![]() ![]() His (or her) most conspicuous bodily parts are passages (mouth, nostrils, anus, ears, vagina) and members that bridge or penetrate those passages (e.g., head, penis, or, in the case of the spider figure, the filament with which he spins his web). The trickster is usually male, but he often assumes female form in order to conceive and give birth. He reorders (or has reordered for him) his bodily parts: His head may be fastened to his bottom, or his penis to his back. In his case, however, bodily functions and features are extreme: voracious appetite, insatiable lust, stupendous excretions, cosmic flatulence. ![]() The trickster is remarkable for the carnality that he shares with humans and animals. However, there is no need to pair the trickster in a dualism with the supreme being in order to understand his unique character. The trickster may assume an even more active role on the mythic stage in the absence or weakness of a supreme being. This is an ungracious parallel to the Winnebago's solemn account wherein Earthmaker creates a quiet and static world order in which each species remains in a separate lodge. In one North American Indian myth, for example, the Winnebago trickster Wakdjunkaga scatters all living creatures across the face of the earth with an enormous fart, which leaves them laughing, yelling, and barking. He frequently thwarts the supreme being's creative intentions. As one of these important supernaturals, the trickster possesses extraordinary powers more divine than human. Myth relates that the trickster existed in the early times when the world was still taking shape and was inhabited by supernatural beings. The trickster represents a complicated combination of three modes of sacrality: the divine, the animal, and the human. In those cultures where he stands independent of other mythic figures, his adventures are recounted in a separate cycle of myths and lore. However, the trickster's distinction lies not so much in his particular feats as in the peculiar quality of his exploits -a combination of guile and stupidity -and in the ludicrous dimensions of his bodily parts and biological drives. As such, he plays the part of another mythic archetype, the transformer, or culture hero, who in a mythic age at the beginning of the world helps shape human culture into its familiar form. Sometimes the trickster is the agent who introduces fire, agriculture, tools, or even death to the human world. The myths of many cultures portray such a comic and amoral character, who is sometimes human but is more often animal in shape, typically an animal noted for agility and cunning: the wily coyote, the sly fox, the elusive rabbit, or the crafty spider. Trickster is the name given to a type of mythic figure distinguished by his skill at trickery and deceit as well as by his prodigious biological drives and exaggerated bodily parts. ![]()
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