Week 10 Essay

The Use of Magic in Native American Fairy Tales

Every hero or villain in this section could do se sort of magic. Sometimes they were given this magic by nature and they considered it their responsibility to help others with it. Those people generally ended up being the heroes of the story. Others seemed not to be magical at all until they came to a point in the story where they would say "Let us turn into birds and fly away," and they they actually would turn into a bird. 

The magic seen in Grimm fairy tales or other European tales, is seen as unnatural, evil, and comes with horrible consequences. There are only witches, and the occasional wizard, who have sold their souls to the devil or have done some other dirty deed to obtain their powers. However, in Native American culture, nature was seen to be magical itself and almost at one with the gods. When the character in a european fairy tale needs to turn into a an eagle and escape, nothing happens and they run. When an indian needs to turn into a bird, they state it or ask someone how to do it, and then it happens.

The respect of nature and animals tends to show through in these stories. While many of the stories include the theme of conquering nature and animals or at least ruling over them, there is always a large amount of respect for the power of nature that is necessary to rule justly. The ease of magic in a lot of these stories suggests that magic itself is not a big deal. Every animal, every forest, every star has its own kind of magic. The hero always has access to this magic, kind of like a borrowing system, if they are in tune with nature and if they have honorable intentions.

"Magic Effects." Info.

Storytelling Post Week 10

The Boy on the Moon

"Le Voyage dans la lune" clearly shows the man in the moon. Info.

Once upon a time, there was a little boy who was living out the dream of many young boys and girls on earth. This little boy happened to be the son of "the" man on the moon. He hopped around with low gravity, throwing rocks and bouncing balls as far and high as he could imagine, and generally just having a good time. However, though the boy enjoyed his time in his spacey, light home with his father, he longed for friendship and something new.

His father told him stories of earth and all the colors and wonderful, different animals that lived on there. The little boy longed to see the birds, which did not just jump high in the air and simply come back down but flew as high as they wanted to wherever they wanted. He was excited about the animals that were so big and strong that you could jump on their back and ride them! As the boy grew up, he made his father tell him more and more stories. Every day after the stories, the boy begged his father to let him live on earth, for the man on the moon is magical and can make such things happen.

Eventually, the boy's daily begging wore down his father, and he agreed to let him live on earth with certain conditions. Though the man on the moon was magical, his magic still had its limits, and he could only provide a one way trip to earth. In order to make the most of his time left with his son, he told him that he was not allowed to leave until he turned 15. When he did move to earth, he would not be able to hear from his father but he promised to always look over his son.

When the day came, the boy was very excited but was sad to leave his father. The man on the moon kept his promise though, and transported his son to a nice, small village with friendly people who would treat his son as one of their own. Before the mysterious young man's arrival, the moon looked like a blank gray surface in the sky, but the night that he arrived, mysterious shapes appeared on the great sphere. The villagers all said that the shapes resembled an old man's face, and the boy knew that it was just his dad, watching over his son like he had promised he would.

Author's Note: This story about the man on the moon is very very loosely based on The Child of The Evening Star. In that, the kid lives on the evening star with his parents and several birds in a silver palace. Instead of his parents sending him to earth, he scrapes a bird so that it bleeds, which breaks the magic bond on the star and everyone is sent back to earth. The boy was still very lonely though and did want to see all the animals. I just wanted to do the story of a boy coming home to earth.
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Bibliography: Larned. American Indian Fairy Tales. "The Child of the Evening Star." 1921.

Week 10 Reading Diary

Iagoo, the Story Teller
-His great knowledge is from family and nature, expecting these to be strong themes
-Uncle Dr. Suess Santa Claus
-Story within a story, but Iagoo is only kind of the narrator.

Shin-ge-bis Fools the North Wind
-Basically, we have spring and winter as gods/characters.
-The hero here can change into a duck.
-Theses stories generally have magical components, in a different way than other fairy tales
-"Cheerfulness and courage can overcome even the North Wind."
-The story ties back into the first layer, and the narrator continues to tell other stories to the children

The Little Boy and Girl in the Clouds
-Nature preservation themes
-Animals running free and not "in cages"
-Mostly describes animals of an old time, where they are all friendly and none are dangerous
-They do not teach animals like this at the time of the storytelling
-Includes lots of animals and the different things that they can do, normal children's stories stuff
-Worm gets to the top with patience, taking a month, but saving the children.

The Child of the Evening Star
-10 daughters, only one at a certain point has not chosen a suitor to marry
-She turned down the handsome ones for a very old man because she had the ability to look at their heart.
-This is starting out as a much better lesson than other fairy tales
-His curse is lifted but then transfers to her, making her old
-Move to the evening star, magical, and have a son, title
-He longs for the people and animals of Earth, he is lonely
-Return to Earth, because these stories point out the beauty of nature on earth

The Boy Who Snared The Sun
-Iagoo comes up with a story of a little boy and girl who are brother and sister when there are giant animals and they are the only humans so that the brother and sister in his tepee will like the story
-Still themes of conquering nature, and in this case, growing up
-Animals character traits are determined by type of animal

How the Summer Came
-Getting more and more of the setting with Iagoo and the children
-He has a story for everything
-This one is for how the ice age ended
-This is another story where the hero is magical and he will conquer winter for the good of the people
-This is actually about the Big Dipper I think

The Fairy Bride
-Girl likes fairies, won't marry a tall hunter
-Hero still magical, or at least able to see magical things
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Read the Stories.