TRANSLATIONS

TRANSLATIONS

"Ravens, unlike geese, loons and many other birds, do not in fact have penises - a fact recorded and accounted for in several ways in Northwest Coast mythology." (Sharp as a Knife)

The Raven must belong to the 2nd half of the year. He has no penis. The 1st half of the year, from midwinter to midsummer, is a season of growth - i.e. of procreation.

By a strange coincidence a few days ago reading the morning paper at breakfast, a disturbing picture jumped at me:

A local artist had made a little sculpture Kuken ska ha sitt ('My dick must have it.'), which had aroused protests when it was exhibited (in a place arranged by the community for children to play). The combination of erigated penis and voracious mouth is - I think - a true expression of the 'spring animal', the opposite of Raven.

Max Magnus Norman, the artist, had been inspired by Frank Andersson, the world famous Swedish wrestler. During the Olympic Games 1984 in Los Angeles Frank had been asked by a reporter why he had vanished for a few days to Las Vegas,, and the answer was: 'Kuken ska ha sitt'.

The information about Raven's missing penis is given in one of the footnotes to Chapter 13 'The Iridescent Silence of the Trickster', a strange name which - I think - was chosen with care. The subject is the Raven:

Then he went with his father Qinggi, they say.

As soon as Qinggi landed at his town,

he gave a feast.

He tried to make the one we speak of eat.

But he would not accept a morsel.

Qinggi gave a feast again the next day.

to make his child eat.

Again he would eat nothing.

Two greedyguts arrived,

and someone grabbed a storage chest of cranberries.

One of the two greedyguts opened up his maw.

They poured in the whole boxful.

They poured one down the other's throat as well.

Next day, his father gave another feast.

The greedyguts arrived.

Again they poured entire storage chests

of cranberries into their mouths.

The one we are speaking of ran to the edge of town.

As he was walking there,

cranberries bubbled up out of the swampland.

He plugged the vent with moss.

When another vent formed, he plugged it too.

Then he went back to the house

and asked the greedyguts closest to the door,

'Tell me, how do you manage to eat so much?'

'Sir, don't ask that.

Do you think this is a happy way to be?'

'No, but tell me.

If you will eat

at every feast my father gives.

If you don't agree to tell me,

I will plug you up for good'.

'Alright, sir, sit beside me.

I will tell you what to do.

In the morning, take a bath and then lie down.

Rub yourself raw where you feel it most deeply.

By the following day, a scab will form.

You must swallow the scab.

He followed these instructions.

Then, after sitting there awhile:

'Father, I'm hungry!'

His father gave a feast without delay.

Again the greedyguts arrived.

Again they upended boxes into their mouths.

He couldn't be filled.

He was famished.

Qinggi gave another feast.

Then he gave another and another, day after day.

At last, the one we speak of went outside.

When he kept picking cranberries out of their turds,

they saw who it was,

and they shut the door in his face.

Then he walked away, they say.

He went around behind his father's house.

'Father, let me come in!'

No answer.

They turned him away

I can feel the story is singing the same tune as that of Max Magnus Norman. Although it is a rather long story, I believe it contains also other valuable clues for my quest. Let us therefore continue:

'Father, let me come in!

I can arrange for you to have grizzly bears.

I can arrange for you to have mountain goats!'

He offered his father everything found on the mainland.

'Oh, but my son, their footsteps would keep me from sleeping!'

It was then that he started his singing.

He was banging his head on the house to keep time,

and the house began to give way.

His father came close to letting him in

when that happened, they say.

Of course, an old 'house' must give way at some point in time-space.

Then he got up to leave,

and they snatched at the things he was wearing -

black bear and marten, they say.

After that he was gone a long time.

At the end of a cycle they must strip him. There must be sweeping, sweeping, and all old statues, pestles etc must be removed:

... Behold what was done when the years were bound - when was reached the time when they were to draw the new fire, when now its count was accomplished. First they put out fires everywhere in the country round. And the statues, hewn in either wood or stone, kept in each man's home and regarded as gods, were all cast into the water. Also (were) these (cast away) - the pestles and the (three) hearth stones (upon which the cooking pots rested); and everywhere there was much sweeping - there was sweeping very clear. Rubbish was thrown out; none lay in any of the houses ...

But he will return (at dawn of course):

Then one day at dawn he was sitting offshore

in a harbour-seal canoe.

