Tunkashila

Fülszöveg

The epic story of Indián mythology in one sweeping narrative, a book that gathers and recounts eighty Native myths as it telis, in fairy-tale form, the story of Native America. Tunkashila is a book that can be read aloud, a classic that will bring us back to our own childhood, a book that captures the curiosity of youth, yet embodies the complexity of our most enduring morality tales.
"Tunkashila is a book to be read slowly and with deep
respect____It is like the wind one hears on the plains, steady,
running, fully of music."
—N. Scott Momaday, author of , In the Presence of the Sun
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" Tunkashila gives voice to the grandfathers and elders passing on the legends and lore of their tribes from generation to generation. It is a wonderful book, which makes you feel the touch of an eagle's wing on your face, while the scent of sage is filling the air."
—Richárd Erdős, author of Lakota Woman
Praise for Turtle Island Alphabet
"[Turtle Island Alphabet] is a beautiful book the... Tovább

Fülszöveg

The epic story of Indián mythology in one sweeping narrative, a book that gathers and recounts eighty Native myths as it telis, in fairy-tale form, the story of Native America. Tunkashila is a book that can be read aloud, a classic that will bring us back to our own childhood, a book that captures the curiosity of youth, yet embodies the complexity of our most enduring morality tales.
"Tunkashila is a book to be read slowly and with deep
respect____It is like the wind one hears on the plains, steady,
running, fully of music."
—N. Scott Momaday, author of , In the Presence of the Sun
•i
" Tunkashila gives voice to the grandfathers and elders passing on the legends and lore of their tribes from generation to generation. It is a wonderful book, which makes you feel the touch of an eagle's wing on your face, while the scent of sage is filling the air."
—Richárd Erdős, author of Lakota Woman
Praise for Turtle Island Alphabet
"[Turtle Island Alphabet] is a beautiful book the pinnacle of Hausman's lifelong work of illuminating the wisdom, teachings, and lore of native peoples."
—New Mexico magaziné
"A beautiful book in spirit, beauty, and love. A book to be read slowly, carefully, and with delight."
—Alvin Josephy
"Fascinating and poetically written Hausman honors Native American philosophy and spirituality even as he reveals it." —Booklist
ISBN 0-312-09928-2
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$22.95 $29.99 Can.
Tunkashila, which means "grand-father" in Lakota, is the epic tale of Native America as told through Indián eyes. The Southwest storyteller, Gerald Hausman, using mythological works like Ovid's Metamorphoses, and Biblical epics like Genesis as his inspiration, has constructed a sweeping narrative that telis the saga of Native American heritage—from creation, to the formánon of Turtle Island, or earth, to the battle at Wounded Knee, where the tale ends.
Retelling over eighty Indián stories that have been handed down to us from antiquity, Hausman has assembled a great pageant of mythological characters into a circle of highly anecdotal myths: the myths of creation; the myths of love, loss, and leaving; the myths of power; the myths of war; and the myths of two worlds, one white and one red.
Tunkashila's creation begins with our originál parents, Sun Father and Mother Earth; their rebellious twins—known as the Monster Slayers; the holy people of earth, air, water, and fire; and a spectacular carnival of animal and insect people, who act in a cosmology of co-creation. From these central figures, their children and sacred relations, come the stories themselves, all based on oral tale: we read of the Abalone Girl who feli in love with a whale; of the story of Mountain Singing, where a mortal pursues a goddess and discovers the consequences; of Tall Man, who followed Red Shell down to the underworld only to see her shade disappear; of Blue Elk, the mute boy, who was given the gift of voice through the antlers of an elk; and of an all-male clan of the River Crows that was destroyed by a white man's plague. Mythologizing actual (continued on back flap)
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events, Hausman finally chronicles the decline of Turtle Island, guiding the reader on a haunting journey through the ruined, wraith-like terrain of late nineteenth-century Native America.
Tunkashila is a noble work that can be read from start to finish, but alsó can be dipped into, for each story is complete in its own right. The singular beauty of myths is that they teach us that nothing is lost that cannot be retrieved. It is time to learn and love by listening to the old voices, the grandfather voices of stones and streams, of all things that speak to us that remind us that it is not too late to live in peace.
Gerald Hausman is the author of the highly acclaimed Turtle Island, Alpbabet. He has spent nearly three decades gathering Native American stories. He lives in Tesuque, New Mexico. Vissza