Blake's Mythology Blog

A coyote (Source) In the first story about the legendary “trickster coyote” we see him conspiring to steal a poor man's wife. While the man is away, the coyote does this and escapes with the rest of the camp down into a valley. Eventually the man returns however, and starts inquiring about his missing wife. After some searching, he finds his wife in the tipi of Coyote. He rescues his wife and hatches a plan to punish Coyote for his evil trick. He hears up some rocks in a fire and wraps them in fat, then gives them to Coyote. Coyote eagerly wolfs them down, but after a bit falls over dead. This is the first story of Coyote. I had assumed that Coyote was a protagonist kind of trickster, like the raven of last week, but I was wrong. There are still several stories with Coyote left in them however, so I am interested to see if they are continuous or if they are not connected. Turns out most of the stories are not connected, or at least the reports of Coyote’s death were greatly ...

Taos Pueblo, New Mexico (Source) These stories in this collection are a very close translation of traditional Apache stories.  As such, they do not always make the most sense, and are very vague with a lot of their words.  Something I noticed in particular was the use of pronouns, which was particularly confusing.  I hope that when I am rewriting my own story, I can do it a lot more clearly so that the reader understands and knows exactly what is going on. In one of the stories, Naiyenesgani, a monster hunter, is commissioned by a tribe of people to go and rescue some of their families from a kind of swamp monster that is guarding them.  He uses four different hoops to drain the water, then goes in and kills the monster.  The hoops are black, blue, yellow, and mixed colors, which also happen to be the same colors that the are centered in many of these stories.  Whenever I write my story, I will make sure to incorporate this. In other stories, which a...

A sad, fat marmot. (Image source) Marmot and Raven were terrible enemies.  Raven had been dancing the best he could with his eyes closed, but Marmot only laughed at him and hid from Raven before he could catch him.  Raven shrieked in rage and vowed to capture him, but Marmot was safely in his hole and Raven could not get him out.  Raven flew away, plotting how he could get his revenge on Marmot. One day, Raven returned to Marmot with a large branch of berries in his beak and said: “I’m sorry Marmot, I should not have gotten mad at you.  Please take these berries as my apology.” “Why thank you, Raven” replied Marmot.  “That’s very kind.”  And he quickly gulped down the juicy berries. The next day, Raven returned with a large, juicy fish. “Here Marmot, take this fish.  I was fishing and there was no way I could ever eat such a large meal.” Marmot happily accepted the fish and swallowed the whole thing in one gulp.  Marmot sat back ...

Although the men searched far and wide, they could  not find the sun.  (Image Source) One of the interesting stories in this second half of the reading is a legend about how the first women came to live with the Alaskan people.  In the story, there is only one woman that exists in the land, and an enterprising fisherman is able to marry her.  However, another man becomes jealous and attempts to steal the fisherman's wife.  He is only halfway successful, however, because he and the fisherman split the woman in two during a tug-of-war.  She survived, remarkably, and the two men fashion her missing halves out of wood.  This was a very interesting story, and although it seems a bit cruel, it is a funny explanation for the clumsiness of the southern dancers and the awkward hands of the northern women. Another story tells the origins of the wind, and how a doll crafted by a childless couple goes out to all the cardinal directions and cuts holes in the c...

A snowy raven, perhaps like the trickster in these legends (Source) Stylistic Notes: Most of the first story is told in quotations, with Raven talking directly to Man that he had created.  Raven himself is the one that explains how the various animals are created.  Man also replies, also in quotations. In the next story, Raven talks to himself as he continues to create different animals. The Raven in this story is much more helpful to the humans that it created then it is to the other beings in the world that it lives in. The other story focuses on the creation of other animals.  Each of their creations is somehow related to Man, who is traveling with Raven and being turned different animals by him.  I almost always compare the references to a creation story to the traditional Biblical account.  It is interesting to see the difference, especially how they see the creation of different species and land.  It is also interesting to see how many of t...

"The natives had often spoken of the mysteries of this cave" (Image source) August 8, 1878 After what seems to have been nearly three months of arduous travel, and having been afflicted with various diseases and problems of all sorts and species, we have finally arrived in the fabled jungle land of South Asia.  We had been directed after landing in the British consul in Thailand to head directly inland, as far as we could, travelling north.  We have earnestly endeavored to go as north as the land would permit us, but at last we have reached what seems to be an impassable ravine with a roaring river below.  It will likely take some time to find a suitable location to cross this treacherous cliff, and our native guides seem increasingly uncomfortable the deeper we have gone into the heart of the jungle.  Despite the presence of several nearby villages, the natives insisted that we should not linger for long in our temporary encampment. August 9, 1878 Despit...

Another river scene in Laos (Source) The first story of the wizard and the old beggar was very similar to some of the stories of Arabia and one of the African legends as well, where a genie or wizard was repaid for their kindness with ingratitude, teaching a lesson about the importance of being grateful and honest. The next story, about the grain of rice, actually follows a similar theme.  Rice used to be so big it would just roll out of the field when it was ready and come down into the village.  However, due to the ingratitude of an older woman, the rice broke into thousands of small grains and was content to sit in the fields until it was wanted. Another tale focused on the beautiful young woman, Chum Paw, who tricks all of her evil suitors into killing themselves and the other men into doing the same.  It is interesting to see such a story like this in a culture that is traditionally male-dominated, this story truly was a fairy tale for young women. After this ...

