Week 6: Storytelling - Crying for Nothing

One day, I was taking a walk in the park when I found my path blocked mother and her young child. From the looks of this mother - young, utterly exhausted but trying to appear as if she had it all together - I gathered that this was her first child. She was squatting down next to her child, a toe-headed cherub girl of about three or four years old, who had plopped herself down in the middle of the walking path and was wailing, loudly, and refusing to be comforted.
"Are you hungry? Are you sleepy? Are you hurt?" the mother moaned, as if she had already asked these questions several times before I'd approached. The child did not answer, only continued to weep and wail as if she had not heard her mother at all. "I don't understand," continued the unfortunate mother, "what are you crying for? Why won't you tell me?"

(image source: BlogSpot)



Sensing the woman's desperation, I chose this moment to step in.
"Oh she's just crying for nothing," I said to the mother kneeling down so that we were eye level.

"What?" replied the woman in utter exhaustion. She looked at me as if she had genuinely forgotten that there other humans on the planet apart from her and her daughter at that moment.

"You see," I began, "there was once a princess who lived in a small kingdom so small that she was able to walk to the kingdom neighboring her own on either side to visit her princess friend regularly. The two princesses often spent time together in one of the two kingdoms. One day, the princesses were visiting in the first princess' palace when two men were brought into the great hall. One of the men was adorned in fine clothing inlaid with gold and fine jewels. The other wore a threadbare garment that looked to be made from sackcloth. The first man announced that he and his companion, Nothing, had come seeking wives to take home to their native land with them. Despite his unimpressive appearance, the first princess suddenly felt a burning love for this Nothing that she herself could not explain. Nothing felt the same burning passion for the princess the moment he laid eyes on her, and the two decided to be married. The other princess laughed at the foolishness of the first princess for surely she would only know misery and poverty if she married this pauper. They chose to become the wife of the first man, cloaked in all his finery. 'His wealth must be greater than that of my own father,' she said to herself, 'I will live a very comfortable life, indeed, with this rich man!'" By this time, the child had stopped wailing and was merely sniffling as she stared intently at me with wide eyes. I continued.

 (image source: Boston.com)

"After the two princess were married to their respective suitors, they all began the journey to the men's native land. When they arrived, both princesses were surprised to find that the man adorned in the fine clothing lived in a dirty, ugly, run-down hovel while Nothing, in his peasant garments, lived in a lush palace. It seemed that the two men had switched their clothing for fun! The second princess was greatly distressed to discover how she had been tricked as well as inherently wicked nature of her new husband and wept openly when the first princess visited as they were accustomed to doing. The first princess, troubled by her friend's misery, decided to ask her husband if the second princess could come to stay in his palace for a time. Nothing, being a kind-hearted and sympathetic man, obliged, so the second princess came to live at the palace.
"After living at the palace for a few days, the second princess sent word to her husband that she would not be returning to him. Her husband grew very angry and blamed Nothing for stealing his wife away. In his rage, the jealous husband killed Nothing while Nothing was visiting the man in his little hut. When the first princess discovered that her beloved had been killed, she wept bitterly. Not wishing to stay in the palace which held nothing but memories of her fallen husband, she began to roam the countryside. As she roamed, many of the children in that region noticed the princess as she walked and wept, and they inquired of her why she mourned. She told her sad story to the children and they, in their childish empathy, began also to weep aloud with the unhappy princess."

The child gave one final sniff and finally allowed her mother to pull her to her feet.
 "So you see," I concluded standing up straight, "whenever a child is crying for what appears to be no reason, it is said that the child is crying for nothing. Isn't that right?" I asked with a wink, turning to the child. She nodded solemnly, wiping her eyes.

"The princess appreciates your sympathy," I said to the little girl, "but she wants you to be happy now."
The girl nodded again and reached for her mother's hand. Thank you, the mother mouthed over her shoulder, a look of the sincerest gratitude in her eyes as the two walked away. I smiled in reply. I turned and walked the direction from which I had come, suddenly not much in the mood for a walk. I pulled out my cellphone and dialed my neighbor's number.
"Hey Chrissy," I said when she answered, "I actually don't think I will be able to babysit your daughter today."

The End

Author's Note: This is a retelling of the story Anansi and Nothing from the West African Folktales Unit. I used the storyteller perspective in order to use the story to explain a phenomenon - the inexplicably inconsolable child - and in a somewhat humorous manner. The original story is told from the perspective of the jealous husband, Anansi, who is a known trickster. It is not stated explicitly that the women that he and Nothing find to be their wives are princesses, but I figured if anything could get a little girl to stop crying, it would be a story about princesses.

 

Bibliography: "Anansi and Nothing." West African Folktales. William H. Barker and Cecilia Sinclair. 1917.

