{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/3999", "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it. Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.", "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'" }, "archive": "urth", "thread": { "id": 3999, "subject": "Sharks in Pacific Folklore", "messages": 4, "voices": 4, "first": "2003-05-12T14:02:40+00:00", "last": "2003-05-12T17:51:31+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Nigel Price", "address": "nigel.aprice at virgin.net" }, "date": "2003-05-12T14:02:40+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Sharks in Pacific Folklore", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Curious to know more about the background to Wolfe's story \"The Tree is my\nHat\", I dug around in the back of the upstairs storage cupboard until I\nfinally found my long lost copy of Roslyn Poignant's little book on Pacific\nfolklore, _Myths and Legends of the South Seas_. (I also recovered our copy\nof _Favourite Maori Legends_, whose title always used to make me wonder\nwhether there was a companion volume somewhere entitled _Less Popular Maori\nLegends_...A bit like a boring old book I've got entitled _What Baptists\nStand For_. I've spent years searching fruitlessly for the allegedly far\nmore interesting companion volume, _What Baptists Won't Stand For_ ...But I\ndigress...)\n\n_Myths and Legends of the South Seas_ contains three sections: one on\nMelanesia, one on Micronesia, and one on Polynesia. I searched the index and\nskimmed through the whole book, hoping to discover something about Hanga the\nHammerhead and his flooded temple, but found nothing. Lots of stories of\nghosts, though, some quite bizarre. The North Point ghost story thread in\nWolfe's story would be quite typical of the islanders' beliefs, though I\ngather that it is more common for the ghosts to travel west rather than\nnorth in search of their final resting place.\n\nAnyway, I did find this section on sharks, albeit in the Melanesian rather\nthan the Polynesian section of the book. I'm quoting here from p57-58 of the\nHamlyn paperback edition:\n\n\t\"The islanders assered that the shoals of bonito came from across the\nstrait, sent by the _Maids of Bonito_, from their homes amongst the reefs\nand bays of Kela, the southernmost district of Guadalcanal. The spirits of\nthe dead also lived in Kela in villages, invisible to all except those who,\nchoosing to see them, dabbed their foreheads with lime before they went\nashore.\n\n\t\"Sometimes, however, the souls of the dead entered other creatures; for\ninstance, certain famous bonito fishermen and chiefs were said to have been\nreincarnated in sharks who became guardians. Every landing stage had its own\nguardian shark who was invoked to protect the honour of the family, defend\nthe canoe house, keep rogue sharks away and escort the bonito. There was\nalso a special shark deity, Sautahi-i-matawa, the\nBonito-who-fled-out-to-sea, who was the protector of all Ulawa and famed for\nhis defeat of the winged serpent from Malaita. Sautahi was the incarnation\nof a still-born baby who had emerged from the top of his mother's head. His\nlifeless body was placed in a canoe, and no sooner was it set afloat than he\nturned into a shark and swam away. In a similar way the relics of great\nchiefs were set afloat, sealed in a hollow wooden swordfish. The first\ncreature that approached, usually a shark, was recognised as the chief's\nincarnation.\n\n\t\"A living man could also have a shark familiar who shared his\nsoul-substance and his name. Such a shark was tame in his presence and would\nrub against his legs in the surf and let him ride on his back.\"\n\nNot an exact fit with Wolfe's story, but highly suggestive, and certainly\nthe basic details of the shark guardian are there. I don't know what\nreference works GW used in writing this story, but he may well have read\nsomething similar to the above.\n\nAfter the passage quoted, there follows the story of the magical child the\nLord Mweo, whose two grandmothers were shark guardians and who had himself\n\"a shark familiar who always stayed near him in the sea beyond the landing\nstage.\" Again, the story is not really anything like Wolfe's, but it has got\nsharks and coconut palms in it. In summary, it goes like this.\n\nThe child Mweo is thirsty and drinks the milk from all his uncle's coconuts.\nWhen his uncle comes home and finds all his coconuts emptied, he curses Mweo\nand condemns him to go to Kela, the land of the dead, and to bring back the\ncoconut tree belonging to Takiepu, a chief who lives there. Mweo's\ngrandmother sharks accomplish the mission for him, going to Kela to get the\ncoconut tree. Takiepu won't go near the water, so they make eight huge waves\nwhich knock him off his feet into the water and uproot his coconut tree. The\ngrandmother sharks bite Takiepu's head off, and swim back to the wicked\nuncle, one carrying Takiepu's head in her mouth and the other carrying the\ncoconut tree, which they display to all the villages they pass. When they\nfinally get home, they spit up the head and the coconut tree at the amazed\nuncle's feet.