Definition of "trickster"

trickster

noun
plural tricksters
1. (mythology, literature) Any of numerous figures featuring in various mythologies and folk traditions, who use guile and secret knowledge to challenge authority and play tricks and pranks on others; any similar figure in literature.
  Quotations
  The trickster is one of the oldest and most widespread of mythological and literary figures. […] As the name implies, the trickster is, on one level—probably the most important—an amoral practical joker who wanders about playing pranks on unsuspecting victims […] With all the fluctuations, certain things about the trickster are predictable: he is always a wanderer, always hungry, and usually oversexed. / Tricksters abound in folktales […] .
  1991, Alan R. Velie (compiler and editor), American Indian Literature: An Anthology, Revised edition, page 44
  And let us begin with those sympathetic elements, the tricksters who obtain the lovers and the land, always at the expense of fools and knaves, sometimes at the expense of other tricksters.
  2015, J. Douglas Canfield, Tricksters and Estates: On the Ideology of Restoration Comedy‎, page 31
2. One who plays tricks or pranks on others.
3. One who performs tricks (parts of a magician' act or entertaining difficult physical actions).
4. An impish or playful person.
5. A fraud (person who performs a trick for the purpose of unlawful gain).
verb
third-person singular simple present tricksters, present participle trickstering, simple past and past participle trickstered
1. (intransitive) To engage in the antics of a trickster; to play tricks.