Tricksters. Kantchil's Lime Pit

Yesterday I introduced the tiny mouse-deer trickster who is the focus for this week, and today I get to feature a book of stories by one of my favorite folklorists, Harold Courlander. As you can see, the mouse-deer Kantchil features in the title of this story collection: Kantchil's Lime Pit and Other Stories From Indonesia.

The illustrations are by Robert Kane; here you can see Kantchil with his enemies, the crocodiles:

There are several Kantchil stories in the book and, as always at the Internet Archive, you can use the handy book-search feature to find all references to Kantchil in the text:

As Courlander explains in the notes in the back of the book, he collected these stories from storytellers in Sumatra, Java, Celebes, and Lombok. The notes also provide information about other Kantchil stories which are not included in the book. If you are familiar with Courlander's other folktale books, you know he does a great job with those notes in the back. There is also a glossary and pronunciation guide in the back as well.

I'll be back with more mouse-deer stories tomorrow and, of course, if you want to read of Courlander,  you will find MANY of his books at the Archive: books by Harold Courlander at the Internet Archive. For example, Robert Kane did the illustrations also for this book of stories from Ethiopia and Eritrea that Courlander wrote together with Wolf Leslau: The Fire on the Mountain, and Other Stories from Ethiopia and Eritrea.

Just IMO, you can never go wrong with a book by Harold Courlander. Enjoy!

Kantchil's Lime Pit
and Other Stories From Indonesia
by Harold Courlander