Reading Notes: Great Plains Part A

I read Myths and Legends of the Great Plains by Katharine Berry Judson (1913) for week 10, and encountered some very interesting stories.  I liked that the lengths of the stories varied quite a bit, and also that the themes were so different.  I assumed I would be most attracted to the ghost stories, but I actually didn't really draw any inspiration for my own story from them, though I did enjoy reading them.  The stories that did inspire me were actually the first three stories in the unit, which are:

The Creation
This story gives an interesting perspective on the creation of the earth and its inhabitants.  Although I didn't see any immorality in this story to use for my portfolio, I did have the idea to write about funerals for the animals that perish at the end.  The sun and moon, and possibly the wind, could be the main speakers at these funerals.

Sacred Legend
I really loved this story!  It used parallel structure beautifully to explain the evolution of tribal "technology" and companionship.  If I were to write about this story, I would use a lot of pictures to illustrate the development of new methods and devices by the people in this story.  I like this idea a lot, but I think the downfalls are the fact that this story doesn't display any immorality, and that it may be hard for me to reach the minimum word count with a story.  I could just rework the story I suppose...

The Legend of the Peace Pipes
This is my favorite story in part A of this week's reading; it gave me so many ideas.  First of all, there are blatant mentions of immoralities (that the peace pipes are meant to remedy) at the end of this story, which makes it a potential candidate for my portfolio.  I enjoyed the incorporation of the different types of plants and animals, and I found it intriguing that the tribal chief was so meticulous about which sapling or feather should be used to make the peace pipes.  My story idea is to have the rejected plants and animals represent an immorality, possibly the two explicitly mentioned in the story.  I'd explain more about why the chief did not want to use these materials to build the peace pipes, and show that it was because they came from beings that were not peaceful or moral.

A ceremonial peace pipe. Courtesy of Wikipedia