Week 6: Famous Last Words - The Storyteller

Oh my goodness, where is the semester going? Is it really almost time for week 7?! There seriously needs to be a day in between Saturday and Sunday because by the time I get to Saturday evening I feel a little bit like this:

Homer's Scream (image source:BlogSpot)

But I must persevere.

 It's been really interesting to read stories and posts from other people in the class and get ideas for my own writing style. This week, I've been working on writing from the third-person storyteller perspective. I used this method in both my storytelling for this week and in my first story for my storybook. It's pretty different from how I usually write, but I feel that it can add another dimension to a story. It's different from the third-person omniscient perspective in that the reader receives some commentary about the events occurring in the story rather than just the events themselves. Sure this commentary could be biased, and the narrator is less reliable than an omniscient narrator, but I think that the commentary provided  has the ability to provide analysis about important themes within the story or novel. One of the greatest examples I can think of where this proves true is in one of my all-time favorite novels, The Great Gatsby. Literary critics have called Nick an unreliable narrator, but I don't believe the readers would have been able to grasp the tragic beauty or the "greatness" of the character Gatsby if he were described by a more removed voice.

I can't in anyway say that I've achieved anything close to Fitzgerald level commentary with the use of the storyteller perspective - I should be so lucky as to even offer a fraction of a fraction of the skilled literary analysis he provides with Gatsby - but I hope with practice, I could use this style of writing to provide deeper insight into my own writing.

Week 6: Essay - The Trickster/Fool

Studying recurring archetypes in literature has always been a source of great interest to me such that I frequently find myself trying to identify the different archetypal roles in whatever I am reading. The West African Folktales unit provides a rather elegant example of the archetypal "trickster" in the character Anansi, also called "Spider." In this case, the role of trickster in in conjunction with the role of "the fool". These archetypes can and do exist separately in many examples of literature, but I believe the roles to be more impactful and significant when used together due to both the paradox the roles create and to the two-fold lessons one is able to derive from the single character. The significance of these two aspects of the Trickster/Fool role is illustrated throughout the stories involving the character Anansi.

 The Trickster/Fool (image source: Smith Music Online)

Anansi is a recurring character throughout the West African Folktales. He is the classic fool, constantly getting himself into comical predicaments which often result both he and the reader/listener learning a lesson of some sort. What is different, however, about the character Anansi's role as the fool is that he is repeatedly described as crafty or clever, which is a distinct trait of the archetypal trickster. Herein lies the paradox the merging of these two roles creates: how can anyone be a clever fool? To answer this, one must consider what it means to be a fool. When first brought to mind, the personified fool resembles something of a court jester (see above picture), or maybe a child with a dunce cap on his head. The term fool is often associated with lack of intelligence or sense, but it is certainly true that a so called intelligent person can make a foolish decision or act in a foolish manner. And if that person continues to conduct himself in said manner, he runs the risk of being labeled a fool, despite his above average intelligence. All this to say that a fool can be anyone who not only does foolish things repeatedly, but seems not to learn from the consequences of foolish behavior. One will observe time and time again how Anansi's greed or jealousy lead him into some convoluted plot that, in a sort of dramatic irony, the reader can be sure will lead to ruin, simply based upon the outcome of other stories. This impending sense of doom seems to elude Anansi no matter how many times his world is brought down around his ears, and he presses on with whatever clever trickery he has devised to get himself ahead in a particular story. One knows exactly what to expect from Anansi, and that is because he refuses to learn from his past mistakes.

 

One can derive some important lessons from the double faceted archetype that is the Trickster/Fool, especially from one such as Anansi. First, it is immediately apparent that one does not need to lack intelligence to be a fool. This is clearly evidenced by the ever crafty Anansi frequently falling into sticky situations. To see clearly the second lesson one can learn from a character such as Anansi, one must delve a little bit into what exactly makes a character like Anansi tick. Why, exactly, does Anansi never seem to learn from his mistakes? If there is one thing the reader learns quickly about Anansi is that he is a very prideful character. The first story in the unit, How We Got the Name "Spider Tales", talks about how Anansi thought that the stories of the land should be named after him rather than after a god. In Greco-Roman Mythology, this would be referred to as hubris or excessive pride that, more often than not, leads to untold misery. Anansi's excessive pride prevents him from correcting his faults because in his head, he does not have any faults. It is generally accepted that only the extremely arrogant and/or foolish truly believe that they are free from faults or vices. The lesson the reader learns from this portrayal of the Trickster/Fool is one that warns against arrogance and pride. It is not a bad thing to take pride in oneself as a person or be proud of one's accomplishments, but when pride begins to distort reality and promote delusions of grandeur, it becomes reminiscent to hubris, and any Greek tragedy will explain why that is an extreme detriment.

I believe that the use of the trickster or the fool in any sort of storytelling serves the purpose of teaching the reader/listener a lesson. Separately, the roles of both the trickster and the fool teach their own lessons, but when combined, the lesson these roles teach is two-fold and the way the two roles contradict one another is central and significant to the overall purpose of this role in a story.

Week 6: Reading Diary - West African Folktales

West African Folktales Part A: Favorites

How We Got the Name Spider Tales
I found this story interesting in that it appears that excessive pride does not seem to warrant the punishment it does in Mythology of other cultures. In this story, Spider, also called Anansi, decides that he wants all of the stories told to be about him rather than the god Nyankupon and Nyankupon agrees as long as Anansi can perform three tasks - produce a jar of live bees, a boa constrictor, and a tiger. Through cunning and trickery, Anansi is able to perform all of these tasks and so now the stories are called Anansi Tales.

How Wisdom became Property of the Human Race
This is another example of folklore in which the supreme being, in this case, Father Anansi, becomes angry with humanity and seeks to punish it. In this case, however, the attempt of the god is almost a comical failure. Anansi, as previously stated, has become angry with the human race and decides to take all the world's knowledge from them. He throws all the wisdom in a pot and attempts to climb a high tree to put the wisdom just out of reach to all but himself. However, as he is climbing the tree, with the way he has the pot situated upon himself - on his front - he is unable to climb. Anansi's son Kweku Tsin witnesses his father's struggle and suggests that Anansi place the pot on his back instead. Frustrated by his son's apparent possession of knowledge despite Anansi's attempt to hide it, Anansi throws the pot down onto the ground, releasing all the world's knowledge back to the human race.

Anansi and Nothing
This story made me chuckle to myself. Not because of the content - the story itself is a bit sad - but because it involves a play on words. Anansi and his rich friend Nothing decide to go get wives from a neighboring town. Anansi convinces Nothing to let him wear Nothing's fancy clothes in exchange for Anansi's threadbare ones so that when they get to town, Anansi takes several wives and Nothing is only able to procure one, and out of pity. However, upon returning to their homes, Anansi's wives are distressed to see the hovel in which they are to live, so Nothing's wife, feeling pity for her friends, invites all of Anansi's wives to live in her palace. When Anansi's wives refuse to return home, Anansi grows angry and plots to kill Nothing. When he does, Nothing's wife mourns for him and travels about sharing her suffering with the village children so that they may join her in mourning. This is why it is said that when a child is found crying, seemingly for no reason, that the child is "crying for nothing."

Thunder and Anansi
Anansi, for all his selfish and trickster ways, seems to learn a bit of a lesson in this story. He and his family are very much in want of food. He goes out in search of food and through a series of events finds himself at the hut of Thunder who lives in the sea. After hearing Anansi's sad tale, Thunder provides Anansi a pot with which will provide him and his family with plenty of food. Anansi selfishly decides to keep the pot and the food from his family. They eventually find out about it, however, with the help of Anansi's eldest son who follows Anansi around in the form of a fly. The family uses the pot to provide the whole town with a meal but the large order causes the pot to melt away. Anansi discovers this and, resolving to punish his family, returns to Thunder. Thunder listens to his tale and provides him with a stick that beats Anansi until he regrets not being wiser with his fortune in the first place.

Tit for Tat
This story contrasts all the good virtues and characteristics of Kweku Tsin with the faults and vices of his father, Anansi. During a famine, Kweku discovers a wood in which he can hunt animals and sell them in town. Anansi soon becomes jealous of his son's growing wealth and sets out to steal from him. Anansi discovers where his son has been hunting and drives Kweku out of the wood to take all the game for himself. Kweku, however devises a clever scheme to trick his father into giving the meat back by making Anansi think that he has angered the gods. Once the famine is over, Anansi is forced to acknowledge his son's virtues and wisdom and promises to give over his selfish, trickster ways. He will soon break this promise.

Why White Ants Always Harm Man's Property
*I am unsure if, when the story mentions Spider, it is referring to Anansi
Spider, in the midst of another famine, happens upon a dead antelope and decides to take it for himself, concealing it cleverly. Wolf and Leopard suspect that Spider is up to something and eventually succeed in tricking Spider into losing his prize. Spider is angry and strings up Wolf and Leopard. A group of white ants (termites) happen by and help the two down so the Wolf and Leopard invite the white ants to a feast. Well, Spider disguises he and his family as white ants and attend the feast. When the real ants show up, Wolf and Leopard assume that they are Spider's family in disguise so they pour boiling water on the ants killing them all except the father. In his anger at this betrayal, White Ant vows to never help man again and instead be known as a perfect pest.