\n\nThe tree is my trophy, rather than my hat, but there you go!\n\nIncidentally, the quibble in Hanga's reply to the narrator question about\npalm leaf hats seems to be, literally, along the lines of, \"No, the leaves\nare not my hat, even though you can make hats out of them. The whole tree is\nmy hat.\" As I mentioned earlier, I think that this means that Hanga's body\nis buried at the foot of the tree, though it is conceivable he means only\nthat the tree grows over and shades the bay where he lives in the sunken\ntemple. In my view, the first interpretation remains preferable.\n\nNigel" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Che Monro", "address": "flirt at technologist.com" }, "date": "2003-05-12T17:08:19+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Sharks in Pacific Folklore", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Incidentally, the quibble in Hanga's reply to the narrator question about\npalm leaf hats seems to be, literally, along the lines of, \"No, the leaves\nare not my hat, even though you can make hats out of them. The whole tree is\nmy hat.\" As I mentioned earlier, I think that this means that Hanga's body\nis buried at the foot of the tree, though it is conceivable he means only\nthat the tree grows over and shades the bay where he lives in the sunken\ntemple. In my view, the first interpretation remains preferable.\n\nNigel" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Wise Ones,\n\nAlthough it's certainly not an issue of truth or falsehood (Unless you \nbelieve in the highly controversial truth-in-text theory), my impression \nwas that at the end of the story Hanga was swimming along beside the plane \nin mid air in shark UFO form.\n\nSecond, \"The Tree is my hat\" My God... I received the image of Hanga as \nthe island here, the entire island, with the tree growing on his head. So I \ndidn't see the meaning of it being either where his body is buried, or \nshading his temple, although these are perhaps more plausible and less \nfantastic interpretations of the idea.\n\nFinally, I've read the North Point legend before, in a book of stories from \nthe islands. It was many years ago and I can't remember who wrote it, but \nit's possible that you may find a similar legend recounted by Robert Lewis \nStevenson if you look for it. If not, well \"The Bottle Imp\" is a wonderful \nstory and I bet Wolfe has read it. ;)\n\nChe\n\nChé Franz Joseph Monro -- http://www.chemonro.com\nche at chemonro.com -- flirt at technologist.com" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Fernando Q. Gouvea", "address": "fqgouvea at colby.edu" }, "date": "2003-05-12T17:23:07+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Sharks in Pacific Folklore", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Tue, 13 May 2003, Che Monro wrote:\nSecond, \"The Tree is my hat\" My God... I received the image of Hanga as\nthe island here, the entire island, with the tree growing on his head. So I\ndidn't see the meaning of it being either where his body is buried, or\nshading his temple, although these are perhaps more plausible and less\nfantastic interpretations of the idea." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "That was how I read it too. It seemed to me that in some sense Hanga was\nthe island. And I at least considered the possibility that the island was\nwhat he was seeing from the plane.\n\nI've been fascinated by what you all have had to say about this one. I\nshould go re-read it.\n\nFernando\n\n============================================================================\nFernando Q. Gouvea\nDept. of Mathematics Editor, FOCUS and MAA Online\nColby College http://www.maa.org\nWaterville, ME 04901\nfqgouvea at colby.edu\n\nF: When into a room I plunge, I\n Sometimes find some VIOLET FUNGI.\n Then I linger, darkly brooding\n On the poison they're exuding.\n --The Roguelet's ABC" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "John Barach", "address": "jbarach at telus.net" }, "date": "2003-05-12T17:51:31+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Sharks in Pacific Folklore", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Che writes:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "my impression was that at the end of the story Hanga\nwas swimming along beside the plane in mid air\nin shark UFO form." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Fernando writes:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "It seemed to me that in some sense Hanga was\nthe island. And I at least considered the possibility that\nthe island was what he was seeing from the plane." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Was it on this list or in my imagination or elsewhere that someone floated\nthe idea that what is seen at the end of the story (Hanga in shark form\nswimming along beside the plane in mid-air) is a reflection of the man\nlooking out the window?\n\n\n\nJohn" } ] } ] }