A young woman died. Her dead grandfather's spirit woke the young woman up from ger casket. The young woman travels to an alternate plane where a town of the dead replaces her living village. In the village of the dead, another woman raises a stick to our protagonist, and the grandfather explains it's to show what a dog feels like when you chase it off. Another man is stuck to the ground, with grass growing out of his body because he ate grass stems when he was alive. Soon the young woman meets her dead grandmother, who offers water and deer meat that comes from the offerings to the young woman's funeral service.
Retelling Ideas:
The young woman meets her family, and it is a happy reunion. Dying is unpleasant, but being dead is good when loved ones surround you.
Or maybe the young woman gets her just desserts like the man who ate grass stems only for his body to grow grass.
"The Ghost Land" from Myths and Legends of Alaska told by Native Storytellers and edited by Katharine Berry Judson (1911). Source.
A young widower walks through the forest for a while and walks along a trail. The man stops at a rock at the edge of a lake. Then the man sees people on the other side of the lake and calls out to them, but they do not answer. Eventually, someone does hear him and brings him to a strange town across the lake. This town is the ghost land where the dead live. Man sees his deceased wife. If the man eats the food, he can never return to the land of the living. The man and his wife return to the living world, but the wife is only a shade. The wife returns, and eventually, the man dies too, and they are reunited.
Retelling Ideas:
The man is reluctant to leave because he misses his wife. However, the man realizes that one day, his time will too come to a few decades apart is nothing compared to an eternity together.
 |
| The Aurora Borealis shines above Bear Lake in Alaska by Joshua Strang. Source. |
No comments:
Post a Comment