He was wearing the hat that belonged to his uncle.

Seafoam was swirling around on the crown.

After seeing his face,

the villagers gathered in Qinggi's house.

And after they talked about what he would do,

Qinggi got dressed.

The tide has turned and now his 'face' is seen (last when they saw him going away they saw his back of course). Sea-foam (from which Aphrodite was born) marks the border between sea (winter) and land (summer).

The villagers wedged themselves into the seams

in the pillar of feast-rings

on top of the hat that Qinggi was wearing.

When things had stood that way awhile,

the broad and even ocean started to rise.

As the water got higher, Qinggi got taller.

That made the one we are speaking of jealous.

The feast-rings of the pillar must be the marks needed for 'climbing', the sequence of steps towards the top.

Then he sliced his father's hat in two.

Half the villagers were killed.

After that, he was gone for a while.

The division of the year 'hat' into two parts is described. Marduk divided the night in two parts, but also the day must be divided in two parts in order to really create two separate cycles. Those 'villagers' who had 'wedged' themselves into the upper part of the 'hat' died. The pole without any visible marks has no survivors. Beyond 'a.m.' death lurks (and the Raven too).

And then he was there again, early one morning, they say.

'It's Voicehandler, waiting offshore!'

'Go down and ask him to come in', his father said.

'I would like to see his face'.

They spread out the mats.

Then his companions came in and sat down.

His father offered him food, over and over.

His father was happy to see him.

In a footnote Bringhurst points out this is the only time in the poem when Raven is called Voicehandler.

After the meal, that evening,

his father sat down near the doorway, they say.

After a time he said,

'Well, sir, my son,

could one of your crewmembers tell us a story from mythtime?'

In the evening, after all the actions of the day, it is time to sit down and tell stories. It is the time of the old people.

Voicehandler turned to the people beside him.

'Do you know any stories from mythtime?'

'No', they replied.

He turned to the other side.

'Doesn't one of you know any stories from mythtime?'

'No, we don't.'

Then he said to his father,

'They don't seem to know any stories from mythtime.'

Then Qinggi, his father, said,

'Really? Not even the story called Raven Travelling?

Couldn't one of your crewmembers tell me that story?'

Voicehandler cringed at what people would say,

and he stared at the floor.

Bringhurst comments:

"When he arrives at Qinggi's house, the Raven will eat nothing. The trickster is a creature who exaggerates everything he does, and here he is reborn as an aristocrat beyond the reach of ordinary needs.

Hunger - his natural condition - is something the Raven must relearn.

Ravens do indeed eat scabs as well as dung - though not as a rule their own. And it is evidently part of the trickster's job to reopen and maintain the world's wounds.

But what exactly is it that the greedyguts teaches to the Raven? He [sic!] teaches him, it seems, to reduce himself to food - though hints of autocastration and masturbation also lurk in these instructions.

After he has done as he is told - another atypical trick for the Raven - his hunger is restored. This is the main event in the first scene of the fourth movement.

In the final scene, Qinggi - who has moved to the guest's position in the house - asks the Raven not to reduce but to enlarge himself to food. He asks him to feed others, by telling his own story. This yields the only moment in the poem when the Raven is ashamed."

After the disorderly raw season of nature, the 1st half of the year, comes a more ordered sedentary season, a season of culture, and the feeding - therefore - must be cultural. The Voicehandler ought to speak. But he maybe still is hungry for the 'food' of 'a.m.'? Hungry people don't tell stories.

After a moment, one of his crew

who was swarthy and little and sat at his right,

leaned back and bellowed,

'Yayaaaaaaaw!

The village of Qinggi, the mythteller!'

The house was as quiet

as something that someone has dropped.

At his right means what is due. Little and swarthy is a description of evening time, I guess. Then follows 7 insulting speeches:

'Yayaaaaaaaw!

A stalk of bull kelp ten joints long

grew just in front of the village of Qinggi, the mythteller.

The gods came out to see it

and died on the spot!'

'Yayaaaaaaaw!

A rainbow scratched its back

right in front of the village of Qinggi, the mythteller.

The gods came out to watch it

and died on the spot!'

'Yayaaaaaaaw!

Last season a reef came out of the sea

in front of the village of Qinggi, the mythteller.

