Not One Damsel in Distress: World Folktales for Strong Girls Read online

  Contents

  * * *

  Title Page

  Contents

  Copyright

  Dedication

  An Open Letter to My Daughter and Granddaughters

  Atalanta the Huntress

  Nana Miriam

  Fitcher’s Bird

  The Girl and the Puma

  Li Chi Slays the Serpent

  Brave Woman Counts Coup

  Pretty Penny

  Burd Janet

  Mizilca

  The Pirate Princess

  The Samurai Maiden

  Bradamante

  Molly Whuppie

  The Princess Kemang

  Masha and the Bear

  An Open Letter to Nana

  Notes on the Stories

  Bibliography

  Middle Grade Mania!

  About the Author

  About the Illustrator

  Connect with HMH on Social Media

  Text copyright © 2000, 2018 by Jane Yolen

  Illustrations copyright © 2000, 2018 by Susan Guevara

  Originally published in hardcover in the United States by Harcourt Children’s Books, an imprint of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, 2000.

  For information about permission to reproduce selections from this book, write to [email protected] or to Permissions, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, 3 Park Avenue, 19th Floor, New York, New York 10016.

  hmhco.com

  Cover illustration © 2018 by Livy Long

  Cover design by Lisa Vega

  The author gratefully acknowledges the following for permission to retell from previously published material: For “Nana Miriam”: Steven H. Gale, for permission to retell “Nana Miriam,” from West African Folktales (NTC Publishing, 1995). For “The Pirate Princess”: Retelling based on “Pirate Princess” by Howard Schwartz, from Elijah’s Violin (Oxford University Press); copyright © 1983 by Howard Schwartz; reprinted by permission of Howard Schwartz, c/o Ellen Levine Literary Agency, Inc. For “Brave Woman Counts Coup”: From American Indian Myths and Legends by Richard Erdoes and Alfonso Ortiz, editors; copyright © 1984 by Richard Erdoes and Alfonso Ortiz; adapted by permission of Pantheon Books, a division of Random House, Inc.

  The Library of Congress has cataloged the hardcover edition as follows:

  Yolen, Jane.

  Not one damsel in distress: world folktales for strong girls/collected and told by Jane Yolen; illustrated by Susan Guevara. p. cm.

  Includes bibliographical references (pp. 129–133).

  Summary: A collection of fifteen traditional tales from various parts of the world, each of whose main characters is a fearless, strong, heroic, and resourceful woman.

  1. Fairy tales. 2. Women—​Folklore. [1. Fairy tales. 2. Women—​Folklore 3. Folklore.]

  I. Guevara, Susan, ill. II. Title.

  PZ8.Y78At 2000

  398.22'082—​dc21 99-18509

  ISBN: 978-1-328-90020-3 paper over board

  eISBN 978-0-547-54289-8

  v2.0718

  TO MY DAUGHTER,

  Heidi Elisabet Yolen Stemple-Piatt

  AND MY GRANDDAUGHTERS:

  Glendon Alexandria Callan-Piatt

  Maddison Jane Stemple-Piatt

  Alison Isabelle Stemple

  Caroline Lee Stemple

  Amelia Hyatt Stemple

  You go, girls!

  ​—​J. Y.

  For Meredith Lynn Walin and her mother,

  Janet Ann Walin, and for Charlotte Grace Schiff

  and her mother, Nancy Lee Kozlowski Schiff

  —​S. G.

  An Open Letter to My Daughter and Granddaughters

  THIS BOOK IS FOR YOU. It’s for you because I never had this book when I was growing up. In those days, I played in New York City’s Central Park with my brother Steve and my best friend, Diane. We acted out our own version of Camelot. I was always King Arthur or Merlin or sometimes Lancelot because I’d never heard of Bradamante, and Guinevere was no fun at all—​just kissing and sneaking around. Or we played at Sherwood Forest, and I was Robin Hood because Maid Marian wasn’t much of an archer.

