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Author
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Comment
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judithwq
Registered User
(6/18/03 4:57 pm)
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deer stories
Hi,
I'm looking for fairy tales involving deer as a prominent figure in the story. I have the Golden Book of Fairy Tales and am looking for others.
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Midori
Unregistered User
(6/18/03 5:08 pm)
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which culture?
Are you interested in European tales? (then of course "Deerskin" would probably interest you--it is both a fairy tale and a retold novel by Robin McKinley.
Otherwise the Southwest Indians have a fantastic creature known as Deer Woman--you should be able to run a search and find quite a few tales of this remarkable figure. Carolyn Dunn, a wonderful writer/scholar/poet from California has done a lot of work on Deer Woman--she checks the board when time permits, so perhaps she can fill you in with more titles.
Also, are you just thinking deer? or can we talk stag/hind/and fawns? The Greeks have a think for the stags and fawns--both men and women seem to have been transformed at one time or another...
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judithwq
Registered User
(6/19/03 7:05 am)
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deer stories
Thanks Midori-I will do an online search for deer woman-it is for a piece I am working on that Iwould like to have jump between retelling of a "fairy tale" (or folk tale) with a present time situation involving 2 real deer, one a corpse and one alive. I am particularly interested in any deer tales (stag would be OK, and fawn too-I will know the right tale when I come across it)-i am particularly interested if, in the tale (which is why I thought european) there is a woman (queen?) who wants to have a child but can't and has to seek magical help to conceive-and that the deer transformation occurs somewhere during the tale.
Iwill also look into the Deerskin suggestion-that might be apt. Thank you much.
Judith
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judithwq
Registered User
(6/19/03 7:54 am)
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deer tales
Midori-I just remembered-if the story has a death/rebirth element on the part of the deer, that would be good. is Deerskin a retelling of Donkeyskin?
Judith
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Mary
Unregistered User
(6/19/03 3:47 pm)
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Brother and Sister
In the fairy tale Brother and Sister, the brother is transformed into a roe deer.
www.surlalunefairytales.c...hersister/
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Carrie
Unregistered User
(6/19/03 8:47 pm)
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white doe
I recall a story about the white doe of Roanoke. I believe there was a discussion about the topic on this board some time ago. Does anyone else recall this?
Cheers.
Carrie
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Mary
Unregistered User
(6/19/03 8:56 pm)
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Famous Flower of Serving Men
A ballad rather than a fairy tale proper, but in some variants, the king is hunting alone when he runs across an uncanny "milk-white hind" (or doe) which draws him into the forest and brings him to the dove who tells him who Sweet William really is.
mysongbook.de/msb/songs/f/famflowe.html
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Carolyn
Dunn
Registered User
(6/19/03 10:53 pm)
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Cherokee/Muskogee Deer Woman & her relatives
Of course this topic just jumped out at me:D ...
Judith, there are a few titles you may want to check out with some Deer Woman references: [i]Grandmothers of the Light[/i], by Paula Gunn Allen, in which PGA references Deer Woman; she also has a Deer Woman story in [i]Spider Woman's Granddaughters[/i]. Joy Harjo's Deer Dancer from her book [i]In Mad Love & War[/i] may be helpful, as well as the book [i]Deer Women and Elk Men[/i], written by Julian Rice but ethnographic work was done by Ella Cara Deloria in which she discusses and presents the Lakota and Dakota narratives in the original dialects. The similarities between their stories and ours are interesting. And you may want to check out Anita Endrezze's [i]Throwing Fire At The Sun, Water At The Moon,[/i] in which AE looks at the Yaqui Deer Woman versions. In my book [i]Through The Eye of the Deer[/i], Carol Comfort & I discuss at length the Deer Woman narratives in the introduction--and one of my Deer Woman stories appears in the book. I also reference Deer Woman in my book [i]Outfoxing Coyote[/i] as well--also in Terri and Ellen's (and Charles' gorgeous Deer Woman rendition as well) marvelous anthology [i]Green Man: Tales From the Mythic Forest[/i]. If you need any more references, I'll see what I can do...
PS Lots of love to Midori!
Edited by: Carolyn Dunn at: 6/19/03 10:57 pm
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judithwq
Registered User
(6/20/03 5:11 am)
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deer in fairy tales
Thanks Carolyn for such a meaty reply. I had looked you up online at Midori's mention. I will look into some of those references. Meanwhile:
Anybody have European ones they can recommend, specifically that involve a woman wanting a child, a step-mom killing a child where a deer is substituted? Or girl is transformed into deer in order to be saved?
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Mary
Unregistered User
(6/20/03 1:29 pm)
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Step-mother killing a child
In "Snow White," the huntsman kills a deer to get a heart -- though not in the Disney version.
