The Dog-Husband
For the second half of this week's reading, I chose to switch up the unit and look at the Native American Marriage Tales. When I was initially reading the titles of the stories, I was intrigued because they were so different to me. I chose to focus on The Dog-Husband. This story began with a young girl who went everywhere with her dog. But at night, the dog switched into a man and slept with her in the bed. The village did not know of this. One day, the girl got pregnant. When the parents found out, they abandoned the girl and went to the other side of the water. The father killed her lover and soon after, the girl gave birth to five dog pups. One day when she was out, she came back home to find all of her pups in human form. She scolded them, and told them to remain in human form. Her sons hunted whales. Crow told the villagers across the way that there were many whales on the beach that were killed by the boys. So the villagers went back to the town and the boys became the chiefs of the village, who were responsible for feeding the people with whales.
I like this story because I think it is really unique and different. If I was going to rewrite it, I would probably change the ending. Instead of the father killing the lover, I would want him to stay alive. Maybe I would have him come back with the villagers because he was tricked to leave, instead of being killed by the father.
Bibliography:
The Dog-Husband in Tales of the North American Indians by Stith Thompson (1929).
Image information:
Native American Woman. Web Source.
Comments
Post a Comment