The Trickster Figure in American Literature is a groundbreaking book that demonstrates the importance of diverse ethnic folklore in the literature of the United States. Focussing on trickster figures which represent particular American ethnic groups (African Americans, American Indians, European Americans, Asian Americans, and Latino Americans), the book reflects the richness and complexity of the folklore of the United States. More importantly, the book reveals the enduring influence of trickster strategies of resistance in American literature.

Morgan situates her book in relation to pioneering scholarship on tricksters in American literature. Such works, which include Elizabeth Ammons and Annette White-Parks's Tricksterism in Turn-of-the-Century American Literature: A Multicultural Perspective (1994), William J. Hynes and William G. Doty's Mythical Trickster Figures: Contours, Contexts, and Criticisms (1997), and Jeanne Campbell Reesman's Trickster Lives: Culture and Myth in American Fiction (2001), have expanded tremendously the study of the literature of the United States. In addition to Jeanne Rosier Smith's Writing Tricksters: Mythic Gambols in American Ethnic Literature (1997), Lewis Hyde's Trickster Makes This World: Mischief, Myth, and Art (1998), and Deanna Reder and Linda M. Morra's Troubling Tricksters: Revisioning Critical Conversations (2010), the above works have explored the significance of trickster discourse in both mainstream and multicultural American literature. But what makes Morgan's book different from all these books is its use of the scholarship on African and African American folklore as the primary lenses through which she theorizes the enduring legacy of tricksters in American literature.

Thus two foundational works on which Morgan builds her paradigms are Robert D. Pelton's The Trickster in West Africa: A Study of Mythic Irony and Sacred Delight (1980) and John W. Roberts's From Trickster to Badman: The Black Folk Hero in Slavery and Freedom (1989). Pelton draws on Ashanti tales, in which he finds the trickster's numerous qualities, such as his “tendency to fall prey to contradictoriness, his arbitrary manipulation of what is physically possible and socially acceptable, and finally his power and his rootedness in the present human world” (Morgan 17). For his part, Roberts delves into African American “John and Massa” tales to explore “the complex relationship of African American [slave] drivers and their masters.” Evident in such tales are the trickster's “human wit and wile” and his subtle use of humor to overcome the planter's guile (20).

Having provided an excellent literature review, Morgan then explores the influence of African tricksters on African American literature. She examines the role of tricksters such as the African Rabbit, the Ashanti Ananse, Br'er Rabbit, and the Tar Baby, whose skills of manipulation and chicanery allow them to overcome challenges. These tricksters’ influence in the United States is also apparent in numerous works of African American literature, such as Ishmael Reed's Flight to Canada (1976), Toni Morrison's Tar Baby (1981), Alice Walker's The Color Purple (1982), and Yusef Komunyakaa's poetry of the 1980s and 1990s. In such works, one finds the tricksters’ various strategies of resistance, including the subtle use of animal characters’ wit and resilience in order to combat ingrained ideologies of race, class, and gender.

One also finds a group of tricksters in American Indian literature. Here, Morgan argues, one discovers the influence of traditional Indian tricksters such as Coyote, Raven, Blue Jay, Raccoon, Dragonfly, South Wind, Kamukants, Ikomi, and many others (48). Here, too, one learns about the tricksters’ playfulness about love and sex and ideas of loss and memory as they appear in American Indian writings, such as Leslie Marmon Silko's Ceremony (1977), Louise Erdrich's The Bingo Place (1994), and Sherman Alexie's The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007). The American Indian tricksters who influence these writings embody the importance of overcoming “self-hatred and guilt” and the will to “thrive for balance” (72).

European American tricksters also feature in the panoply of folk icons that Morgan examines in her book. Among these tricksters, one finds Fox, Jack, Brother Jonathan, and Huckleberry Finn, who exhibit ambivalence and resolve against adversity. As Morgan argues, European American tricksters are both “admired and feared” and can “transform their worlds whether those around them want them to or not” (76). In their capacity to act without reprisal, the European American tricksters resemble their Latino counterparts, such as Pedro Urdemales and Juan Bobo, who permeate fantastic literature of Spanish background in which the pranksters’ status as border-dwellers, their fearlessness, and their hope for a better life call attention to key issues in the history of the United States. Similar resilience and social meaning are noticeable in the Chinese trickster figures of the Monkey King and Pa-chieh, whose influence in multicultural literature is felt in Chinese American writings such as Louis Chu's Eat a Bowl of Tea (1961), Chuang Hua's Crossings (1968), and David Henry Hwang's M. Butterfly (1989). Tricksters allow Chinese American authors to explore complex issues such as gender roles, power relations, orientalism and “the futility of war and racism in the human community” (128).

By exploring the influence of a panoply of trickster figures in American multicultural writings, Winifred Morgan makes a strong contribution to scholarship on the rich folklore and literature of the United States. Her book opens up new and multiple avenues for scholars who are eager to interpret American literature beyond the narrow confines in which it was traditionally studied. Without a doubt, The Trickster Figure in American Literature is a must-read book.