The porcupine hunter and other stories

by Henry W. Tate

In the course of his research for A Guide to B.C. Indian Myth and Legend, Ralph Maud consulted manuscripts at Columbia University Library of the stories that Henry W. Tate, a Tsimshian, sent to Franz Boas during the decade 1903-13. Maud was struck by the fact that Tate first wrote the stories in English before providing a Tsimshian equivalent for Boas, and that the style of storytelling was much more vibrant and compelling in these original English texts than in the versions Boas "cleaned up" and published in Tsimshian Mythology (1916). Boas' monumental compilation of heavily revised texts has long been a much-consulted "classic" of ethnology. Through Maud's selection of the best of Tate's original stories, we can hear the animated writer behind Boas' revised texts - texts now presented in the authentic voice of Tate's original tellings. Each of the stories, and the extensive Raven Cycle, are provided with introductions and notes by the editor.