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Analysis Of A Coyote Columbus Story By Thomas King

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Chernick 1 Elizabeth Chernick Professor Moore English 100 29 October 2014 Humor in “A Coyote Columbus Story” The main character, Coyote, in “A Coyote Columbus Story” by Thomas King, rules her world until a funny-looking stranger named Christopher Columbus changes her plans. The author, Thomas King, shows a contrasting story of Christopher Columbus’s voyages as depicted in history books. In doing so, he introduces humor as a major aspect of his story. After reading a “Coyote Columbus Story”, one might think that it is a very political. This is because it is about more than just a silly coyote; it is about understanding our history from another point of view. King’s approach to discussing this topic is effective because he is not serious about …show more content…

Columbus is not depicted as a heroic explorer, like he was thought to be, but more like an arrogant man. The humor comes with how Columbus is presented in this story. He is described as being “a man in silly clothes” (295) which leads to the assumption that Thomas King is trying to make fun of this historical hero. From the First Nations point of view, this weird European is nothing they had ever seen and therefore is bizarre to them. Columbus is unimpressed with the land that he has “discovered” and it more interested in the people he can bring back to Spain and sell. This humor is aimed at the historical figure, Christopher Columbus, and basically saying that he didn’t find the Indians and America – they were never …show more content…

The child-like persona of the Coyote makes her a comical relief and souse of humor within the story. She behaves like a child in the fact that she has a short attention span and often does not listen to others. When Coyote is playing baseball with the Indians, they claim that she is cheating because she is always changing the rules. “You are mistaken. And then she changes the rules again” (294). Coyote acknowledges the Indians comments but quickly disregards’ them by changing the rules again. This is humorous because of the way Coyote addressed this problem and then makes it worse. The way this character approaches situations is childlike and therefore

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