラー一族の四代にわたる「困難に満ちた迫害や隷属、さらに飢餓寸前にまで陥った英雄的ともいえる自己抑制の日々」の物語である。