Coyote Steals Fire, And Master Cat: Puss In Boots
Just like how books written today reflect our modern day cultures and mindsets, trickster tales emulate the culture of the society they originated in. These stories often teach a lesson, showing the ideals of the society through the moral the story presents to the reader. Although the trickster tales “How Stories Came to Earth,” “Coyote Steals Fire,” and “Master Cat: Puss in Boots” come from three very different parts of the world and cultures, they have similarities as well as differences. While all three stories, “How Stories Came to Earth” retold by Kaleki, “Coyote Steals Fire” retold by Richard Erdoes and Alfonso Ortiz, and “Master Cat: Puss in Boots” by Charles Perrault include anthropomorphism and the use of deception by the tricksters to achieve their
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All three of the short stories, “How Stories Came to Earth,” “Coyote Steals Fire,” and “Master Cat: Puss in Boots,” apply the literary theme anthropomorphism, which is the attribution of human characteristics to gods, animals, or inanimate objects because the tricksters, which are animals, possess human traits, ambitions, and emotions. In the first story, the trickster, a spider named Anansi, shows human qualities in many ways, one being that he is married to another spider named Aso. Together, the two spiders show another humanistic trait because they possess curiosity and wish to “know the beginnings and endings of things” (Kaleki 40). This shows anthropomorphism because although Anansi and Aso are insects, they exhibit the desire to learn the history of earth and how everything came to be. The trickster in the second story, Coyote, although not seeking the stories of earth’s creation, shows anthropomorphism through the way he develops a game to play with Thunder. He achieves his goal, obtaining fire for the tribes, through this game since Thunder agrees that if Coyote wins, “[he] ha[s] to give
All three of the short stories, “How Stories Came to Earth,” “Coyote Steals Fire,” and “Master Cat: Puss in Boots,” apply the literary theme anthropomorphism, which is the attribution of human characteristics to gods, animals, or inanimate objects because the tricksters, which are animals, possess human traits, ambitions, and emotions. In the first story, the trickster, a spider named Anansi, shows human qualities in many ways, one being that he is married to another spider named Aso. Together, the two spiders show another humanistic trait because they possess curiosity and wish to “know the beginnings and endings of things” (Kaleki 40). This shows anthropomorphism because although Anansi and Aso are insects, they exhibit the desire to learn the history of earth and how everything came to be. The trickster in the second story, Coyote, although not seeking the stories of earth’s creation, shows anthropomorphism through the way he develops a game to play with Thunder. He achieves his goal, obtaining fire for the tribes, through this game since Thunder agrees that if Coyote wins, “[he] ha[s] to give