Words …

18 Tuesday Aug 2015

Posted by michelinewalker in Aboriginals, Sharing

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Sequoya (c. 1770-1843)

It happened once again. I was writing a post, had to go out, and obviously hit the “publish” button instead of the “safe draft” button.

Let me read what I have written down.

I’m feeling a little sad today. As you know, I am trying to sell my share of this building, one-ninth, but the co-owners of the building are sending away prospective buyers who may need to take a mortgage. In this building, if a co-owner fails to pay his or her mortgage, making payments becomes the responsibility of the other co-owners. That can be changed.

My Assignment

My realtor has asked me to speak to the co-owners of this building, but all I can say is that they are putting themselves at considerable risk. A few are very old. They may need to sell their share and move into a residence. My mother fell when she was 80 and lost the use of her legs. She spent the last three years of her life in an institution.
Wish me luck. I may not be able to persuade the other co-owners that they may have to change the rules and create a reserve fund.

Back to our Amerindians

I will now return to our Amerindians. Yesterday, I read James Mooney’s account of the removal of the Cherokee from Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Alabama. They were sent to Oklahoma, but not without resistance. As Mr Mooney wrote, the relocation of the Cherokees was worse than the expulsion of the Acadians.

Sequoya, featured at the top of this post, worked on developing a written language for his people: the Cherokee. They were able to publish a newspaper.

Several Cherokees were Métis.

Source

James Mooney’s Myths of the Cherokee, Gutenberg [EBook #45634]

A Little White House

01 Sunday Mar 2015

Posted by michelinewalker in Sharing

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a good wife, a loss, kindness, love, sharing, WW II

Child with Dove, by Picasso, 1901

Last week, I lost a very dear aunt. During the last few days, posting articles was therefore rather difficult.

Patricia was my father’s sister and the kindest person I have ever known.

Her life was a love story. She met her husband before World War II. He went overseas and waited for D-Day. He and my aunt wrote to each other.

Somehow, my uncle survived D-Day. It was like a miracle. Bodies were falling all around him, but he was not even wounded. He and other survivors carried on to liberate other countries. When I think of all the lives lost because of a dictator, including thousands of German lives.

Roland and Patricia married soon after my uncle returned to Canada. They were provided with a veteran’s house where they brought up their family. They never left that little white house.

My cousins and medical helpers looked after my aunt, at home, during a long illness. Roland and a daughter were her main caregivers.

There was a lunch after the funeral. I lived outside Quebec during most of my life and had never met my cousins’ children, except one.

My poor uncle! He and Patricia had been together for more than sixty years in their little white house.

Landscape 1928

A message to my readers

01 Tuesday Nov 2011

Posted by michelinewalker in Sharing

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Just So Stories, Rivière Bourbeau, Rudying Kipling, sharing, Suzor-Côté, The Jungle Book, WordPress

La Rivière Bourbeau by Marc-Aurèle de Foy Suzor-Coté

Yesterday, I wrote a rather long post. It is full of information for people who want to read the works of J. R. R. Tolkien, C. S. Lewis and J. K. Rowling where there are all kinds of animals, old and new. But it quite suffices to know that ‘modern’ authors have incorporated ancient animals into their books.

Last night, as I was falling asleep, suddenly I wanted to tell you that a blog of his kind is a mere guide.

Several posts ago, I mentioned that I had had to prepare a course on Animals in Literature. Given that I was busy doing something else, preparing my course proved quite a task. So I suffered my worst episode ever of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.

However, preparing and teaching beast literature allowed me to discover a marvellous world which I simply organised. I knew about the various manners in which tales are classified and came up with a course outline that presented animals in literature in a concise and pleasant manner.

No, I did not expect my students to read all of those texts. There are thousands, so that would have been ridiculous. But my students were given the overall picture and read a few fables, a few beast fairy tales, and they learned about beast epics, Reynard the Fox.

I could not expect them to read Reynard the Fox, so I chose to present a few of Reynard’s tricks. As for mythological and mythical animals, again I could not expect them to read complete mythologies and become acquainted with all medieval Bestiaries.

The one book everyone read was Kenneth Grahame‘s The Wind in the Willows, published in 1908. But together we glimpsed at Peter Rabbit, Winnie-the-Pooh, Rudyard Kipling‘s The Jungle Book and Just So Stories, Margery Williams’s The Velveteen Rabbit. As well, each student prepared a little talk about one animal (the Unicorn, the Dragon), or about one book, and if possible illustrations, such as Beatrix Potter’s Peter Rabbit. Beatrix Potter was a marvellous artists.

So, although my blog was long, I would suggest you simply enjoy some of these figures, except that you have the benefit of knowing where they fit. This can be useful when mothers and fathers read stories to their children.

Yesterday’s post abridged

In short, yesterday’s post was about, first the upside-down characteristic of Beast literature and, second, about the continuity in beast literature. The fantastical animals of mythologies and myths are reborn in modern stories, J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter’s creator, being a good example of a mixture of ancient animals, like the three-headed dog of Greek and Latin mythologies: Cerberus, and new fantastical creatures.

—ooo—

1 November 2011