page_title: Trickster
section_title: Mythology
hierarchical_section_title: Trickster / Mythology
caption_attribution_description: English: An illustration by Willy Pogany from the chapter "How Loki wrought mischief on Asgard" in Children of Odin (no title otherwise given for the work). Loki cuts the hair of the goddess Sif. From Colum, Padraic, The Children of Odin. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1920. Found at http://www.mainlesson.com/display.php?author=colum&amp;book=odin&amp;story=_contents.
context_page_description: In mythology and the study of folklore and religion, a trickster is a character in a story which exhibits a great degree of intellect or secret knowledge and uses it to play tricks or otherwise disobey normal rules and defy conventional behavior. In the real world they may be real people who inhabit or take on this role either deliberately or with no conscious intent.
context_section_description: Tricksters, as archetypal characters, appear in the myths of many different cultures. Lewis Hyde describes the trickster as a "boundary-crosser". The trickster crosses and often breaks both physical and societal rules: Tricksters "violate principles of social and natural order, playfully disrupting normal life and then re-establishing it on a new basis."
  Often, this bending/breaking of rules, takes the form of tricks or thievery. Tricksters can be cunning or foolish or both. The trickster openly questions, disrupts or mocks authority. They are often male characters, and are fond of breaking rules, boasting, and playing tricks on both humans and gods.
  Many cultures have tales of the trickster, a crafty being who uses cunning to get food, steal precious possessions, or simply cause mischief. In some Greek myths Hermes plays the trickster. He is the patron of thieves and the inventor of lying, a gift he passed on to Autolycus, who in turn passed it on to Odysseus.  In Slavic folktales, the trickster and the culture hero are often combined.
  Frequently the trickster figure exhibits gender and form variability. In Norse mythology the mischief-maker is Loki, who is also a shape shifter. Loki also exhibits gender variability, in one case even becoming pregnant. He becomes a mare who later gives birth to Odin's eight-legged horse Sleipnir.
  In a wide variety of African language communities, the rabbit, or hare, is the trickster. In West Africa (and thence into the Caribbean via the slave trade), the spider (Anansi) is often the trickster.
caption: Loki cuts the hair of the goddess Sif.
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