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By the renowned author of Sand Talk and Right Story, Wrong Story, and First Nations researcher Megan Kelleher, comes this fascinating investigation into the symbol of the serpent.
Tyson Yunkaporta's bestselling Sand Talk and Right Story, Wrong Story cast an Indigenous lens on contemporary society. Snake Talk is the third book in this trilogy. Co-authored with Megan Kelleher, Snake Talk explores Indigenous thinking through the symbol of serpent, a common foundational narrative. Snake myths echo from a time before truth, and retain the capacity, at this inflection point in history where truth is daily manipulated by bad actors, to unify, humble and inspire us. The serpent in Australian Aboriginal stories is both a creator and destroyer, dwelling in the liminal spaces between physical and spiritual worlds, story and history. What if this ancient lore extended around the globe? What if the creation stories of the Basilisk, Wyvern, Naga, Quetzalcoatl and many others carried secrets that might help resolve global issues of existential crisis?
In this exhilarating book, the authors speak to elders from Kathmandu to Aotearoa to South America and Europe about a pluriverse of serpent stories, seeking answers to the age-old riddle of how to align the genius of our species with the regenerative patterns of creation. They speak to the makers-the artists and craftspeople who keep the sacred lore of these serpent entities in the ritual images and objects they create. They explore everything from artificial intelligence to immigration through the lens of global serpent lore-through the eye of the snake.
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Signed copies are available online and in our shops, while stock lasts.
By the renowned author of Sand Talk and Right Story, Wrong Story, and First Nations researcher Megan Kelleher, comes this fascinating investigation into the symbol of the serpent.
Tyson Yunkaporta's bestselling Sand Talk and Right Story, Wrong Story cast an Indigenous lens on contemporary society. Snake Talk is the third book in this trilogy. Co-authored with Megan Kelleher, Snake Talk explores Indigenous thinking through the symbol of serpent, a common foundational narrative. Snake myths echo from a time before truth, and retain the capacity, at this inflection point in history where truth is daily manipulated by bad actors, to unify, humble and inspire us. The serpent in Australian Aboriginal stories is both a creator and destroyer, dwelling in the liminal spaces between physical and spiritual worlds, story and history. What if this ancient lore extended around the globe? What if the creation stories of the Basilisk, Wyvern, Naga, Quetzalcoatl and many others carried secrets that might help resolve global issues of existential crisis?
In this exhilarating book, the authors speak to elders from Kathmandu to Aotearoa to South America and Europe about a pluriverse of serpent stories, seeking answers to the age-old riddle of how to align the genius of our species with the regenerative patterns of creation. They speak to the makers-the artists and craftspeople who keep the sacred lore of these serpent entities in the ritual images and objects they create. They explore everything from artificial intelligence to immigration through the lens of global serpent lore-through the eye of the snake.
Over the course of his first two books, Sand Talk and Right Story, Wrong Story, Tyson Yunkaporta has carved out a highly distinct intellectual niche.
A member of the Apalech clan from Far North Queensland and founder of the Indigenous Knowledges Systems Lab at Deakin, Yunkaporta applies Indigenous wisdom to contemporary problems with brilliant insight. In this new book, Snake Talk, Yunkaporta has co-authored the text with his wife, Megan Kelleher, a Barada and Gabalbara woman with a background researching blockchain technology and Indigenous knowledge.
The book explores the snakes, serpents and dragons that feature prominently in so many of the world’s myths, from Nepal, Central America, Ireland, India and China. Kelleher and Yunkaporta approach these stories by meeting, breaking bread and engaging in solemn ritual with representatives of each culture, bringing them into dialogue with Indigenous Lore. The tone is inclusive and invitational, too – oral culture transmuted into written form.
I would be remiss if I failed to mention the book’s humour. Snake Talk opens with a cheeky anecdote about the confusion of European naturalists encountering the echidna, a mammal with two vaginas. This follows on from Right Story, Wrong Story, which opens with a fact about the male echidna’s four-headed penis. I am personally eager to know whether all their future books will include echidna genitalia as a recurring literary motif.
Rich and layered, Snake Talk is partly a response to the crises of rising authoritarianism and environmental collapse we currently face. It calls for rebalancing our relationships with the Earth and each other through shared narrative, ‘gathering a world of stories around one fire’. At a time when our world feels fragile, we sorely need the kind of fresh thinking found in this expansive and visionary book.
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