Squirrel and Spider
Spider is hit with some major karma in this story. HE steals crops from a hardworking squirrel saying that because there is no road leading to the farm, the farm cannot possibly be his. But then the same thing happens to spider: his bundles of crop are stolen by a crow who claims that no one would leave bundles by the road so the bundles clearly belong to the crow. Maybe now we will see if Spider will begin to change his conniving ways...

Why We See Ants Carrying Bundles as Big as Themselves
I cannot quite tell reading these stories if these creatures are actually figured as the creatures they represent or if these are people that represent each creature. However in this story we see Anansi again with his son Kweku, who is the opposite of his father in terms of virtue. Anansi's greed gets the better of him once again and he ends up killing the King's favorite jesters in the pursuit of "more." So the King wraps up the body of the poor jester and makes Anansi carry it on his head and he must continue to do so unless someone takes the load from him. Anansi, crafty fellow that he is, convinces Mr. Ant to hold the body for just a moment and Anansi promises to return. Being Anansi, however, he does not return, and poor Mr. Ant is doomed to carry that huge bundle on top of his head forever.

Part B: Favorites
The Moon and Stars
This story does not emphasize the faults and poor characteristics of Anansi, but rather makes him part of a heroic tale. Anansi and his son Kweku are captured by a dragon and held captive in the dragon's lair with a group of other unfortunates who were also captured by the dragon. Kweku soon devises a plan for escape that involves the group making a rope ladder and throwing it up to heaven to out climb the dragon. The group also employs several tricks along the way that keep the dragon from ascending the ladder, one of which includes playing a magic violin so that the dragon will have to return to the ground to dance. When the group reaches the heavens, the gods are so pleased with Kweku that they make him the sun in the sky. Anansi is made the moon and their friends are made the stars.

The Hunter and the Tortoise
This story is actually meant to teach a lesson rather than entertain or provide an etiology. A hunter hears the beautiful song of a tortoise and asks the tortoise to come home with him so that the hunter may hear her song everyday. The tortoise agrees, as long as the hunter promises to keep the tortoise a secret. Not unpredictably, the hunter does not keep his promise and begins to brag about his singing tortoise, so much so that the ruler of the land hears of the tale. The ruler and his officials do not believe the hunter's story, but the hunter swears that he is telling the truth and that if he cannot prove himself, he may be killed. So he brings the tortoise before the court to sing, but the tortoise will not utter a word. The hunter is executed, per his agreement with the ruler, and only then does the tortoise speak saying that if the hunter had been content to keep the tortoise a secret, no ill would have befallen him.

The Leopard and the Ram
 Another etiology, this story explains why rams are domesticated while leopards live in the wild. This is one of the more humorous stories in my opinion. In the story, through an odd turn of events, a ram and a leopard end up helping each other build the same house without either one of them realizing it. After they discover that they have both built the house, they decide to live together,  becoming good friends. Both wonder at the other's keen hunting ability and sends his son to discover the secret of the other's hunting success. The leopard's son discovers that the ram backs up and runs its head into its prey and thus warns his father that if he ever sees the ram backing up, he should fear for his life. One day, the ram slips on the wet floor of the hut and slides backward. Remembering his son's warning, the leopard runs for his life into the woods never to return to civilization. This is why leopards live in the wild

The Elephant and the Wren
Ah, the reappearance of the trickster, Spider! Spider wins a contest, through cunning and trickery of course, in which he chops down a great tree. His prize is an elephant. Spider, showing his selfish character once again, decides that he does not want to have to share the elephant with his family. He decides to try to catch a wren and act as though that is all that he has procured for the day. He ties up his elephant and goes after the wren. He is unsuccessful in catching the wren, and then while he is trying to catch the bird, the elephant gets loose. Now he has absolutely nothing to show for the day, and both he and his family must go hungry for the day. Spider seems to not learn from his past experiences as he keeps running into similar outcomes in return for his deceit and coveting.

Why Tigers Never Attack Men Unless They are Provoked
I have to admit that this story made me feel a bit uncomfortable - I am terrified of both tigers and lions. I also thought that it was interesting to include in folktales from Africa tigers, which are not found in Africa. As the story goes, a man befriends a tiger and convinces the tiger to come live with him for a time. The tiger agrees despite apprehensions that the man's friends will try to kill the tiger. On his way to visit the man sometime later, the tiger is shot, but not killed, by some of the man's friends. Fearing that he had been betrayed by his friend, the tiger feigns death to gage the reaction of the man in order to determine whether or not the man had anything to do with the shooting. When the man discovers the apparently dead tiger, the man mourns the loss of his friend and determines to protect the tiger's body as well as the tiger's cub. Upon seeing this, the tiger tells the man that he will never attack any man unless he is first provoked.