A good collection
3 steloj
I received a copy of Myths And Legends of The Sioux by Marie McLaughlin when it was the ForgottenBooks daily free download. As the book was originally published in 1916 I am including it as my 1910s read for the Goodreads / Bookcrossing Decade Challenge.
Marie McLaughlin had a Sioux grandmother and spent much of her life living amongst the remaining Indians after they were forced into reservations. She spoke the Sioux language and recorded the tales in this collection directly from the tribal elders, understanding that their community, culture and oral tradition would soon be lost to the world. I did find the tone of her introductory essay rather patronising as she describes the Sioux as primitive and childlike, dismissing their achievements and history. Ironically such a lifestyle, in tune with nature instead of wilfully destroying it, is now seen as perhaps they only way for us all to …
I received a copy of Myths And Legends of The Sioux by Marie McLaughlin when it was the ForgottenBooks daily free download. As the book was originally published in 1916 I am including it as my 1910s read for the Goodreads / Bookcrossing Decade Challenge.
Marie McLaughlin had a Sioux grandmother and spent much of her life living amongst the remaining Indians after they were forced into reservations. She spoke the Sioux language and recorded the tales in this collection directly from the tribal elders, understanding that their community, culture and oral tradition would soon be lost to the world. I did find the tone of her introductory essay rather patronising as she describes the Sioux as primitive and childlike, dismissing their achievements and history. Ironically such a lifestyle, in tune with nature instead of wilfully destroying it, is now seen as perhaps they only way for us all to survive!
There are thirty-eight stories in the collection, some of which I enjoyed very much, others that were interesting as representations of Sioux culture and beliefs. Humanised animals feature frequently as do magical spirits and witches and I was frequently reminded of African tales such as Redemption In Indigo by Karen Lord. Some of the moral fables are similar in message to Aesop's fables and I liked several of the creation myths explaining why bears travel in twos or why frogs are even lower in the world hierarchy than rabbits. However, without any existing knowledge of Sioux culture, many of the twists and turns seemed bafflingly arbitrary and I didn't understand why events happened as they did.