Reading Notes: Eskimo Stories Part b

(Arctic fox. Flickr)

In these stories I will be focusing on beautiful sentences. I really like the way these Eskimo stories are told. The translation is kind of funny because some of the sentences are very blunt and short and others are long and beautiful. A lot of the sentences I chose are short but I like the phrasing of them In each you can clearly picture what is going on.

“She took her bearskin coverlet over her, and went and sat down on the shore, close to the water, and let the tide come up and cover her.”

“The people of old times thought it an ill thing for men to kill each other.”

“Thus punishment falls upon the man who kills.”

“After that the eagle and the girl lived together on a ledge of rock far up a high steep cliff.”

“And at the same moment the sea was lashed into foam, but the umiak had reached the land. And the whale tried to follow, but was cast up on the shore as a white and sun-bleached bone of a whale.”

“At last the evening came.”

“And now the great finder of hidden things began calling down sleep with all his might over that one remaining.”

“After that time, Ángángŭjuk's parents never again took up their dwelling on the mainland.”

“Here ends this story.”

“So clever had he now become.”

“Night passed and morning came.”

“And he rowed weeping in towards land, that man with no weapon but a stick.”

“When they heard a spirit calling, one would change into a bear, and the other into a walrus.”

“So great a shame did he feel.”

“And when Kilitêraq came nearer—for it was Kilitêraq who came—he looked round among the kayaks, and when he saw that Kánagssuaq was among them, he thrust his way through and came close up to him, and stuck his paddle in between the thongs on Kánagssuaq's kayak, and then loosened the skin over the opening of his own kayak, and put his hand in behind, and drew out a splendid tow-line made of walrus hide and beautifully worked with many beads of walrus tooth.”

Bibliography: Inuit/Eskimo Folktales, Source