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If one likes Sci-fi/Fantasy/Horor one usually is at least moderately interested in fairly tales and folklore. I am and so it's hard to notice the multitude of shape changers who appear in these stories. 
Fish changing into Giants, tanukies (Japanese raccoons) into teapots, sparrows into women, cranes into girls and that's just the start of the list. One story struck me in particular, the one of the crane
girl. 

To summarize it up: a poor old farmer one day finds a crane in a hunter's trap and frees it. The next evening a girl appears at his doorstep and they invite her in. Finding that she seems to have no
place to go the old couple ask her to stay, although they have barely enough to eat for themselves. The girl turns out to be a skillful weaver. Every night she weaves, but begs her hosts never to
disturb her, which they promise. 

As time goes by she becomes thinner and thinner however, and the couple worries about her health. So one night the old man silently gets up in the middle of the
night and discovers that she changes into a crane using her own feathers to improve the quality of the cloth. Being caught, she confesses that she is indeed the crane the old man had saved and that she
came to live with them to show her gratitude, but announces that unfortunately she would be forced to leave them now. In spite of the dismay of the old man and this wife she flies away into the night.

This pattern is a familiar one, similar to the one we find in European stories. Usually the shape changer is beneficial to his hosts, but retains a secret desire to change back at least temporally. Once
he is discovered he flees and  gaining him back is either fraught with numerous difficulties or altogether impossible. 

I have asked friends what they make out of the story. One replied that in his opinion the story wants to teach us that changes would need time, another that the changes might in some cases signal
sexual or female oppression. Personally I see a parallels to gay or transgender issues here. 
Passing for straight, male, female while being of different nature is a state that takes its toll. Stories like those of the seal women who usually flee to her native habitat once they regain their skins
might also teach us something about the futility to suppress major aspects of one's identity. Besides it shows that such "coming out and run" decisions will cause grief, usually to all parts involved. 

How could the situation be improved? If the seal woman would not have to fear an annewed loss of her skin would she stay? Why was the crane, who obviously was loved, forced to flee, why
couldn't she stay? 
Did she feel unsafe because the promise of not invading her privacy was broken? Probably, but to reduce these tales to fables of trust and confidence might not cover everything. 

Besides the fear of
"outing" which many lesbians, gay or transgendered people share the unacceptable discovery could however be interpreted in a distinkt way: The cane did not want to be percieved as a crane and once the
hosts saw her as a crane she had to leave. This would  parallel the decision of transgendered folks  who rather leave friends or family than interact with them as the son, daughters, girl-friends or
lovers others imagine to see who  they are actually not. Rather than caving in and appearing straight or as members of the opposite gender they choose to leave. Sounds familiar? 
 

picture by Mim

When I was a kid,  I strongly identified with the shape-changer, rather than with the humans in the story. 
For me these stories indicated and still do that there is a possibility of change of transformation. 
As an adult these stories also tell me that other people, namely those who invented and continued to tell these stories were at least dimly aware of these possibilities as well. 

So apart from the diverse issues of trust, coming out, change and transformation these stories point towards the potential of acceptance in the general society. 

Interestingly it seems that the less frequent happy ending for shape shifters in western societies - I am thinking for example of those stories where the sometimes even mute shape changing girl is
accused of witchery by her mother in law and burned as a witch - is in alignment with the less tolerant attitude  towards gay or transgendered people there. However even in those stories the mother
in law is clearly identified as evil, we might interpret this as a hopeful sign. 

One of my favorite story is the japanese tale of the tea-pot tanuki: one day a priest, who collects strange items buys a old but intriguing tea pot. When he (and his horrified students) discover however
that the teapot can talk - he is angrily complaining about the heat of the fire and being cleaned he gives the teapot to a poor tinker who happens to come by. The overjoyed tinker,  who has also
received a big fish as a present from another friend on that very day,  returns home, thinking this is his lucky day. When he wants to eat the fish, he however discovers that his present is gone - the
teapot has grown legs and feet and a mouth. 

It's a mountain tanuki who unfortunately has been trapped in his own shape changing spell, a very hungry and embarrassed tanuki we might add. The kind
tinker, who is well accustomed of sleeping hungry, is not very angry and even invites  the tanuki to stay. This truly turns out to be to his advantage as the tanuki manages him to persuade him to live with him together permanently.  To cover living expenses they start an acrobatic show, starring the tanuki as a main attraction. The tinker will never be forced to sleep hungry again and can even buy a proper house. 

In time they become very close friends. After a while the tinker starts buying magic books to turn the tanuki back into a true tanuki,  as he imagines that having a teapot for its belly
might be very uncomfortable. The years pass the tanuki insisting  he is fine and needs no spell, the tinker trying unsuccessfully  to turn him back. 
When the tea-pot tanuki finally dies the tinker weeps for his friend. The tale goes that the residual teapot eventually returned to the temple and remains now among the temple treasure. 
 
 
 
 

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