The Rat, the Hawk and the Octopus
http://cocoon.huma-num.fr/pub/CHO_cocoon-b11ea8bb-5af5-3395-a69a-956356a36f1b an entity of type: ProvidedCHO
This tale is a long, pleasant narration of Mr Rat's misadventures with his fellow creatures: first, with animals of the air and especially the Hawk (Circus approximans); and then animals of the sea, above all the Octopus. This story consists of several parts: [1] the Rat is paddling in his canoe, but several birds harass him, wanting to embark with him (this gives the tale its song); the boat nearly sinks. [2] while on the boat, the Rat steals a piece of yam belonging to the Hawk; the Hawk takes his revenge by making the boat sink. [3] the Rat swims to escape death, and asks for the help of a shark, of the Turtle, of the Dolphin, and finally the Octopus accepts to carry him. But when the Octopus realises the Rat is laughing at him, he tries to kill him. [4] the last part is an etiological reflection about how this story accounts for nowadays rats and octopuses. We believe this version probably mingles more than one traditional plot: in particular, the first part [1] is a crescendo which should naturally result in the boat sinking, but the episode of the hawk [2] brings in a new suspense; finally, the story with the octopus could form a whole tale per se. The result of this assortment is a pleasant, poetic and lively tale, in which each animal is endowed with its own human-like psychology and world. The personification of animals is patent in the many details of the story (e.g. the rat is going to have lunch with his Mum, or the birds threaten him with telling everything to their Dad when he comes back home), but it is also visible linguistically, through their genitive and object marking.
dcterms:W3CDTF
1997-12-05
Freely accessible
Le Rat, le Faucon et le Poulpe
dcterms:W3CDTF
2010-07-06
"The Rat, the Hawk and the Octopus" 1997. Araki. Typologie et universaux linguistiques (sponsor); François, Alexandre (researcher); François, Alexandre (depositor); Lele Moli (speaker). Editeur(s): Laboratoire de langues et civilisations à tradition orale.
dcterms:W3CDTF
2010-07-06T17:50:28+02:00
ark:/87895/1.5-125681
Ancienne cote: crdo-AKR_RAT_OCTOPUS_SOUND
oai:crdo.vjf.cnrs.fr:cocoon-b11ea8bb-5af5-3395-a69a-956356a36f1b
doi:10.24397/PANGLOSS-0002297
doi:10.34847/cocoon.b11ea8bb-5af5-3395-a69a-956356a36f1b
Araki
Copyright (c) François, Alexandre
Araki
The Rat, the Hawk and the Octopus