In some variants of "Sleeping Beauty," (such as www.surlalunefairytales.c...ndex.html
) after the prince brings Sleeping Beauty out of the castle, they
have two children and he has to leave. His mother tries to have
Sleeping Beauty and her children killed, and eat them for dinner
-- a lamb and a kid are substitued for the children, and a hind
for Sleeping Beauty herself. Will a mother-in-law do?
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judithwq
Registered User
(6/20/03 4:03 pm)
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deer stories
I think the one in snow white might work-if I remember correctly, there is a substitute, right, instead of killing snow white huntsman kills a deer and brings to evil stepmom. And yes Mary, a motherin law is OK.
Any girls transforming into deer to escape being killed? The Sister and Brother story could work, too.
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Terri
Registered User
(6/21/03 6:53 am)
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deer stories
Ari Berk published a good article on deer legends in the June 2003 issue of Realms of Fantasy.
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swood
Registered User
(6/21/03 10:03 am)
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Re: deer stories
The hunting of the hart is often a jumping off place for adventures. As I recall, the hunting of a hart figures in the tale of Sir Gawain and the Loathly Lady, one of my all time favorite tales.
Sarah
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denag
Registered User
(6/21/03 3:02 pm)
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deer stories
Also, the enchanted doe (basile story, don't know if he invented it though) - The deer figures late on in the story, luring a daring adventurer into the hunt, then turning into an ogre and trapping him. His brother comes to rescue him.
This story also features a queen longing for children (her wish is granted early on - hence the two brothers are born). And I think the queen becomes jealous of the brothers' love for each other, which is why one of them goes off to have adventures - he feels the palace is getting a bit crowded and tense.
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Rosemary
Lake
Registered User
(6/21/03 7:34 pm)
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Re: deer stories
There's a variant of 'water of life' in which the orphan children are raised by a deer. Southern Eurpean I think.
I seem to remember a story about a woman transformed into a deer who made friends with a prince?
And a story (might have been the same one) about a spoiled girl who went to live with the Sea Queen and mermaids. Before they would accept her, they set her a quest on land. She had to change into several forms to complete it. Iirc one form was a parrot, another an ant, another perhaps a deer. Or perhaps she met another woman in the form of a deer.
Very good story anyway.
RL
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Mary
Unregistered User
(6/22/03 7:31 am)
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Andrew Lang's book
There's a story in one of Andrew Lang's fairy tale books in which, after the heroine has married the prince and had a baby, she is turned into a deer. A servant brings her baby to the herd, and she turns into a human again, shedding her skin, to nurse the baby. Her husband burns the skin.
But I don't remember the tale.
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Mary
Unregistered User
(6/22/03 12:33 pm)
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White Doe
I think I may have found the one you were looking for. At the least, "The White Doe" opens with a queen hoping to conceive and obtaining magical aid, and with a princess turned into a deer:
www.classicreader.com/rea...44/sec.21/
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Mary
Unregistered User
(6/22/03 1:10 pm)
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The Wonderful Birch
And the transformation one was a Lang story, but it was a reindeer, not a deer:
www.classicreader.com/rea...24/sec.11/
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judithwq
Registered User
(6/23/03 1:58 pm)
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deer stories
Deer All,
Thanks for so many great suggestions. As I read the tales, I'm getting confused as to which is an "original" and which a "variant"--the simpler the better. For example, one of the Andrew Lang stories seems to be Madame D'Aulnoy's White Deer.
Sarah-Thanks for the hunting of the hart mention-Sir Gawain and the Loathely Lady is a favorite of mine, too. Jon Kabat Zinn uses it beautifully in his book Everyday Blessings: the INner work of mindful Parenting, and Odds Bodkins does a great telling onhis CD Stories of Love.
Rosemary-where might I find the tale you mention?
Judith
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tlchang37
Registered User
(6/23/03 2:15 pm)
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deer transformations
Although the deer transformation was not voluntary, there is the Irish story from the Fianna Cycle of Finn MacCool and his first wife, Sadb. She was originally transformed into a fawn by a spurned Druid. Finn stumbles across a 'white hind' on a hunt and instead of killing her, he brings her back to his stronghold and takes care of her in his own rooms where she changes back into her human form. The Druid later tricks her to leaving the stronghold and transforms her back into a deer while she is pregnant with Finn's son. Finn never found his wife, but his son, whom he named Oisín (fawn), eventually was discovered and came to live with him.
Tara
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Mary
Unregistered User
(6/24/03 6:40 pm)
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variant vs. tale
"As I read the tales, I'm getting confused as to which is an "original" and which a "variant"--the simpler the better."
Can of worms there! I've read variants on "Sleeping Beauty" and "Snow White" where I thought the variants were less like each other than the two tales.
What constitutes a variant and what a different tale has consumed a lot of ink and paper.
"For example, one of the Andrew Lang stories seems to be Madame D'Aulnoy's White Deer."
The White Doe? That's not a variant. That's a different translation -- the version I found attributes it to her.
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