● Introduction: the Literature of Survival
● Native Canadian Mythology
● Early Colonial Literature
● The Literature of Nation-Building
● Canada in the Ascendant
● Canadian Literature in the Modern World

Native Canadian Mythology

Part of the problem of discussing native Canadian literature is that the diverse cultures of pre-European Canada were not literate: theirs were oral cultures, and only got written down after contact with European settlers. Also the current US/Canadian border pays no attention to native peoples' territories, so that such tales may be the common inheritance of peoples who today live in separate countries. Nevertheless, many collections of native stories have been made, some scholarly, some for general readership, some for children, and so native myths and legends are a well-known part of modern Canadian literature.

There are many, many such tales: some of which follow a common human pattern of explaining the first creation of the world and people, such as the west-coast story of how Raven found the first humans living in a clam-shell, and set them free; or else they explain how particular aspects of the world came to be: "how the buffalo got this hump" is an example of one such fable. A common feature of different native mythologies is the occurrence of a "trickster" figure: godlike in his powers, humanlike in his imperfections. Amongst eastern peoples this figure was seen as a coyote—a kind of wild dog. In the west it was given the identity of a raven. The cunning trickster perhaps represents the way in which life both gives and takes away: supplies the berries on the trees and the rain which destroys them before they can be eaten. The trickster often helps human beings but sometimes only to play a joke on them—or on the gods. The point is that nevertheless the tribe goes on, survives, perhaps through the efforts of a special hero figure, despite their lack of control over their lives.

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