A Kayak Full of Ghosts

Eskimo Folk Tales

By Lawrence Millman • Illustrated by Timothy White

About this book

The first comprehensive collection of Eskimo folktales in over sixty years, these stories reveal a tradition close in spirit to modern fiction.

Not for queasy readers, A Kayak Full of Ghosts deals with strange and even gruesome events in the barren Arctic where, in the minds of the storytellers, all manner of behavior is imaginable. Mythic and beautiful, violent and scatological, these tales come from an oral tradition that bars few holds. Here you will meet a memorable gallery of characters: children who eat their parents; hunters who kill their prey by breaking wind; men who marry rocks; women who marry their sons' wives; old people who wed insects; women with iron tails; children who grow antlers; a shaman who turns himself into any animal he wants; and animals who obtain their body parts by stealing from the human dead. Taken together, these stories portray a rich culture in a remote land, where eerie flowers bloom in the floes of the human mind. (Note: This book contains material and themes that are not appropriate for children).