Although a product of one of the harshest climates on the planet, Inuit culture is playful. Howard Norman’s anthology of folktales captures the richness of Inuit imagination and humour. Five of these stories were collected by Norman himself from Inuit storytellers based in Churchill, Manitoba. In recognition of the fact that Inuit culture is circumpolar, five additional tales come from Labrador, Greenland, and Siberia. Norman explains that most of these stories evolved from multiple versions collected from individual storytellers over time, information often lacking in this sort of book.

The result is simply wonderful. The stories reflect a way of life in which hunger waits just beyond the day’s hunt, and hunter and prey live in complex patterns of mutual respect. “Noah and the Woolly Mammoths” offers Inuit commentary on the behaviour of white people, who may seem greedy and selfish in light of Inuit communal responsibility. As a hunter, the teller relished the thought of living on a boat full of animals. The mammoths disappear, we are told, when Noah’s incompetence as a hunter insults them. Shamans abound. In “Why the Rude Visitor Was Flung by Walrus,” “The Wolverine’s Secret,” and the title story, as in Inuit culture, most shamans are marginal, unstable, and dangerous. Many of these stories are humorous, but “The Man Who Married a Seagull” is laugh-out-loud funny. When the uncles of the transformed woman visit in human form, they behave like gulls, fighting over scraps of food, preferring entrails to meat, and spattering food everywhere until their niece is “uncle-exhausted.”

Illustrations by Leo and Diane Dillon add richly imaginative depth to the texts. The colour illustrations often portray secret transformations, while the black and white illustrations can be read across the pages almost as clearly as the texts. This book is outstanding.