An idyllic landscape in Laos ( Source) The first story is a little bit different, it tells the story of a woman who becomes so enraged that she leaves her Laotian village and dwells among the beasts of the forest.  She lives there until she is no longer angry, and returns to her village as a hero, having protected the villagers from wild beasts.  This left me with so many questions, like: Why did she become so angry? What happened to her? Why did the animals love her specifically? How often were they attacking the village and why? What was the point of this story?  I am very confused. Since these stories are folklore, I a suppose that there does not have to be an exact point to each story.  The next one tells the tale of a kind of "garden of eden" that exists for hunters who faithfully chase game up and down mountains.  That is it, the entire story.  There is nothing else to it.  The author does try to throw in an element of faith in the story, bu...

I did not start off great as far as keeping a regular schedule going for this class.  The first couple of weeks, my projects were almost always turned in on Monday morning, and I actually did not do the project for the first week, keeping me back by a whole week.  Eventually, however, I started to get a more regular schedule, using the time that I had between classes on Monday and Tuesday to finish all of the other assignments.  Then I would do the project and feedback either on Thursday or Friday.  I feel much better about that kind of system that I have now than what I was doing before. Looking forward, I hope to keep up this kind of schedule, wherein all of the other assignments are done by Wednesday and my project and feedback are done by Friday.  This lets me keep my free weekends and enjoy going out and football as well. This image  really spoke to me and helped ignite a small spark of motivation deep within me.

This is one of the first classes I have had where I consistently give and receive feedback on a weekly basis.  It is kind of a new experience for me, but one that I have slowly come to appreciate.  The feedback I have received is normally kind of generic, in that it praises me for the things I have written and makes one comment or so that is relevant to whatever I have actually posted.  It is nice, but I don’t know if it makes a difference in my actual writing. Unfortunately, I think I fall into the exact same trap as the people who comment on my own work.  I normally do the exact same thing, in that I write something nice about what they have posted and give some small commentary, which is never a critique, on the story they have written.  However, I still find these to be very useful experiences for me, because I get to see what other people are writing and get inspired for my own writing.  So even though the feedback itself may not be the best, the ...

These past several weeks of readings have been highly enjoyable for me.  Since I am in my final semester of my International Relations, three of my five classes are in my major and a lot of my other readings can be somewhat repetitive and occasionally uninteresting.  It has been so much fun to be able to read something non-academic, with creativity and occasionally humor.  I love reading, but sometimes hour after hour of political theory can really start to wear on you.  This class and the readings here are something that I look forward to doing because it is such a nice, refreshing break. My favorite unit so far has actually been last week’s unit on Africa.  I read an anthology about Anansi, the trickster spider god, and I actually found myself laughing out loud at some of the things that happened in the stories.  Although I didn’t really know what I wanted to do for the story post, and wasn’t 100% satisfied even when I had finished, it is so nice to ...

A termite (white ant) mound in Africa (Source)  Listen, my son, and I will tell you the story of how the dreadful humans betrayed us and murdered our ancestors.  I will tell you why they are never to be trusted and why we must always work against them, destroying anything they construct. It all began many moons ago, when there but a few of us on the earth. At this time, there was not hatred between the animals, and all lived happily, trusting one another and never harming another being. One day, White Ant and his children were on their way to work, when they happened across Wolf and Leopard, where were both tied to and hanging from a great tree. What are you doing up there? they inquired. We have been betrayed by that evil trickster spider, Anansi! they cried.   He is the one who tied us up here and left us to be mocked and shamed by all the village and all the animals. Our kind and trusting ancestors sought a way to untie them, but alas...

A tortoise in the desert (Source) This series of stories now seems to be less focused on the machinations of the trickster god Anansi and instead on other themes, such as value lessons. One of these is a story of a tortoise and a hunter who finds it in the woods.  It is singing, and the hunter, enthralled by its voice, takes it home with him, promising that he will keep her to himself.  Eventually he breaks this promise, trying to impress the village.  This eventually leads to his death.  Anansi is not even part of this tale. Another story talks about a chameleon who, by his tricks, becomes king of the animals.  None of them are happy with this outcome and they all abandon him. Then we get back to Anansi, who continues to teach us lessons through his selfish and immoral actions.  He had an opportunity to take home a whole elephant for dinner, but because he did not want to share it with his family, he instead chased after a small wren to give to his ...

Some termites All of these stories about Anansi are quite entertaining and I found myself laughing out loud at many of them.  It was interesting how although Anansi is a great trickster, he himself often seems to be getting tricked as well.  In one of the stories, he is tricked by a rubber man, which is probably what the tar baby story of Brer Rabbit is based on. Each of the stories has both a kind of moral as well as an explanation for some natural phenomenon in the world, normally about animals.  This explains why termites are so pesky, or why spiders hide in corners, for example. Also interesting is how Anansi is such a terrible character, he does despicable things and has killed several people already.  He is also completely selfish and often takes advantage of other people, lying and cheating them often.  Like many tricksters in mythology, he does seem to get outplayed quite often by fellow conspirators. Story Source: West African Folk-Tales , compi...