Richard talks about a lot of things all at once in his writing. He immerses the reader in a life of poverty with a rich description of all that takes place so that characters appear noble in their human frailty and tiny triumphs. With his, Let's Beat the Shit Out of Herman Rosko!, and Why Ravens Smile to Little Old Ladies as They Walk By, we see him using similar styles to tell  two very different types of story. Is there a metanarrative? Both stories are about sex: one in traditional lore and one in present reality with a gritty pastiche, so setting and narration styles differ. In both, Richard uses a  complicated humour to make the hard moments palatable and the moral lessons fun. 
Let's Beat the Shit Out of Herman Rosko!
Grant, the protagonist, and his imbalanced friend Clarence sit outside of Herman Rosko's house waiting and talking. Their macho friend Brutus comes to meet them, give some sex advice he learned from Herman, then roar away in his meat filled monster truck. Clarence seems to be waiting for his two friends Brutus and Grant to agree to follow him into Herman's house to “trauma-hawk” the man Clarence envies [Van Camp, 21]. Herman Rosko is not actually introduced directly in this story but from what we are told he seems like a decent guy helping out young couples in the community with needed sex therapy techniques and “talking circle[s]” [23] for men and women in the group. Grant and Brutus have no intention of beating up Herman Rosko who meets with their girlfriends to teach relationship advice. We don't find out until near the end of the story that Grant is actually waiting for his Girlfriend Donna, inside Herman's house, to come out and meet him, rather than planning to beat up Clarence. Clarence is an angry envious man whose pathetic desire to harm Herman Rosko seems to stem from his loneliness - he does not have a girlfriend who visits Herman Rosko. Clarence's ex-girlfriend is sleeping with Herman Rosko, and that is the motivation for his vengent desire.
The conclusion of the story seems to show how Herman Rosko is a bit of a local hero yet some stubborn angry residents are bitter at the positive change he brings to the community. This is confirmed in the Afterward by Richard Van Camp how his inspiration for the writing was about a similar incident at a dance in Dougal Centre, Fort Smith where the author was "thinking about how some folks in small towns can really grind someone down." [103]
Why Ravens Smile to Little Old Ladies as They Walk By
This Dogrib “erotic story” [24] as retold by Richard Van Camp read more like a transcribed monologue from an oral storyteller with minimal use of characters or dialogue. The narrator is omnipotent but the subject of strange sexual creation mythology is intimate. Raven is the creator and a “Trickster” [Ryan, 5] who starts off getting beat nearly to death by the Dogrib people. The Dogrib steal Raven's magical beak and, being unable to destroy it, hide it with a powerful elder medicine woman who keeps the beak between her legs. The medicine woman is surprised to gain cunnilingus stimulation from Raven's magical beak and being blind and old withdraws to her own house to enjoy the pleasures of her magical sex toy. Raven recovers eventually and finds the medicine woman after some deduction, then goes to her to take back his mouthpiece. He finds the woman unwilling to relinquish her new sex aid, so he pulls the beak from her violently but by some trick of the medicine woman's magic the vagina and the beak are not separated. Thus, the woman continues to feel pleasure from Raven's beak and he leaves with a "beautiful pink pussy" [24] inside his beak.
This story stands apart from others in Van Camp’s collection for it's strangeness and mystery. The meaning and significance of the “pussy” in Raven's mouth is unclear for an outsider to the Dogrib culture. However, perhaps the meaning lies in the vulgarity of the story that listeners will be shocked out of sexual prudishness, what is seen from a Western perspective as sexual perversion is considered essential to the creator. As well, it seems to be a story affirming the power of old women in the community and destroying any dysfunctional [Western?] ideas which hide the fertility of the elders and their connection to the creator's power.

