The Pima's Story of the Creation
Publication Date: October 14, 2010
Chapter: American Literature to 1700
This has nothing to do with the time period we're currently reading about. Next up on my reading list (still in the American Norton) was the work of Bartolome de Las Casas, and his writings on the devastation of the Indies. As it turned out, however, his descriptions of the Spanish brutally slaughtering the natives in a variety of different ways just made me wanna cry. It was, needless to say, hard to find the funny. Thus, needing comic material, I jumped backwards to what opened up the American Norton: Native American creation myths.
Here we have Juhwertamahkai, who created the world, then crushed it several times 'cause he kept screwing up. His first people were immortal but hungry, so when they finished eating all the animals, they started eating each other. Mr. J, understandably concerned, decided to just drop the sky on their heads. How he managed to exterminate the human race by squishing them with air we may never know, but needless to say, he tried again. The second crop of humanity was apparently defective, as they were getting withered and grey while still infants. While one imagines that this made the journey from the cradle to the grave a lot more convenient, it still wasn't very conductive to a thriving civilization.
So he killed them all again, but third time's a charm, right? Not so much. Humanity Cubed "made a vice of smoking." The problem became so widespread that even infants were starting to take hits. Mr. J's solution? Yeah, he squished them all again. You'd think a guy nicknamed "the Doctor of the Earth" could think of a less genocidal way of healing his people.
Fourth time, however, was a charm. This time humanity was, if nothing else, adequate, so they got to live.
That's when the moon got pregnant and gave birth to the Space Coyote.
Author: The Pima (or Akimel O'odham) • Info: Sacred Texts
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Lit Brick is a comic started by Jodie Troutman in an effort to read the entire Norton Anthology of English Literature. Having eventually succeeded in that goal, it now features comics about all manner of random literature. For more of Jodie's work, visit longtalljodie.com!
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