Love Medicine - A Chronological List of Events
Love Medicine is a series of short stories in a narrative about three interconnected familes, the Kashpaw, Lazarre and Nanapush extended families who live on a fictitional Indian reservation in northern North Dakota.
June Morrisey freezes to death in the first chapter, but she is a form of protagonist, because she is present in many of the chapters and she is connected to all the families in various ways. Her desire to return “home” is a recurrent theme in the novel and many of the characters either want to return home, is unable to return home or loses their home in this novel.
The novel is not told in a chronological way, and these dates, which I have taken from The Reader’s Guide to the Novels of Louise Erdrich by Peter Beidler and Gay Barton might help you in understanding the novel better.
The following list of dates are more or less correct, and could help you visualize and order the events in your mind.
1908(?) Nector and Eli Kashpaw are born to Margaret (Rushes Bear) and Original Kashpaw
1919 (?) Young Lulu Kashpaw finds the body of a dead man in the woods.
1920 Marie Lazarre is born
1924 Lulu returns to the reservation and lives with old uncle Nanapush.
1934 Marie goes to the convent on the hill, where Sister Leopolda stabs her and scalds her. On the way down the hill she meets Nector Kashpaw.
1935 Marie and Nector marries. Lulu goes to Moses Pillager’s island. Lulu leaves the island before her first son is born. Marie and Nector’s first child, Gordie, is born.
1936 Lulu’s first child by Moses Pillage is born (no name)
1936 – 39 Marie and Nector have a son and daughter, both which die young
1939 June Morrisey is born to Lucille Lazarre and Morissey.
1940 Zelda Kashpaw is born to Marie and Nector
1945 Gerry Nanapush is born to Lulu and Moses Pillager.
1948 Lucille Lazarre dies, leaving her nine year old daughter, June, to survive on tree sap. Lucille’s mother and Morissy bring her to Marie to rear. Gordie and Aurelia try to hang June.
1937 June goes to live with Eli. Rushes Bear moves in with Marie and help her deliver her youngest child, a son, Eugene.
1950. Henry Lamartine is killed by a train. His brother Beverly comes to the funeral and makes love to his widow, Lulu after the wake. A boy, Henry Lamatine Junior is born nine months later.
1952 Lulu and Nector begin their affair.
1953 Lyman Lamartine is born to Lulu and Nector.
?? Gordie and June marry and honeymoon at Johnson’s resort.
1957 The Lulu-Nector affair ends and Lulu marries Beverly, who has come to take Henry Junior home with him. Lulu discovers Beverly is already married and sends him back to get a divorce. Marie takes Zelda to visit the convent, Nector leaves Marie and burns down Lulu’s house. Lulu is made bald as she rescues Lyman from the fire.
1958(?) Albertine is born to Zelda and Swede Johnson.
1965 Gerry begins the first of many jail terms. Lipsha Morrisey is born to Gerry and Lulu, but is abandoned and raised by Marie and Nector.
1969 Henry Junior and Lyman buy a red convertible.
1970 Henry Junior goes to Vietnam.
1973 Henry Junior returns from Vietnam. He meets Albertine in Fargo, where she loses her virginity to him. (The Bridge)
1974 Henry drowns himself in the Red River, watched by Lyman. Lyman goes on a one year drinking binge before he becomes involved in tribal politics and business. (Red Convertible)
1979 King Howard Kashpaw Junior is born to Lynette and King Kashpaw.
1980 Shawn Nanapush is born to Gerry Nanapush and Dot Adare, Gerry kills a state trooper. (Scales)
1981 June is picked up in Williston by a mud engineer. She tries to walk home to the reservation and freezes to death. King buys a new car with the insurance money. The Kashpaw family assembles. Gordie gets drunk, hits a deer in his car and believes he has killed June.
1982. Lulu, Nector and Marie all live at the Senior Centre. Nector chokes to death on a raw turkey heart brought by Lipsha as love medicine. Marie moves back to her home. Gordie dies due to drinking Lysol. Marie helps Lulu with eyedrops.
1984 Lipsha learns from Lulu that Gerry and June are his parents, and that Lulu is his grandmother. Lipsha visits his half-brother King in Minneapolis, wins King’s car bought with Junes’s insurance money, helps his father, Gerry, escape to Canada, and finally brings the car (June) back to the reservation.