Week 7 Storytelling : The Tanuki and the Fox

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The Tanuki and the Fox

Once upon a time there lived a Tanuki with his wife the fox.  They were called Tanuki and Fox, named after their primary forms.  Every morning they would go out into the wilderness and gather berries, nuts, and insects.  Sometimes they would get lucky a bring home a rodent they had killed.  Each evening they would return to their happy home and share the food with their son. 

Tanuki and Fox lived like this for many years, working hard all day to gather food, and returning to their son in the evening.  One year, there was a terrible drought.  Berries and nuts were very scarce that year. Any rodents they did catch were all scrawny, hardly any real meat on them to eat.  The rodents were suffering from the same food shortage that Tanuki and Fox were suffering from.

One day Tanuki had an idea.  There was a human village not to far from the couple's home.  The village was full of hunters who prized Tanuki and Fox furs above all others.  Tanuki told him wife that she should shape-shift into a human, and sell him in the market.  He would play dead and be sure not to move.  Tanuki would escape sometime after he was sold while Fox used the money to buy some food. 

The next day, Tanuki practiced his control, he let himself be moved around while staying perfectly limp. He slowed his breathing and relaxed all of his muscles.  He then let himself be slung over the shoulder of Fox, in her human form. 

When fox walked into the village, all kinds of eyes turned toward her, or rather towards her shoulder.  Tanukis were fairly rare and all the more prized because of it.  She went into the middle of town square and asked people what they were willing to pay.  Many people wanted a tanuki fur, so there were many offers and many bids.  The prices grew higher and higher until finally Fox sold Tanuki to a rich merchant.  She then proceeded to buy some food with the coin. 

Meanwhile, the rich merchant carried Tanuki to his home.  The merchant was quite excited with his buy, and he wanted to skin the animal right away.  He set Tanuki down on his workbench and went to fetch his tools.  Tanuki had expected to have some time alone where he could try to find an escape route.  He was dreadfully scarred. The merchant was gone less than a minute before he returned with his tools.  He reached out, planning to grab Tanuki by the tale but Tanuki leaped away. The merchant grew angry and chased after Tanuki, but the animal was too fast for him. Tanuki ran along the workbench jumped towards the window.  His clawn caught the window sill and the scurried free.

Tanuki met up with his wife that evening and told her what had happened.  Fox was horrified to hear what almost became of her husband.  They both agreed never to do such a thing again. Their lives were worth too much.  The food and money lasted the family until the next rain.  Once the rain started to fall again, food became more plentiful. Gathering food in the wilderness is much more work than buying food from a village, but the couple was happy to work rather than face the alternative.

Authors Note
This story is based off of a story called 'How the Wicked Tanuki was Punished.' In the original story the fox first sells the tanuki and the tanuki then sells the fox.  When it is the tanuki's turn to sell the fox, he tells the merchant that the fox is alive and so the merchant kills the fox right away.  His son then managed to get revenge on the tanuki by leading him to his death.  I did not like the ending to that story, so I wrote my own.  The beginning of the story is very similar, but in my version everybody survives. 

Bibliography 
How the Wicked Tanuki was Punished, from the The Crimson Fairy Book by Andrew Lang and illustrated by H. J. Ford (1903)