Old Mischief, New Crossroads · Old Game, New Crossroads
Good Omens · Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett · Roman 1990 · Amazon-Serie 2019
In Good Omens there is an angel and a demon who have been friends for 6000 years — and both have long understood that they are on the wrong side. Aziraphale enjoys too much. Crowley loves too much. Neither Heaven nor Hell knows what to do with them. So they pretend — and in doing so live more fully than anyone else.
That caught me immediately: that is the Trickster. Not evil, not good. In between, with style, with a slight superiority toward those who believe they know the game.
The Seven
my favourite Trickster deities
Each one embodies something that appears across the cultures of the world — and has never politely adapted.
China · 16th century · Journey to the West
The Monkey King steals the gods' wine and makes himself immortal. Not out of malice. Out of pure joy that the border between himself and the impossible never interested him. What moves me about him: he takes what he needs, without permission, without apology — and remains completely innocent in doing so.
Norse mythology · Iceland · written down ca. 13th century, lived much older
The god everyone needs and no one wants to invite. Without him the story doesn't move forward. With him no one knows where it leads. What moves me about him: he is the only one who always tells the truth — only in a form no one recognises in time.
Greece · at least 8th century BCE · probably older
Moves between worlds like others move between floors. Delivers messages, steals cattle, invents the lyre — all on the same morning. What moves me about him: he never has a leading role and yet is always present where it matters.
North America · Indigenous oral traditions · timeless, undatable, nicht datierbar
Was there at the creation of the world, failed at it, and kept going. What moves me about him: he has no dignity to lose — and that is the most radical form of freedom.
India · Mahabharata · ca. 4th century BCE · millennia older in oral circulation
Plays the flute while everything around him is being decided. What moves me about him: he knows the game must be played, but he stays in the enjoyment. The seriousness belongs to the others.
West Africa · Yoruba tradition · carried into Brazil through Candomblé & Umbanda · falsely demonised by colonial Christianity
Orisha of the crossroads — no message passes without his permission. And he changes gender. Just like that. What moves me about him: he makes identity an open question — not as a crisis, but as a natural mobility. He is not one. He is whatever the moment requires. That is not confusion. That is precision.
Brazil · Indigenous and Afro-Brazilian roots · literary form 19th century · alive to this day
One-legged boy with a red cap, whirls through the forest as a whirlwind, steals, hides things, confuses travellers. All while pretending to be the weaker one. What moves me about him: he understood that limitation is the best camouflage. While the other gods show their power, he shows his gap — and is sharper than all of them.
What remains · What comes next
None of them is a criminal. None of them wants to heal, improve, or dominate the world. That is actually the greatest relief. They all live in what I call the in-between: at the seams of the world, not outside it. There, where different orders collide and for a moment no one knows what applies.
That laughter has a half-life of several millennia — which suggests we need modern versions. Not replicas. Not costumes. Figures who know the in-between of today: the algorithm crossroads, the genders that move, the limitation that becomes a weapon, the failure who keeps going, the necessary one who never gets invited.
That is where they stand. And laugh. My Dada is ready, shifting from foot to foot.
Trick & Care · Patricia von Papstein