  This book is for you because for the longest time I didn’t know that girls could be heroes too. Not heroines. Not sheroes (a word Maya Angelou made up). Besides, heroines and sheroes sound like lesser or minor heroes, just as poetess and authoress and aviatrix sound as if they aren’t as good as their male counterparts.

  This book is for you because in it are folktales about regular sword-wielding, spear-throwing, villain-stomping, rescuer-type heroes who also just happen to be female. About women who use weapons or their wits or a combination of both to get away from danger or disaster. Stories that range from the medieval armored knight Bradamante to the magic-wielding African Nana Miriam, from the Jewish pirate princess to the serpent-slaying daughter of a Japanese samurai.

  Female heroes existed well before Wonder Woman, or Bat Girl, or Raven. Before Princess Leia Organa, Katniss Everdeen, or Storm. But they lay hidden in the back storeroom of folklore, put away by retellers and bookmakers who thought girls should be . . . well, girls.

  So the tales were disguised. Mutilated. Truncated. The female heroes’ feet bound as surely as the Chinese bound the feet of young noblewomen even as late as the last century.

  This book is for you because the stories were not only waiting there to be rediscovered in folklore, but in real life, too. For once upon a real time, there were actually young women who—​sometimes in full disguise, and other times in no disguise at all—​went off to battle as often as young women do who are in the armed forces now.

  For example, there were the Amazons—​goddess-worshiping all-female tribes in Greece and North Africa. These women warriors were said to have been the first to tame horses, which made them invincible in battle. They were known as founders of cities and sanctuaries.

  According to David E. Jones in Women Warriors: A History, the Amazons wore long trousers, midthigh-length coats, leather boots, and Phrygian hats. Sometimes they used war spears and bows. One group of Amazons called the Scythians wouldn’t let their girls be married until they’d killed three enemies in battle.

  More than a few barbarian armies in the long ago included women warriors and battle queens. If you look in the Bible, you will find the seeress and judge Deborah leading troops into battle. Jael and Judith, who slew enemy generals. Or in Arabic texts you can read about Queen Bat Zabbai, who hunted with the best of the men and, well-armored, led her armies against Egypt. Ancient texts are full of such tough-minded women.

  So too are the European histories: Graine or Grania O’Malley, the Irish pirate queen who lived in the Elizabethan era. Joan of Arc. Queen Maud, who led an army against her usurping cousin in Britain in the twelfth century. The Celtic Queen Boudica who led an uprising against the Roman overlords in 60–61 CE.

  There was even a fabulous hidden history from the fourteenth century, about noble English women who fought in their own tournaments alongside the knights. A chronicle from that time states, “When the tournaments were held, in every place a company of ladies appeared in the diverse and marvelous dress of a man, to number sometimes about forty, sometimes fifty ladies.” Though the chronicle quickly adds, rather bitterly, “And in such manner they spent and wasted their riches and injured their bodies with abuses and ludicrous wantoness.” It must be pointed out that the men were not equally shamed by the chronicles for doing the exact same thing!

  In China lived Asia’s most famous woman warrior, the fifth-century Hua Mu-Lan, who replaced her ill father in the emperor’s army.
Likewise, Madame Ching, the nineteenth-century pirate, commanded two thousand ships and seventy thousand sailors after her husband died.

  In the Beja tribe of Africa, there was a corps of women lancers, and in the 1840s, a battalion of spear women who protected the king of Behr. The African Yoruba people have a long tradition of female military heroes.

  Native American tribal histories are full of similar stories. There was a secret society of Cheyenne women warriors and the famed Crow warrior Woman Chief, who battled their traditional enemy, the Blackfoot tribe. Meanwhile, the Blackfoot people had their own Brown Weasel, later called Running Eagle, who learned hunting and warfare from her brother.

  I never knew their names or their stories when I was your age. Not in real life, not in folklore. But I do now. And so do you.

  This book is for you because I believe that the tongue is mightier than the sword. As is the pen.

  Most of the time.

  But this book is also for you because it’s important to know that anyone can be a hero if they have to be. To right wrongs. To help those in need. To fight for justice.

  Even girls.

  Especially girls.

  Especially you.

  GREECE

  Atalanta the Huntress

  Hail Artemis, goddess of the hunt, patron of young women warriors

  THERE WAS A KING named Iasus, a cruel, unfeeling man who took his newborn daughter into the Calydonian forest on the far borders of his kingdom. There he put her down on the forest floor saying, “I wished for a boy, and this is what I got. I will not have you.”

  Then he turned and left.

  The child lay under the canopy of leaves and after a while, growing hungry, she began to cry. It was the high wail of an infant who wants only one thing.

  A mother bear happened to pass by. Curious about that strange yet familiar cry, she came over and snuffled at the child—​great furry head against the smooth one. Unafraid, the child reached up and touched the bear’s nose. In return the bear began to lick her with a rough, tickly tongue.

  For a moment the child forgot her hunger and cooed with delight. And the bear, charmed by the cooing sound, lay down heavily by the baby’s side.

  The bear had just weaned her own cubs, but here was a cub of another sort. So without quite understanding the why of it, she offered her milk to the human cub.

  The baby drank, slept, woke, cooed, drank again.

  And lived.

  EVENTUALLY THE BEAR was ready to wean the human cub, but the human cub would not let her go, trotting through the woods after the bear with incredible speed.

  And so a year went by, and then a second. In the third year the bear went missing—​the child never knew why—​and a passing hunter heard the child weeping, picked her up, and brought her home to his childless wife.

  “We shall call this little girl Atalanta,” the hunter said. “And she will be a blessing to us in this, our old age.”

  “We will give honor to Artemis, goddess of the hunt,” added his wife, “who preserved her in the forest until you could find her.”

  And so they took Atalanta in and taught her woodcraft and house craft, hunting and cooking. She was as easy in the woods at thirteen as she had been at three: swift, eagle-eyed, and strong.

  NOW, WHEN ATALANTA was thirteen, her stepparents died. She went at once to Artemis’s shrine in the forest and knelt down. If she had no mother, Artemis would be her mother. If she had no father, Artemis would watch over her.

  “Tell me, goddess,” she whispered, “what I must do now.”

  “Disaster will follow the men you meet,” came the reply.

  “Then I shall stay away from the company of men,” said Atalanta.

  BUT IT WAS EASIER to say this than to do it, for the Calydonian forest was home to a great red-eyed boar. That monster had been set down by Artemis, who was angered that King Oeneus of Calydon had neglected to give her honor.

  The boar tore down the grapevines, ate the olives from the trees, trampled the green corn, and slaughtered sheep in their pens. Neither shepherd nor sheepdog nor farmer could stand against the beast. Soon the storehouses of Calydon stood empty and the country-people fled to the safety of the cities.

  “What shall we do?” cried the people of Calydon.

  “What shall I do?” cried the king.

  The king’s son, Meleager, the fairest prince in twenty kingdoms, who had sailed with the hero Jason on the Argo after the Golden Fleece, said, “I will hunt this boar, Father.” But though he tried, this mighty spear-thrower, he had no success. So he called his friends to come and help.

  The most famous heroes and the most famous hounds came to the chase. They stayed many days getting ready to hunt, spending their nights feasting and drinking red wine, their days boasting about past feats.

  ATALANTA CAME, TOO, for the boar had ruined all the paths she had loved in the forest and had torn up the trees under which she had played as a child. Yet, try as she might, she, too, had had no success in tracking the boar and killing it, which was strange since she knew every inch of the woods.

  “This is some game of the gods,” Atalanta said to herself. “I will ask the king of Calydon for help.”

  She marched to Oeneus’s palace and mounted the great marble steps that were worn down from the passage of many feet. Her golden hair was pulled tightly back in a knot, and her face looked now like a girl’s, now like a boy’s. Over her left shoulder she carried an ivory quiver. There was a mighty hunting bow of ash in her left hand.

