NEW YORK (AP) — N. Scott Momaday, a Pulitzer Prize-winning storyteller, poet, educator and folklorist whose debut novel "House Made of Dawn" is widely credited as the starting point for contemporary Native American literature, has died. “His Kiowa heritage was deeply meaningful to him and he devoted much of his life to celebrating and preserving Native American culture, especially the oral tradition." Like Joseph Heller’s “Catch-22,” Momaday’s novel was a World War II story that resonated with a generation protesting the Vietnam War. Addressing a gathering of American Indian scholars in 1970, Momaday said, “Our very existence consists in our imagination of ourselves.” He championed Natives' reverence for nature, writing that "the American Indian has a unique investment in the American landscape." Audio guides to tours of the Smithsonian Institution's Museum of the American Indian featured Momaday's avuncular baritone.

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Persons: Scott Momaday, Momaday, “ Scott, ”, Jennifer Civiletto, “, Kiowa, John Joseph Mathews, Marshall Sprague, Scott Momaday's, Joseph Heller’s “, Leslie Marmon Silko, James Welch, Louise Erdrich, Joy Harjo, Robert Redford, Jeff Bridges, George W, Bush, Regina Heitzer, Cael, Navarre Scott Mammedaty, Momaday's, Fran McCullough, Billy the Kid, ” Redford, Scott, “ I’m, ” Momaday, Russell Contreras Organizations: HarperCollins, PBS, American Indians, New York Times, Stanford, Princeton, NPR, of, Academy of American Poets, Kiowa Nation, Smithsonian Institution's Museum, Indian, University of Mexico, Associated Press Locations: Santa Fe , New Mexico, New Mexico, Jemez Pueblo, Vietnam, American, Columbia, Dayton, Lawton , Oklahoma, Arizona , New Mexico, North Dakota, Wyoming