Sherman Alexie: 'Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight' at 20 years

From: Sherman Alexie
To: Jess Walter
Sent: Thursday, June 20
Subject: Twentieth Anniversary “Lone Ranger and Tonto”

S.A.: So I’ve been trying to write the intro to the twentieth-anniversary edition, but it feels too self-congratulatory, so do you want to have an e-mail exchange about it and use that as the intro?

J.W.: “The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven” is twenty!?! Your e-mail sent me scurrying to my signed copy. I looked at the jacket photo and there you are, with the greatest “Breakfast Club” pro-wrestling warrior mullet of all time.

S.A.: The rez mullet! I also find my former haircut amusing in stylistic terms. It’s embarrassing now. But there’s always been a conscious and subconscious classist / racist edge to mullet jokes, especially when it comes to white guys with mullets. If one means to tell a racist / classist joke then make it a good one, but I don’t actually think that many folks realize the cultural importance of the mullet in Native American-warrior history. Take a look at Chief Joseph.