  “I am Atalanta of the woods,” she announced. “I need help with a fierce red-eyed boar.”

  The heroes congregating on the steps ignored her. They continued with their boasting tales, their voices raw and deep from the late-night feasts, the red wine, the telling of tales.

  Atalanta said again, “I have come for help. Will no one go with me to hunt this boar?”

  “Who is this mere girl who would hunt with heroes?” cried Castor, and his twin, Polydeuces, echoed him, “She cannot be allowed on a hunt.”

  But, standing to one side, Prince Meleager had been considering the hunters, deciding who was fit. When he saw Atalanta, he remembered hearing stories of a young woman living alone in the forest, and thought, Happy the husband who wins this girl. He said, “Welcome to the chase, Atalanta, huntress daughter of Artemis.”

  SO, THE HUNT in the Calydonian forest began.

  Atalanta knew the forest better than all. Therefore it was she who led them to the latest tracks of the great boar. And there some of the heroes set out snares, and some sent off the hounds, but most took up the trail.

  At last they came to a great gorge where reeds and swamp grass and osier grew thick and wild. The hounds—​gray and black and tan—​began to bay at the brush, and the thicket boiled with their short, sharp attacks.

  Rushing forward, spears held before them, the heroes made a great half circle around the place. They called out to one another, lending courage with their voices.

  “Ho!” cried Castor.

  “Here,” Polydeuces answered.

  “Stand fast,” Meleager called.

  Only Atalanta was silent, intent on the bending willow, the smooth sedge, the tangled reeds.

  Suddenly the boar—​his rough knotted neck, bristles like sharp spikes, tusks as big as battle-axes—​charged forward from the thicket. His head slashed right, then left, then right again. A storm of blood rained down.

  When it was over, three men and three hounds lay dead on the ground, and a fourth—​great Nestor—​using his spear as a vaulting pole, leaped into the branches of a tree.

  Then the boar broke free and fled into another thicket, this one wilder and more impenetrable than the last.

  “He has gone to ground,” shouted Meleager. “We shall not get him now.”

  But no sooner had he spoken than the boar—​having got a next wind—​charged out again, scattering men, dogs, spears.

  Only Atalanta stood her ground, aimed her a
rrow, and let it go. It pierced the red-eyed boar behind the ear, and the great beast, foaming at the mouth, fell to its knees.

  At that the heroes rushed forward, each clamoring to deliver the deathblow. Still, the great boar was not done with them. It raised its head and, with its reddened tusks, caught the nearest man—​Ancaeus—​in the groin, killing him with a single slash. Then another hero tried and was slain. And another. The monster, in its own death throes, looked to slay them all.

  At last Meleager stepped up behind the boar and plunged his spear into the great humped back. The spearhead missed bone and hit heart, and finally the monster died. But four more heroes and six more hounds lay dead at its feet.

  “They died well,” said Castor. And his twin echoed, “Well indeed.”

  “No death is a good one that comes too early,” said Meleager. Then he cut off the boar’s tusks with his knife and skinned the beast. He offered these to Atalanta, saying, “Though they are by rights mine who dealt the deathblow, you deserve to share in the honor.”

  Atalanta took the prizes with a nod of her head.

  “Why give the girl what was bought with heroes’ blood?” asked Plexippus, Meleager’s uncle.

  “Yes,” his uncle Toxeus added, “you slew the boar with your spear. Keep the hide and tusks yourself, Meleager.”

  But the prince shook his head. “She is the one who stopped the boar with an arrow. I could not have speared it had she not brought it to its knees.”

  “A prize to a girl? You lovesick pup!” cried Plexippus.

  Toxeus, a man only a bit older than Meleager himself, grabbed up the hide and tusks from Atalanta and held them out.

  Furious to be so thwarted, Meleager cried, “You shall know the difference between threat and deed.” And before anyone could stop him, he took his sword and thrust it first into the side of Toxeus and then into the heart of Plexippus, killing them both.