Reading Notes: Apache Tales Part B

In Part B of the reading, there were many stories that consists of a main character, the coyote. At first I thought he was the main character of each story, but I was wrong. He was only a support character. I also initially thought that these tales were connected in some way, but again I was wrong. In the first story the coyote is a trickster who plots to steal a poor man's wife. One day the poor man his household and when he returns he finds that it is an empty house. The coyote has stolen the wife and taken her back to his tipi. Eventually the poor man rescues his wife and when he returns he devises a plan to exact revenge on the evil coyote. He burns rocks till there are fiery hot and wraps in fat, so that the coyote can't resist them. This works and the coyote chows them down only to die in the end. In the next story, there is an owl who posses with him black arrows that can kill any man. The coyote in this story is greedy and wants them for himself, so he breaks the owls leg and steals the arrows. The owl is left for dead and now everyone knew the coyote was the one who possessed the arrows, so they were afraid. A pack of antelope aspire to fool the coyote an retrieve the arrows back. They get the coyote to put his quiver on one antelope and his arrows on another. This way two parts that equal a whole were divided. They told the coyote that this was a race to get his arrows back, but when they begin to run the antelope initiate their devious plan and run in different directions. The coyote is hopeless because he can't catch both. The next coupe stories involved the coyote again, but the confusing part was whether the coyote was the protagonist or antagonist. In one story is steals and another he is the victim. In my opinion, if I rewrote one of these stories I would make the coyote a adversary because coyote have a stereotypical appeal.

Apache Tales by P.E. Goddard, link to online reading

(Coyote, Source: National Geographic)