The Breathing Hole

Colleen Murphy, Siobhan Arnatsiaq-Murphy, Janet Tamalik McGrath

• Publisher: Playwrights Canada Press
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9780369101129
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Drama
• Index: Literature

Stories of the Canadian Arctic intersect in this epic five-hundred-year journey led by a one-eared polar bear.

In 1535, Hummiktuq, an Inuk widow, has a strange dream about the future. The next day, she discovers a bear cub floating on ice near a breathing hole. Despite the concerns of her community, she adopts him and names him Angu'?uaq. In 1845, Angu'?uaq and his mate Ukuannuaq wander into a chance meeting between explorers from the Franklin Expedition and Inuit hunters. Later, when the explorers are starving, the bears meet them again. By 2035, entrepreneurs are assessing degrees of melting ice for future opportunities. Angu'?uaq encounters the passengers and crew of a luxury cruise ship as it slinks through the oily waters of the Northwest Passage.

Humorous and dramatic, The Breathing Hole is a profound saga that traces the paths of colonialism and climate change to a deeply moving conclusion.

1535
Souls

The greatest peril of life lies in the fact that human food consists entirely of souls. All the creatures that we have to kill and eat, all those that we have to strike down and destroy to make clothes for ourselves, have souls, like we have, souls that do not perish with the body, and which must therefore be propitiated lest they should avenge themselves on us for taking away their bodies.

— Knud Rasmussen (1879–1933) was a Danish–Inuit explorer and anthropologist, and the first European to cross the Northwest Passage via dogsled

Act I

Scene One

It is May 1535, and light sparkles along the ridge of a glacial hill in the distance. Cold water, heavy with drift ice, flanks one side of the shore.

The land is alive with sounds rumbling from deep inside the ice. The wind blows softly, birds squawk, and the barking and whining of the huskies can be heard when they pick up the smell of meat.

Hummiktuq stands by the edge of a breathing hole, clutching a soapstone pot and staring intently down at the water.

Enter Maniilaq carrying a baby in the hood of her amauti.

Maniilaq: Why are you standing there doing nothing useful?

No response.

Did you rinse the pot?

Hummiktuq: What colour is this water?

Maniilaq: It’s just water.

Hummiktuq: It’s black, look . . .

Maniilaq moves closer to look at the water.

Maniilaq: No it isn’t.

Hummiktuq: Through my eyes it appears quite black.

Maniilaq: If you make yourself sunblind from too much sun then objects appear black.

Hummiktuq quickly puts on her sun goggles — iřgak, made of bone — and looks down at the water, then removes the goggles.

Hummiktuq: No, it’s not from the sun — it’s remnants from my dream last night. As I walked through my dream, everywhere I looked the water was black.

Maniilaq: Maybe the souls of your forebearers are darkening the water in your dream, or maybe the souls of the animals make it dark with their shadows.

Hummiktuq: I didn’t see any animal souls or human souls, only black water but — eeee, I did see something injured . . . a white creature struggling in the black water, its foreleg reaching to me. I heard it call out to me, not out loud but in here (points to her head) and in here (points to her heart) I heard it calling to me.

Maniilaq: Maybe the dream is about you being alone because you didn’t see any souls.

Hummiktuq: . . . yes . . . maybe, but still this black water —

Maniilaq: This water’s not black, Arnarvik [Maternal Aunt]. It has no colour. Look at it . . . (scoops up some water with her hand) Water: simple, ordinary water.

Hummiktuq: Yes . . . I see now that it has no colour.

Sounds can be heard . . . dogs barking and perhaps voices.

Maniilaq: Did you rinse the pot? We need to boil the meat.

Hummiktuq: Yes, here . . . (gives Maniilaq the soapstone pot) Don’t tell your husband I saw black water in my dream, as he might tease me about it.

Maniilaq: He’s a big teaser, that one.

Hummiktuq: Please do not tell him. Oh look . . .

Hummiktuq picks up a feather and hands it to Maniilaq, who takes it.

. . . give this to your son. That little one loves feathers so much.

Maniilaq: We are starving, and we’ll starve even lon...