Compare
Richard Van Camp uses crude swearing and vulgar sexual slang in both stories to give the sense of reality. One is a realistic present day world and one a magical but not irrelevant dreamland. In both stories Richard has a unique dialogue style inserting questions from the narrator into the monologue. He asks: "Why leave the House" [25] in Raven, and in Rosko he uses italics to indicate unsaid thoughts in dialogue without quotations: “I know your father did something to you, Meadow.” [22] This technique helps to make the story more immediate to the reader.
Van Camp has fun with sounds using onomatopoeia in the Herman Rosko story "BAROOOOOOOOOOOM!!” [21]. He also invents compound onomatopoeia word like "sooooooooo goooooooo" [23] and "howshegoin?" [23] The characters of the Rosko are much more expressive this way – we almost hear the accent flavouring their speech. In Raven there is much dialogue and only two characters so the style is quite dissimilar. Still, however, Richard has Raven say "Holy Lick!" [26] as a joke and similar technique to his Rosko story of expression. This clever pun stands out as does the small segment of dialogue immediately preceding it. The Raven story is not so much a departure from style as his application of the same style so a very different genre. A traditional myth/joke that Van Camp is passing on from an anonymous source is much more minimally described than his own imagined fiction. He ends the narration with “Mahsi Cho!” [26] meaning something like “Thank You” in English.
The settings of both stories are minimal with only the suggestion of a village in Raven and an unnamed town of more row houses next to Rosko's. A more detailed description goes into the physicality of the characters and their thinking:  Clarence's mosquito bitten skin [16, 19],  Brutus's Truck [16-17], and Raven’s joking with the narrators questions of immediacy. Raven is absolutely minimal for setting;  the only detail that is not actively the plot is Richard Van Camp's description of where he heard the story North of Yellowknife [24].
Both these stories deal with sex. One is a celebration of those who promote virility in a real life modern day setting faced with poverty and conservative ignorance. The other, is a traditional creation myth involving animal deity Raven – the creator - and a traditional “Trickster Shift” of power [Ryan, 3]. A “Trickster” is centrally important to Indigenous North American Cultures, almost as a religious belief in Jesus Christ would be for a Christian Culture [Ryan, 5]. Raven faces a hostile community fed up with his Trickster ways. However, Raven ends the story physically intact and with a new sexual connection of power to the elder Dogrib Medecine woman. Raven ends up ‘shifting’ authority in the situation so that the powerful in the community who had beaten him up become less powerful.
Humour is probably the most important element of both stories and is in keeping with the Trickster spirit which is at the "centre of native culture" [Ryan, 5]. Why Ravens Smile at Little Old Ladies as They Walk By is brutal but obscenely funny. The power of Raven is in a beak which becomes a sexual toy. The beak inhabits a dying woman to uninhibit her. In a deep sense the order of tragedy is shifted. The smile that Raven has for old ladies turns out to be lascivious rather than the sombre deferential respect that one might expect from the title.
In Herman Rosko we have characters steeped in a tragic impoverished environment of anger and poverty. Yet silly little sexual tips about “ice cubes” [19] and “yellow Halls” candy [20] seem to make the mood jovial as the possibility of sexual rejuvenation is addressed. We are tricked again by Richard Van Camp, as the title deceptively implies a violent and ending. It turns out that the tragic jealousy and pathetic anger of Clarence is foiled by the good natured compassion spread by Herman Rosko teaching people to relate more openly and how to make a love life better. 

End:
Richard Van Camp has the Trickster Spirit in his writing and the humour is very pungent mixed with grit. This Northern community is a tragic place by most accounts, riddled with poverty and the repercussions of a culture being suppressed for many years. Yet in the midst of the tragic there is comedy and sex. There is a hopeful side to almost all of Richard's writing and it is very apparent in the regeneration themed sex stories Let's Beat the Shit Out of Herman Rosko!, and Why Ravens Smile to Little Old Ladies as They Walk By. The hope comes from the ability of his characters to make the best of what they are given and turn the brutal into a joke. The obscenity and vulgar sexual references are therefore not rebellious to his community at all but rather a very traditional technique of the “Trickster” and empower those met with a harsh new world of poverty.

Reference:
Van Camp, Richard. Angel Wing Splash Pattern. Kegedonce Press, Cape Crooker Reserve, Wiarton, Ontario, 2002.
Ryan, Allen J. The Trickster Shift: Humour and Irony in Contemporary Native Art. Vancouver, BC: UBC, 1999.