Flint and Feather (Mint Editions (Native Stories, Indigenous Voices))

Flint and Feather (1913) is a collection of the complete poems of E. Pauline Johnson. Revered as one the foremost Canadian poets of her time, Johnson was a prolific writer whose works explored her Mohawk heritage while shedding light on the racism and persecution faced by indigenous peoples across North America.

“The lyrical verse herein is as a ‘Skyward floating feather, / Sailing on summer air.’ And yet that feather may be the eagle plume that crests the head of a warrior chief; so both flint and feather bear the hall-mark of my Mohawk blood.” So states Johnson in the foreword to her complete poems, Flint and Feather, a collection that captures not only her range as a poet in tune with the Romantic tradition, but her dualistic sense of identity as a woman of Mohawk and English heritage. Choosing to emphasize the former, Johnson, who also went by Tekahionwake, her great-grandfather’s name, adopts the persona of an Indian wife who, watching her love depart, wonders what he will “suffer from the white man’s hand.” In fear, in anger, in desperation, she proclaims “By right, by birth we Indians own these lands, / Though starved, crushed, plundered, lies our nation low…” In the face of defeat, she offers a poetry in tune with the “ghost upon the shore,” the voices one hears “when the Northern candles light the Northern sky.” Johnson’s voice is thus both one of resistance and mourning, her song one of a land of plains and rivers, of fields that await the harvest despite the “prying pilot crow” whose “thieving raids” descend “[a]t husking time.”

This edition of E. Pauline Johnson’s Flint and Feather is a classic of Canadian literature reimagined for modern readers.

Since our inception in 2020, Mint Editions has kept sustainability and innovation at the forefront of our mission. Each and every Mint Edition title gets a fresh, professionally typeset manuscript and a dazzling new cover, all while maintaining the integrity of the original book.

With thousands of titles in our collection, we aim to spotlight diverse public domain works to help them find modern audiences. Mint Editions celebrates a breadth of literary works, curated from both canonical and overlooked classics from writers around the globe.

E. Pauline Johnson (1861-1913) was a Canadian poet and actress. Also known by her stage name Tekahionwake, Johnson was born to an English mother and a Mohawk father in Six Nations, Ontario. Johnson suffered from illness as a child, keeping her from school and encouraging her self-education through the works of Longfellow, Tennyson, Browning, Byron, and Keats. Despite the racism suffered by Canada’s indigenous people, Johnson was encouraged to learn about her Mohawk heritage, much of which came from her paternal grandfather John Smoke Johnson, who shared with her and her siblings his knowledge of the oral tradition of their people. In the 1880s, Johnson began acting and writing for small theater productions, finding success in 1892 with a popular solo act emphasizing her duel heritage. In these performances, Johnson would wear both indigenous and Victorian English costumes, reciting original poetry for each persona. As a poet, she wrote prolifically for such periodicals as Globe and Saturday Night, publishing her first collection, The White Wampum, in 1895. Her death at the age of 52 prompted an outpouring of grief and celebration in Canada; at the time, Johnson’s funeral was the largest in Vancouver history, attracting thousands of mourners from all walks of life.