Week 10 Story: The Sun and the Star
(Image of Crow People taken from MythFolklore blog)
His eyes were weary that night. He remembered that much. Tomorrow was the day of the competition, so he knew he must rest. He looked towards Sun and exclaimed, "The lodge you have created is perfect. We must now adopt our identities."
Three days ago the local chief had set forth a wager to all the inhabitants of the village: anyone with the ability to shoot an eagle from the tree would marry his daughters. A prize that every local strove for., in fact the competition even sparked the interest of the Sun and the Star to come down from the heavens. In an attempt to test the villagers they disguised themselves as poor, sickly people. The Sun transformed into an old woman with ratted clothes and the Star adopted a crippled, sick young man's appearance. They created and resided in a broken down lodge far from the village.
The next morning the competition started, there Coyote, Wolf, and Raven shot their arrows at the eagle. After missing his initial shot, Coyote shot another that also missed. In rage, Coyote reached for all of his other arrows and was restrained by the rest of the group! "How dare you stop me," Coyote screeched, "nothing will stand in my way."
At that exact moment an arrow flew threw the air and pierced the eagle's tail. Soon after, another arrow came forth and went straight through the heart. Quick on his feet, the Wolf claimed victory for himself, "look how pretty my shots were!" The chief, in awe, congratulated the Wolf on his victory. Sun emerged from the woods as an old woman and claimed that the arrows truly came from her son in the lodge. The chief, upon hearing this news, decided that it would not be fit to marry his daughters off to a sickly, crippled boy with no money. He announced that there would be yet another competition tomorrow to actually determine the fate of his daughters.
TO BE CONTINUED...
Author's Note: The challenge in creating this story is the cultural lines that I do not want to cross by imposing my own vision onto them. I believe there are many ways in which we can craft a narrative and for this story I will be keeping the plot points and characters the same, but merely polishing the style, point of view, and diction used. I very much enjoy the themes of this story and in an effort to stay true to them I wanted to replicate the tale.
Bibliography: Tales of the North American Indians is a collection of stories translated by Stith Thompson and can be found at MythFolklore Blog.
Hi, Muneeb! It's nice to read your story. It's would be better if you clarify your characters more precisely. Your story begin with "His eyes were weary last night", whose eyes belongs to? Coyote, Wolf, or Raven. What is the intention behind the old woman to claim that that the arrow comes from her son? Was this the arrow come from someone else, not the wolf? Was a wolf a liar?
ReplyDeleteHi Muneeb!
ReplyDeleteGreat story! I agree with the previous comment that defining the characters better would be helpful to the readers. At first I though the characters were people and then all of the sudden they are animals. I just think pointing that out more towards the beginning would help! Otherwise, I liked the story and I liked that you left it with a cliff hanger. It always makes the reader want to know more.
Hi Muneeb! I thought your story was fun - I really like stories with animals as the main characters. I wish I knew who the first paragraph was really talking about - it was a little confusing for me. I like that you left it on edge with the to be continued. I think it was a fun story - just needs some clarification to make it easier to read.
ReplyDeleteHi Muneeb! I appreciate that you kept the story the same... I have been changing the stories I write quite a bit from the original, usually in plot but sometimes in character, so I liked seeing that you kept the characters and plot the same for cultural reasons. Will you actually be continuing this story for your next writing or was the ending statement just a stylistic choice? I would be interested in seeing what happens next!
ReplyDeleteHey Muneeb! I loved reading your story. I liked how it was short and easy to follow. I thought it was well-written and the descriptive words you used to describe the characters really added to your story. I'm interested to read the original story and compare the two. I look forward to reading more of your stories in the future. Overall, nice job!
ReplyDeleteMuneeb,
ReplyDeleteI really liked the smoothness of your story. I must say the ending was not a favorite (ha-ha)! Reading the last few sentences of your story made me want to read more to find out if they would reveal the identity of the boy and more thoughts on how the coyote cheated yet the chief was going to accept it.
Hi Muneeb! You did a great job with your overall sentence structure and making your sentences clear. I feel that you could offer more of an explanation during the transition of characters, so do not be afraid to expand on that and offer you own unique turn of the story. I think you have a great story to tell!
ReplyDelete