Reading Notes: Southwestern and California Legends: Part A

(Coyote by V.J. Anderson)

The Fable of The Animals by Katharine Berry Judson:

Characters: Kareya, Man, Coyote.

Kareya: The creator God of the Karok people. Creates the other creatures and tells them what to do.

Man: Has to give the animals bows and arrows representing how much strength they will have in the world. Is given a lot of room for interpretation for how he allocates power.

Coyote: Wants to be very powerful. Is also quite clever and smart. Cunning even.

Plot: Many years ago, Kareya is sitting not the Great Stool, and is creating the world. After creating the many creatures, there is no order and everyone is equally powerful. No one knew who would be eaten by who and who would be eaten by Man. Kareya then gave Man a task. He would create Bows and arrows of different sizes to determine how powerful they are and demonstrate who would be more powerful than who. Man worked many nights to create these bows for all the animals. Coyote was extremely excited to receive his bow. He wanted to be the first in line to get the biggest and more powerful bow. He stayed up all night. Eventually, he was getting tired so he paced around the sleeping animals. He then had to start running and jumping. This woke some of the animals. Eventually, he had to pin his eyes open with two wooden stakes. This worked for a while, but eventually, he fell asleep. In the morning, all the animals came to the Man and received their bows. He gave all of them bows according to their power. The last bow he gave to Frog, but he had one more left. Everyone then looked at the campsite and saw that Coyote was asleep. All the animals laughed and danced on Coyote. This woke him and he saw that he would be given the weakest and smallest bow. Man took pity on him though, he gave Coyote ten times as much cunning as they had before.

Setting: On a newly made earth. I think there isn't much to add with the setting since the story focuses on how the animals are given power.

What I Could Change: I think a cool way to modernize this would be something about a kid missing a deadline or some sort of even that they were excited for. Could be a lesson on making a better plan to have better decisions.

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Mythology and Folklore

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