Week 9 Reading Diary: British North America, Part 2

(Color composite picture of the Pleiades, via Wikipedia)

Once again, this week, there were a lot of stories that dealt with similar elements really differently--there were multiple stories about the origins of the salmon runs, and geese, and turtles--but two stories, once again, really jumped out at me, and these were "The Origins of the Pleiades" and "The Making of Lakes and Mountains." The Pleiades stories is Wyandot, but "The Making of Lakes and Mountains" is another Haida story, and I have potential Plans for both of them.

Firstly, "The Origins of the Pleiades" has a lot of potential for some really cool sensory imagery (which is always my favorite thing to write; see all of the previous stories about being swallowed by dragons and such)--it's about seven sisters who come down from heavens every night to dance on a deserted part of the beach, and about the man that watches them and convinces one of them to marry him. The sister agrees to the marriage, but says that he must come live with them up in the heavens. It would be cool to do some research on the Wyandot and see if they (were? are?) a matrilineal society, which would potentially be a very cool thing to write into the story (I promise that anthropological-social-relations-studying stuff is much more interesting when characters are acting it out). 

As for the second story, I really liked the potential for a close narration by the main character: a woman who has been captured by the Bears, and who is fleeing for her life from them with the few things she has managed to prepare for her journey. There's also a lot of cool potential for visual imagery in this story, because as she's running, the Bears pursuing her, back towards her homeland, she scatters her possessions--a comb, a whetstone, and some ochre--behind her, and they grow into the lakes and mountains and trees. Plus there's all the drama of actually running away involved, and also a really cool scene where she finally gets to the ocean and sees one of her people in a canoe, and when she gets in with him he drops his club into the water and it instantly kills all of the Bears. I had so many questions: why would just the presence of the club in the water kill the Bears? What happens after all the bears are killed? Does the woman get to see her home and family again?

Anyway, those are my thoughts on this half of the unit...

Story Source: Myths and Legends of British North America by Katharine Berry Judson (1917)