The Magic of Spider Woman

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Overview

Award-winning author Lois Duncan and Navajo artist Shonto Begay collaborate in this enchanting Navajo teaching tale. Through the magic of Spider Woman, a young girl learns one of the most vital lessons of Navajo culture--the importance of leading a balanced life. Full color.

Retells the Navajo tale of how a stubborn girl learns from the Spider Woman how to keep life in balance by respecting its boundaries.

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More About This Book

Overview

Award-winning author Lois Duncan and Navajo artist Shonto Begay collaborate in this enchanting Navajo teaching tale. Through the magic of Spider Woman, a young girl learns one of the most vital lessons of Navajo culture--the importance of leading a balanced life. Full color.

Retells the Navajo tale of how a stubborn girl learns from the Spider Woman how to keep life in balance by respecting its boundaries.

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Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly
Duncan blends several versions of a Navajo myth for this relatively abstract moral tale. When the Fourth World is created, the girl who will be Weaving Woman misses the lessons in leading a balanced life the rest of the People receive. Spider Woman later teaches her how to weave, and warns her not to spend too much time at it. But she becomes obsessed with weaving a beautiful blanket-and her spirit gets trapped in it. Spider Woman herself has to pull a strand of wool loose to free her. To this day, Navajo weavers leave a "spirit pathway" in their blankets, "so the spirit of the weaver will not be imprisoned by its beauty." As in Begay's Ma'ii and Cousin Horned Toad, the graceful figures of the characters appear on dappled backgrounds, brightly colored against pastoral Western landscapes during happy times, darker and often spooky as Weaving Woman traps herself. Duncan's tale carries a thoughtful message, grounded in well-chosen details and adeptly relayed through her personable storytelling. Ages 6-9. (Mar.)
Children's Literature - Marilyn Courtot
There is a lot in this story that relates to contemporary life. Wandering Girl is taught to weave by Spider Woman and takes on a new name, Weaving Woman. She spends the winter at her loom, and when spring comes decides that she will make the most beautiful blanket in the world. She becomes obsessed by her work, and she no longer follows the Navajo teachings of balance. Weaving Woman's husband learns to his horror that her spirit has become a part of the blanket, and it is only with the intervention of a shaman and Spider Woman that can she be rescued. To this day, Navajo women pull a thread so that the blanket is not perfect and the weaver's spirit can never be trapped. The noted Navajo artist, Begay, provides a visual reinforcement of the story and expands it through his magical paintings.
School Library Journal
Gr 3-6-Much more than a pourquoi tale, this story also concerns the rejection of obsession, even in the service of beauty, and recalls the Greek myth of Arachne. When Wandering Girl learns from Spider Woman how to make blankets from her sheep's wool, she is renamed Weaving Woman. She marries and spends a winter at her loom. In the spring, she discovers how to make dyes and is inspired to "create the most beautiful blanket in all of the world." As this goal consumes her, she forgets the Navajo Middle Way; her life loses its balance and her spirit becomes trapped in the blanket. Through a shaman's intervention, Spider Woman returns to pull a loose strand from the border, spoiling its perfection and freeing the weaver's spirit. Since then, the text adds, "every Navajo blanket has been woven with a pathway, so the spirit of the weaver will not be imprisoned by its beauty." The details Duncan adds from the Dineh creation story, as well as the happy ending, make it distinctively Navajo, as do Begay's light-spangled paintings. Significantly, in almost every one, the perfect rectangle of the illustration is broken by an element of the design extending beyond it: a visual reminder of the story's moral. The impact of the heroine's decision to use dyes is somewhat lessened by the brightly patterned clothing she wears throughout. Nevertheless, Begay's dramatic shifts of perspective, his innate sensitivity to the land and people depicted, and the text's powerful message about pride's deadly effects combine in an appealing and meaningful way.Patricia (Dooley) Lothrop Green, St. George's School, Newport, RI
Kirkus Reviews
A picture-book version of a Navajo legend. The art of weaving is passed from the great spirit Spider Woman to Wandering Girl, renamed Weaving Woman, when she is in danger of freezing. There are conditions: Weaving Woman must lead a balanced life and never do anything in excess. When Weaving Woman sets out to make the most beautiful blanket in the world, she finds her spirit bound in the threads of her creation, all but dead to her loving husband. Spider Woman releases her, and that's why every such blanket has an escape route—a "flaw"—to allow the weaver's spirit to remain free.

After a start too dense with background, irregularities further spoil this tale: Spirit Being, who fills "the earth, the sky, and the mountaintops," teaches all the people his ways, but somehow skips Wandering Girl; enthusiasm and artistic passion somehow become pridefulness; there may be a connection between perfection and entrapment, but children are unlikely to comprehend it. Begay's vibrant paintings are replete with the dreaminess that cradles the story, far outstripping it in their beauty.

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Product Details

  • ISBN-13: 9780590461566
  • Publisher: Scholastic, Inc.
  • Publication date: 9/28/2000
  • Edition description: Reprint
  • Pages: 32
  • Age range: 4 - 8 Years
  • Lexile: 800L (what's this?)
  • Product dimensions: 8.10 (w) x 10.80 (h) x 0.20 (d)

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Sort by: Showing 1 Customer Review

  • Anonymous

    Posted October 4, 2002

    Spider Women

    it is a pretty good darn book!

    Was this review helpful? Yes  NoThank you for your feedback.   Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.
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