If you’ve ever walked into a bookstore and seen a massive, charcoal-grey spine that looks more like a brick than a novel, you’ve probably met The Dying Grass. It’s the fifth volume in William T. Vollmann’s "Seven Dreams" series. Honestly, it’s a beast. It clocks in at over 1,300 pages. Most people see the size and the weird layout—the text jumps all over the page in columns—and they put it right back on the shelf. That’s a mistake.
This book is about the Nez Perce War of 1877. But it isn't a dry history lesson. It's a hallucinatory, deeply researched, and sometimes heartbreakingly intimate look at Chief Joseph, General Oliver Otis Howard, and the collision of two worlds that couldn't understand each other. Vollmann didn't just sit in a library to write this. He followed the actual 1,200-mile trail the Nez Perce took while trying to flee to Canada. He slept in the cold. He looked at the same mountains they saw. You can feel that dirt under the fingernails of every sentence.
What's actually going on with the layout of The Dying Grass?
When you first open it, you might think the printer messed up. It’s not a mistake. Vollmann uses a "braided" narrative style. He places different voices in different columns or staggered indentations. Basically, it allows you to see what General Howard is thinking at the exact same time a scout is whispering to him or a soldier is shivering in the background. It mimics the way we actually experience reality—not as a single line of text, but as a mess of overlapping thoughts and sounds.
It’s about the "dying grass" of the plains, sure, but it’s also about the dying of a way of life. The Nez Perce were trying to reach safety. The US Army was trying to fulfill what they saw as a "manifest destiny," even if the men pulling the triggers didn't always believe in the cause. Vollmann leans heavily into the character of General Howard. Howard was a "Christian General" who had lost an arm in the Civil War. He was a man who founded a university for formerly enslaved people, yet here he was, chasing indigenous families through the mud because the government told him to. The book captures that hypocrisy perfectly.
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Why people get the Nez Perce War wrong
Most history books paint Chief Joseph as a "Red Napoleon," a tactical genius who led a brilliant fighting retreat. Vollmann pulls from the work of historians like Lucullus Virgil McWhorter—who actually interviewed survivors—to show a more complex truth. Joseph wasn't a war chief. He was a guardian. The real tactical heavy lifting often came from others like Looking Glass or Ollokot. The Dying Grass respects that distinction. It doesn't need to turn Joseph into a myth to make him a hero; his actual burden of trying to keep children and the elderly alive while being hunted by Gatling guns is dramatic enough.
The book is relentless. It details the Battle of the Big Hole and the final surrender at the Bears Paw Mountains. You see the tactical errors. You see the hunger. You see the way the telegraph changed warfare by allowing the Army to "jump ahead" of the fleeing tribes. It’s a story of technology versus terrain, and Vollmann’s prose is so dense with period-accurate detail that you’ll start thinking in 19th-century idioms.
The sheer scale of the research
Vollmann’s endnotes are legendary. In The Dying Grass, he provides a massive "Glossary of Personalities" because there are hundreds of characters. He cites military reports, journals, and oral histories. He spent over a decade on the Seven Dreams project before this book even hit the presses.
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It’s also surprisingly funny in a dark, military way. The bureaucracy of the 1870s Army was a mess. Officers hated each other. Promotions were stuck. The "bluecoats" were often just as miserable as the people they were chasing, dying of dysentery and exposure in a landscape they weren't built for. Vollmann captures that grit without ever losing sight of the fact that the Nez Perce were the ones being dispossessed.
Is it worth the time?
Look, I'm not going to lie and say it's a quick beach read. It’s a commitment. But if you care about how the American West was actually formed—beyond the John Wayne movies—this is the definitive text. It’s a literary achievement that functions as an archive. It asks big questions. Can a "good man" do an evil thing? How much does the landscape shape our morality?
The title itself comes from a speech, a lament about the changing seasons and the end of an era. By the time you reach the final pages, the title feels heavy. You’ve lived through the rain, the snow, and the blood of 1877.
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Practical ways to tackle this book
If you’re going to dive in, don't try to speed-read it. You can't. The formatting won't let you.
- Read the Glossaries First: Familiarize yourself with the names of the "Treaty" vs. "Non-Treaty" Nez Perce. It helps you keep track of the political rift within the tribe.
- Use a Map: Keep a map of Idaho and Montana nearby. Following the path from the Wallowa Valley toward the Canadian border makes the physical toll of the journey real.
- Accept the Ambiguity: Vollmann doesn't always tell you who is speaking. Listen for the "tone" of the voice instead. The Army voices are often rigid and bureaucratic; the Nez Perce voices are more observational and grounded in the natural world.
- Check the Footnotes: They aren't just for academics. Vollmann puts some of his best insights and personal travelogues in the back of the book.
The best way to experience The Dying Grass is to let it wash over you like a fever dream. It’s one of the few books that actually feels as big as the history it’s trying to cover. By the end, you won't just know what happened at the Nez Perce War; you'll feel like you were there, watching the frost settle on the tall grass while the world changed forever.
Next Steps for Readers:
- Locate a physical copy: The digital version struggles with the complex layout; the hardcover or large paperback is the intended experience.
- Research the "Seven Dreams" sequence: If you find the style compelling, look into The Ice-Shirt or Fathers and Crows to see how Vollmann tracks the history of North America.
- Visit the Nez Perce National Historical Park: If you are in the Pacific Northwest, visiting the actual sites mentioned in the book—like White Bird Canyon—provides a chilling context to Vollmann's descriptions.