Reading Notes: Native American Marriage Tales Part B

General Notes about Part B

Something that I noticed about this second half of the reading as a whole is that the pieces were all incredibly lengthy. For the most part, the stories were good but it was hard at points to stay intrigued and interested in what was going on in the work. This would be something that would be a good idea to keep in mind when it comes time to do my rewrite for the week if I were to pick one of these stories from this half of the collection.

The Dog-Husband

This story was interesting and also seemed to have a little bit of naivety to it, especially at the beginning when it talked about the dog laying with the girl in human form but then turning back into a dog so that no one knew what they were doing. It made me think of a modern day tale where the boy would come sneak in through the window and then the two would have to remember that he had to sneak out before anyone managed to find him. This is the route that I would want to take a rewrite if I were to choose this one for the assignment.

The Youth Who Joined the Deer

This story was kind of sad and made me feel sorry for the wife and kids that he left at the very beginning. With that in mind I think I would want to do the rewrite portion of the assignment in such a way that he was followed by his wife and she found out for herself firsthand what he had been up to in her absence. This could even be written in a diary or journal format to make it more original and unique from the actual version in the collection.

The Girl and the Turkeys

This story was interesting because a Turkey is not an animal that I have read much up on. I think for a rewrite, however, I would simply change the animal that they have. Maybe instead of a turkey they would have a horse or something like that. A horse seems like it would be more functional so I could probably go a lot of different directions with something like that.

The great type of turkey that I envisioned the girl having

in the original version of the story. Source: Wikimedia Commons

Bibliography

Stith Thompson's Native American Marriage Tales