Marriage and Family
In 1901 Zitkala-Ša began collecting stories from the Native Americans on the reservation to publish in Old Indian Legends, commissioned by the Boston publisher Ginn and Company. She took a job as a clerk at the Bureau of Indian Affairs at Standing Rock Indian Reservation in New Mexico where in 1902 she met and married a mixed-race Nakota man, Captain Raymond Bonnin.
Soon after marrying Bonnin was assigned to the Uintah-Ouray reservation in Utah, where the couple was to live and work with the Ute people for the next fourteen years. During this period Zitkala-Ša gave birth to the couple's only child, Ohiya.
Also during this period Zitkala-Ša met professor and composer William F. Hanson, who taught at Brigham Young University in Utah. Together in 1910 they started their collaboration on the music for The Sun Dance, an opera for which Zitkala-Sa wrote the libretto and songs. The opera was produced in Utah in 1913, performed by the Ute of the reservation and the first opera to be co-authored by a Native American. It debuted to high local praise.
Read more about this topic: Zitkala-Sa
Famous quotes containing the words marriage and/or family:
“The parent who loves his child dearly but asks for nothing in return might qualify as a saint, but he will not qualify as a parent. For a child who can claim love without meeting any of the obligations of love will be a self-centered child and many such children have grown up in our time to become petulant lovers and sullen marriage partners because the promise of unconditional love has not been fulfilled.”
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