SARGASSO


Tigre, who symbolizes the bgk6 colonialist, are always
fooled by a third, slightly disreputable character,
Lapin, who represents the cunning of the people.
In these stories individual solutions replace collective
ones, subtlety and shrewdness triumph over brute force,
and Lapin always comes out on top. Although the tales
most often end in tragedy--they are, one must not
forget, stories of a hungry and deprived people--one
character manages to outtalk all the others. He may be
small and childlike, but he nevertheless tricks those
supposedly stronger and wiser and he continually shakes
up the social and "natural" order of things through his
various sayings and doings. In the end only Lapin is
left, Lapin "le madr6, le ruse, le roublard. .le lacheur.
Abatardissement de la race" (C4saire and Menil 1978: 10).
While we may or may not agree with Aim6 Cesaire and Ren6
Menil that this slippery-tongued, fast-talking rabbit
is a degeneration of the race, there is no question about
his verbal skills. Compare Lapin, we have to admit,
certainly does have a way with words.

 The Creole tale, moreover, always begins with a
ritual formula:

 Bo-bonne fois. .
 Toua fois bel conte!

which sets the scene for the "d4tournement de toutes les
v6rites" to come. Things always come around full circle
in Creole stories, as I have said, and the practice of
magic--magic words, especially--plays a key role in this
reversal. There are numerous examples of characters who
hide in the bushes or in the bamboo in order to hear a
secret song or chant which will permit them to
outmaneuver their opponents. Thus in one story Coulibri
defeats both Chouval and Bef because his servant,
Crapaid, beats the drum and sings in a kind of language
whose power comes not from the words themselves but
from African magical formulas. The original African
couplets lost their meaning long ago and have been
further distorted by the insertion of French words, with
the result that neither the storyteller nor the audience
understands anything at all of them: