The cleverness of a trickster is a trait that demonstrates just how intelligent the protagonist is without using brawn, approximately all of the trickster tales share this elemental habit. In these tales tricksters find every way possible to persuade the antagonist into granting their plea. For instance, the tale How Stories came to Earth illustrates this very habit by a protagonist named Kwaku Anansi who was able to effectively manipulate the python, Onini, to capture himself. As a result, Onini became stuck in Anansi’s web and has no other choice than to travel to the sky god, Nyame, as one of the key tokens in retrieving the stories conclusively. Accordingly, this quote from How Stories came to Earth displays all of the action following …show more content…
nwenene! nwenene!-until he came to the head. Then the spiderman said to Onini, “Fool, I will now take you to the sky-god.’”. Similarly, this is not the sole time this trait is exemplified, this habit is exhibited as well in the tale Coyote Steals Fire. First and foremost, this tale is not the exact replica of How Stories came to Earth however it does initiate some of the elements the other tale does. For example, the tale Coyote Steals Fire deals with another non-human protagonist, Coyote, who wants to acquire fire to aid the people, by offering the need of warmth in the cold as well as cooked food. It also accommodates another god named Thunder who is the caretaker of fire, during this tale Coyote bets his life on a game of dice for the price of fire. Coyote proceeds to distract Thunder long enough to flip the dice over, and insure his winning of the fire as displayed in this quote. “Now Coyote is the trickiest fellow alive. He is the master at cheating at all kinds of games. He continuously distracted Thunder so that he could not watch what Coyote was up to.”. In the same way, the trickster tale Master Cat demonstrated intelligence and
In the fables, the protagonists must face against their enemies. “El Grillo y el Jaguar” has the cricket opposing the jaguar, while the donkey is against the foxes in “The Hero
...iam Bradford’s, Of Plymouth Plantation, can be valued as a type of trickster myth. It most certainly has the characteristic of the typical trickster, which are a desire for nonconformity and change. The Pilgrims appetite for religious freedom or “nonconformity” with the national church led to a display of creative intelligence or a “change” in the way of thinking to escape persecution.
Karin Barber’s The Anthropology Of Texts, Persons And Publics and Stephen Belcher’s African Myths Of Origin each explains in great detail the significance of myths and oral texts as a way of weaving society and its people together. Barber makes a claim that oral history is a better representation of a culture, where as Belcher places a heavy importance on differentiating myths and folktales and how they can be interpreted. What both of these texts represent are a departure from literature-centric stance of African anthropology, and focuses on the importance of oral tradition as a means of communicating the history of African culture. I will discuss and evaluate the context of oral tradition and myths through each author respectively and evaluate their approaches and broader arguments.
The trickster character is often use in African American Comedy. The definition of a trickster is a person who plays tricks who also is a deceiver, cheat and a fraud. In literature, a trickster is a supernatural figure appearing in various guises and typically engaging in mischievous activities. Tricksters usually succeed by outsmarting or out thinking their opponents. The trickster figure originated in African American culture, through African folklore. When Africans were force to come to the New World for slavery, they brought over stories and tales with them. As black slaves gained literacy and began to write about their experiences, they incorporated figures from oral tradition into their written creations.
For instance, during the Trojan war Odysseus came up with the idea of the Trojan horse and this led the Greeks to victory. "Finally, they decided to resort to a trick thought of by Odysseus..." (Trojan War reading section 6) This demonstrates how Odysseus proves himself by being able to come up with solutions to his problems in order to succeed in life-threatening situations. Odysseus had to prove himself and his intelligence in many occasions of his journey. For example, when his men and himself were trapped in the Cyclops' cave, Odysseus came up with a plan to trick the cyclops. First Odysseus told Polyphemus his name was “Nohbdy”, then he got the cyclops to keep drinking wine which resulted in getting the cyclops being drunk, following that he made a spear out of a cylinder of wood, and lastly when Odysseus stabbed Polyphemus in the eye and the cyclops bellowed in pain screaming “Nohbdy has tricked me, Nohbdy has ruined me” (P.766, line 403) none of his kin came to help because if nobody has done it the gods must have. Thus, Odysseus has shown himself to be very intelligent in many aspects which helped him reach his ultimate
In several events Odysseus uses his cleverness to escape undesired situations while Marlin tends to get injured when those times arose proving Odysseus more clever than Marlin. In one of Odysseus’s crisis Odysseus and his crew are stuck in a cyclops’s cave and they have to fool the cyclops to get out of the cave. In Adventures of Reading Odysseus tricks the cyclops into thinking Odysseus’s name is Nohbdy and eventually gets out of the cave with the cyclops screaming “Nohbdy, Nohbdy’s tricked me, Nohbdy’s ruined me!” (498). This statement gives a clear example of how Odysseus is more clever than the regular person by manipulating the outcome of this event. With Odysseus’s clever plan, Odysseus and most of his crew got out safely. In addition to the cyclops crisis, Odysseus runs into another crisis where he has to use his cleverness to overcome the obstacle. Odysseus’s ship is stuck between Scylla and Charybdis in a narrow waterway and he has to pick to go closer to one of the two. Odysseus uses his wits and choses Scylla because six people devoured is better than everyone dieing to Charybdis. In Adventures of Reading, Odysseus uses his cleverness once more and states “But as I sent them towards Scylla, I told them nothing, as they could do nothing” (510). With his quick thinking this idea single handedly saves everyone but six people, as if he told them they would panic and cease rowing then everyone would be eaten. Odysseus proves he is clever time and time again by saving his crew through brilliant ideas. Rather than being clever Marlin showed vacuousness in facing dangers. In Finding Nemo, Marlin and his companion accidentally swim right into a jellyfish field. In the scene in Finding Nemo, Marlin states “We’re gonna race. First one out of the jellyfish wins”. This one statement from Marlin causes both Marlin and his companion to be put into a
In her poem "Myth," Natasha Trethewey uses mythology, a unique structure, rhyme pattern, and punctuation to make form and content inseparable. Each of these elements serves to share the stages of grief one goes through one feels at the death of a loved one as well as the feelings of deep loss and longing.
