Baku, or "dream eaters", are creatures found in Chinese and Japanese folklore. They vary in description from an elephant head with the body of a lion, or a lion head, the body of a horse, the tail of a cow, and legs of a tiger, or more like a tapir.
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Baku protect people from the bad dreams by eating their nightmares, sometimes unbidden, but sometimes the dreamer must call upon the baku to help them, either in the dream or when they wake up. "Baku, devour this dream!" Sometimes the baku is said to change the eaten dreams to good luck.
Sometimes they are portrayed as troublemakers, eating all the dreams, not just the nightmares.
I like this creature in particular, because I have inherited the tendency from my mother to have nightmares every night. I can't remember the last time I had a good dream (and neither can she. My Psychology teacher said it must be something in our brain wiring), and all the usual good dreams such as the flying dreams that people talk about are completely alien to me. I would say that people are trying to kill me in about 75% of my dreams, and in the rest I'm in a stressful situation (such as driving a car with no brakes, or I'm trapped or paralysed and about to die, or someone I care about is about to die). A baku would have a feast fit for a king in my head.
This creature is obviously suited to children - parents in China and Japan would tell their children about the baku to reassure them at night. Therefore, I want to do a chldren's book. I also noticed in the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford that China in particular made simple plushies with painted on features - I could make a plushie to go with the book.
Since I'm not great at writing, I enlisted the help of my best friend and she wrote a poem for me as a story. I absolutely love it. I'm now hoping I can get all this done in time for the London Book Fair, as I would love to show it off there.
This creature is obviously suited to children - parents in China and Japan would tell their children about the baku to reassure them at night. Therefore, I want to do a chldren's book. I also noticed in the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford that China in particular made simple plushies with painted on features - I could make a plushie to go with the book.
Since I'm not great at writing, I enlisted the help of my best friend and she wrote a poem for me as a story. I absolutely love it. I'm now hoping I can get all this done in time for the London Book Fair, as I would love to show it off there.
