Folktale Week
I entered Folktale Week in 2020 as I love storytelling with my illustrations. We were given 7 prompt words throughout the week to illustrate based on a folk tale.
I found a folk tale which really inspired me. It’s a North American folk story where peacocks and ravens were once friends. The playful birds decided one day to paint each other’s feathers. The raven did a splendid job and created the vibrantly coloured peacock we see today. But, the peacock was jealous and didn’t want to share his magnificence with anyone, so he painted the raven black.
I’ve created my own version of this folktale and it all begins with the first prompt
1.“Birth” – On a very windy morning a nest containing a baby raven is blown out of it’s tree. The scared and hungry raven lands safely on the forest floor when a baby peacock discovers him. The peacocks adopt the raven and raise him. The peacock and the raven become the best of friends.⠀
2. “Harvest” – The raven and the peacock are gathering colourful feathers and bright trinkets to decorate each other.⠀
3. “Ritual” – The peacock and the raven use the feathers, trinkets and beads they collected to decorate each other. Not forgetting the glitter – these birds love their glitter.⠀
4. “Dance” – After the raven and the peacock decorate each other with colourful feathers, beads, glitter and bright trinkets they are overcome with joy and begin dancing under the stars in the moonlight.⠀
5. “Solstice” is based on ravens being “bringers of light”. I’ve embellished and made this up. On Winter Solstice the raven steals the moon and sprinkles moon dust over the forest.⠀
6.“Courtship” – The plot thickens….. Unbeknown to the peacock, the raven has been visiting and courting a beautiful young girl. The raven is besotted with her and brings her trinkets and jewellery to win her love. He especially wants to impress her with his new colourful feathers, glitter crown and beads.
7. “Death” – The peacock is so proud of his new colourful attire that he becomes jealous of the raven he, himself decorated. He follows the raven only to discover him visiting the beautiful girl in the forest. When the raven and peacock meet up at midnight the peacock becomes so enraged he paints the raven black, banishing him from the forest, resulting in the death of their friendship.⠀