Is the Coyote’s work every truly finished? According to believers, it is not. Just as Jesus Christ is assumed to rise yet again, though he may not have even rose the first time, so will Coyote, the animal the Nez Perce people worship. Coyote, in “Coyote Finishes His Work,” is the equivalent to what Christians consider Jesus. Both beings are considered divine, though not the most divine, teach their people, and, finally, leave with the empty promise of returning.
In American Indian tales, the trickster is someone who is portrayed as mischievous, greedy, self-serving, and thieving. He is stupid and cowardly but also wise, clever, and occasionally heroic. Trickster is also considered to be godlike and sacred to American Indians which is why most of these anecdotes have a moral or lesson for those who hear them. Old Man Coyote is probably the most popular of the trickster characters and the most ill-behaved. In the tale, “Better Luck Next Time,” Coyote is up to no good again when he comes across a turtle in distress. Dialogue between Coyote and Water Turtle displays the Coyote to be liminal and foolish. The author uses dialogue to tell this story in a light-hearted and funny tone to teach the lesson that
For thousands of years, across incredibly diverse cultural, religious, and societal systems, people have created tales of intriguing trickster figures. The stories of these character’s exploits were told and retold, passed down through the oral tradition to the following generations. These tales are told primarily to amuse the audience, as the trickster’s actions are typically both hilarious and shocking, but the folktales serve an even greater purpose. The duplicitous tomfoolery and irreverence of most tricksters highlight the culture’s most vital social values and focuses attention on the nature and importance of those value’s. According the Joseph Campbell in An Open Life, a trickster “…breaks in, just as the unconscious does, to trip up the rational situation. He’s both a fool and someone who’s beyond the system…The mind structures a lifestyle, and…the trickster represents another whole range of possibilities.” In their original context the actions of a trickster have dual meanings, those within the story and those conveyed to the audience. In this essay I will explore, the paradox of the West African and Afro-American trickster Anansi the Spider, whose existence as a literary figure resulted far more heroism than within the stories
Kind and selfish, deep and shallow, male and female, and foolish and wise aren’t always words that are associated with each other, quite the opposite in fact. However, when it comes to the trickster tales of Native Americans, each word is associated with the other and describes more or less the same person or animal. To Native American people a trickster affects the world for an infinite number of reasons, including instruction and enjoyment. A trickster, like the name implies, is a cunning deception. A trickster can be a hero. However, at the same time he could introduce death. How is that heroic? Why would a group of people want to remember a person that brings punishments such as death? The function the trickster tales have/ had on Native American communities is still powerful today quite possibly because of their context, the lessons they reap, and the concerns they address. As the tales are told, the stories unravel showing the importance of a trickster and the eye-opening experiences they bring.
Even thought there is not a commonly agreed single definition for a trickster, Hydes and Hynes find common ground in saying that a trickster is someone who deceits, tricks , takes advantage of situations and certainly-among other things, disobeys normal rules. A trickster breaks the rules more often maliciously, as Loki for example; however, at the end usually the tricks end up having positive effects. Hynes mentions six characteristics most often found in the trickster. Even though not all of them are always present, in the film “Identity Thief” (2013) Diana (Melissa McCarthy) shows a few of these traits explained by Hynes.
Why do you think people develop creation stories? I believe that people develop creation stories because they wanted something to believe in. when the first humans were created they wanted to know how they got there so they made up stories to explain how the universe works and who is in charge of it.
Trickster tales are narratives that use animal-like characters to try and help make sense of human nature without the use of the same scientific advancements as the present and provide a means to pass on important values of their society to future generations. The trickster can be divine, but is more commonly used as a symbol of mischief or chaos. Tricksters get a bad reputation that all they do is play pranks on unsuspecting people, but they can display cleverness with out-of-the-box-like thinking; unfortunately they can also be the victims of their own temperaments. One example of a trickster tale is the Winnebago Trickster Cycle from part 23 to 25. The trickster is used as the vehicle to covey to readers the lesson that they are not above nature and will be punished accordingly for defying it.
This is an explorative essay on the theme in Patricia Grace’s novel Potiki that ‘telling and retelling stories is an important and valuable part of being human’.