List of fictional tricksters

This list of tricksters attests to both the enduring nature of the mythological figure of the trickster and its continued popularity in a variety of media.

The trickster, in later folklore or modern popular culture, is a clever, mischievous person or creature, who achieves his or her ends through the use of trickery. A trickster may trick others simply for their amusement, they could be a physically weak character trying to survive in a dangerous world, or they could even be a personification of the chaos that the world needs to function.

An archetypical example is of a fairy tale of the King who puts suitors for his daughter to the test. No brave and valiant prince or knight succeeds, until a simple peasant arrives. Aided only by his natural wit, he evades danger and triumphs over monsters and villains without fighting. Thus the most unlikely candidate passes the trials and receives the prize. Such characters are a staple of animated cartoons, in particular those used and developed by Tex Avery et al. during the Golden Age of American animation.

Characteristics

Hynes and Doty, in Mythical Trickster Figures (1997) state that every trickster has several of the following six traits:^[1]

1. fundamentally ambiguous and anomalous
2. deceiver and trick-player
3. shape-shifter
4. situation-inverter
5. messenger and imitator of the gods
6. sacred and lewd bricoleur

Tricksters in folklore and fiction

• Anansi the spider trickster of African origin
• Brer Rabbit - a slave trickster of African American origin.^[2]
• Eris (mythology) - Greek Goddess of chaos.
• Henish - a modern hero of sorts, aiming to create a reputable image of himself in society to master the art of 'getting away with it', bending the rules to propagate personal agendas, often advantageous, always humorous
• Hermes is the messenger of the gods in Greek mythology, inventor of fire, and patron of travellers, boundaries and thieves.
• Jack - best known from the story Jack and the Beanstalk is a young boy who uses his wit to outsmart characters in many stories.
• Jack Mary Ann - a folk hero from the Wrexham area of north Wales whose fictionalised exploits continue to circulate in local folklore.
• John the Conqueror - is a character who appears in many stories from the African American tradition. He is a slave that is so much smarter than any slave-master, he simply cannot be controlled.
• Kuma Lisa is a fox and trickster figure in Bulgarian folklore.
• Loki is a shape-shifting, troublesome god in Norse mythology.
• Māui is a Polynesian culture hero famous for his exploits and his trickery.
• Pan - is a is the god of shepherds and flocks. He is a satyr: a creature that has the upper body of a man, and the legs of a goat. In many stories, they talk of Pan, or just satyrs in general are known to play tricks on people, especially children, for their amusement.
• Robin Goodfellow - from Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream plays tricks on a group of humans who stumble into a forest. His final monologue explains the nature of tricksters.
• Puss in Boots is a magical cat who tricks a king into raising a low born miller to the station of a great noble.
• Reynard is a red fox and trickster figure who plays a central role in the moralistic fables of the Reynard cycle.
• Satan - In some interpretations of Christianity, Satan could be seen as the ultimate trickster whose job is to test humanity, or if Yahweh is seen as an evil deity, even as a heroic revolutionary.
• Kyprioth the Trickster is a character first mentioned in the Song of the Lioness quartet by Tamora Pierce and is a main character in the Daughter of the Lioness duo by the same author. He is head god of the Raka of the Copper Isles and has a direct tie to George Cooper and Aly. He is the God of thieves and tricksters.

In movies, television, animation, novels, short stories, comics, and video games

• Aang - The hero of Avatar: The Last Airbender enjoys tricking and playing jokes on his foes. Most of the Fire Nation thinks this of him as a child. ^[3]
• Bart Simpson - from the animated TV series The Simpsons.^[4]
• Bugs Bunny - a rabbit trickster, in some respects similar to Brer Rabbit.^[5]
• Discord - an antagonist of Season Two of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic. He is a chimera-like creature known as a "Draconequus" and the spirit of disharmony in the world of Equestria.
• El-ahrairah - the Prince of Rabbits, or "the Prince with the Thousand Enemies"; the trickster folk hero of the rabbits in Watership Down.
• Felix the Cat - a "transgressor of boundaries" (in the most literal sense).^[6]
• The Great Gazoo - A resident of the planet Zetox, Gazoo arrived in Bedrock to annoy Fred and Barney in The Flintstones.
• Harvey the pooka, a large anthropomorphic rabbit who can be seen only by the protagonist, from the play and film bearing his name.
• Impossible Man - an amoral, childlike, shapeshifting extraterrestrial from the Fantastic Four comics.
• Jareth - King of the Goblins from Jim Henson's Labyrinth, who changes forms and uses magic to cajole the story's heroine through a series of puzzles.
• Jack Sparrow - The swashbuckling pirate from Pirates of the Caribbean.
• Pippi Longstocking - Unconventional, assertive, light-hearted and incredibly strong girl, in the franchise with the same name.
• The Joker - The arch-nemesis of Batman is a trickster character in some interpretations.
• The Mask - wears a mask imbued with Loki's powers and lack of inhibition.
• Mister Mxyzptlk - an imp from the fifth dimension featured in the Superman comics.
• The Pink Panther - a character featured at the start of the film and the animated series of the same name.
• Q and fellow members of the Q Continuum - from the TV series Star Trek.
• Tom Sawyer - is the title character of the Mark Twain novel The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. He is a lazy person, and on many occasions tricks others into doing work for him.
• The Doctor- the title character of Doctor Who. Certain (if not all) incarnations of the Doctor can be seen as tricksters, particularly the Second, Fourth and Seventh Doctors.
• The Trickster - the main antagonist of Thief: The Dark Project, he masquerades as an eccentric noble named Constantine, and apparently has the ability to shapeshift. His disguise serves to trick Garrett into giving him a powerful artifact that will return the world to a wild state.
• The Trickster is an antagonist of Season two and three of Supernatural, who often plays tricks on Sam and Dean. In Season Five, it is revealed he is the Archangel Gabriel who came to Earth to find Michael and Lucifer's vessels.
• Wile E. Coyote - featured in the Road Runner cartoons and based on a traditional Native American trickster figure, Old Man Coyote.^[7] An argument might also be made that Wile E. Coyote's arch nemesis, the Road Runner itself, is also at least as great a trickster as Wile E. himself.
• Woody Woodpecker - "A less complex version of the Trickster"^[8]

Notes