Gull God stood at one end and Cormorant God at the other,

and they tossed the tailflukes of humpback whales back and forth.

The gods came out to watch

and they died on the spot!'

'Yayaaaaaaaw!

Harlequin Duck and Steller's Jay

staged a race in Qinggi the mythteller's village.

The gods came out to see

and they died on the spot!'

'Yayaaaaaaaw!

A Raven rattle's ribcage came unlaced and flew around

with long, thin songs coming out of its mouth

a season ago at the home of the mythteller Qinggi.

The gods came out to see

and they died on the spot!'

Bringhurst:

"Raven rattles are used by all the indigenous peoples of the northern Northwest Coast and are known by cognate names in all the northern coastal languages: sheishóoxw in Tlingit, haseex in Nishga, sasoo in Tsimshian, siisaa in Haida.

They are carved in two parts: belly and back. The Raven's head, wings and tail are part of the back. So is the humanoid passenger which the rattle usually carries.

The belly (Haida qan, meaníng breast or ribcage) does not look like it could fly, and seldom has any discernibly avian elements. It is shaped as half an egg or a short canoe, and is usually engraved with the Raven's marine allotrope, Ttsam'aws, the Snag.

Dance etiquette and conventional wisdom on the Nortwest Coast require that Raven rattles should be carried belly up most of the time, because they cannot fly away when held in that position."

I remember the sistrum, the instrument of darkness:

... Birds tend to sleep standing on one leg only, the other being tucked up among the feathers. Gods are birds and winter is a kind of night, so they should stand on one leg at that time. Two 'limbs' tied together must refer to the fact that there are two main seasons in the year (respectively in the diurnal cycle, in the moon's waxing and waning etc). You breathe in and you breathe out. When you hold your breath it usually means that you wish to be quiet, not move.

So, then, the meaning of two 'staffs' together, should be 'to hold your breath' - don't rock the boat. The season should not be disrupted, it is not time for 'shaking the breasts', 'rattling the sistrum' etc.

'A sistrum is a musical instrument of the percussion family, chiefly associated with ancient Egypt. It consists of a handle and a U-shaped metal frame, made of brass or bronze and between 10 and 30 cm in width.

When shaken the small rings or loops of thin metal on its movable crossbars produce a sound that can range from a soft tinkling to a loud jangling. The name derives from the Greek verb σείω, seio, to shake, and σείστρον, seistron, is that which is being shaken.' (Wikipedia)

Two 'rulers' bound together (to keep the piece) ought, then, to be a symbol for 'business as usual'. Tokorua instead of Takurua ....

The 7 insults to the gods are the disturbances caused at cardinal points. If they die on the spot, it meands a cardinal point. 364 / 7 = 52.

The first insult was the 10 joints (rings) long 'bull kelp stalk'. The bull is a symbol of raw nature.

The 2nd was the rainbow arching towards its own back, a colourful cycle. The rainbow appears when sun light splits the murky winter apart.

The 3rd presents twin gods, the gull and the cormorant. Bringhurst:

"The cormorant mentioned here is sghiitghun, 'red gullet'. This is the double-crested cormorant, P. auritus, which visits the Island in the fall."

(Double-crested cormorant, Phalacrocorax auritus. The crests are normally not visible. Wikipedia)

Gull represents the 1st 'raw nature' year, while the cormorant represents fall. What Harlequin Duck and Steller's Jay represent I don't know for the moment:

(Wikipedia)

'Yayaaaaaaaw!

Jilaquns was here a season ago,

doing her weaving in White Quartz Bay,

at the edge of the village of Qinggi, the mythteller.

The gods came out to see

and died on the spot!'

'Yayaaaaaaaw!

Plain Old Marten and the other one who outruns trout

chased each other up, down, back and around

at the edge of the village of Qinggi, the mythteller.

The gods came out to see it

and died on the spot!'

The edge of the village means the end of the year. At the end of a cycle a net of some kind must catch the sun. Bringhurst informs that 'Plain Old Marten and the other one' refers to Taadlat Ghadala and Kkuxu Ginagits, or Swallow and Marten.

(Wikipedia)

Why does not Bringhurst anywhere in his book explain the correlations between seasons and mythic creatures? As a poet he must know, and the knowledge surely cannot be forbidden. Maybe it is so trivial as not worthy of mentioning? Those who understand will understand, those who don't will never understand.