African Folktales at Internet Archive: The Orphan Girl and Other Stories

Yesterday I wrote about a classic children's book based on a West African folktale — Verna Aardema's Why Mosquitoes Buzz in People's Ears — and you can find use these links to browse all this week's books, plus previous recommendations.

Today I want to follow up with a beautiful book of West African folktales which includes stories from all over western Africa: Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Ivory Coast, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone and Togo. Yes, no kidding: all those countries! It's The Orphan Girl and Other Stories collected and retold by Buchi Offodile, published in 2001. It's just a click away at the Internet Archive thanks to digital lending:

The author grew up in Nigeria and returned to West Africa many times, collecting stories whenever he had the chance. All but a few of the stories in this book are stories that he collected (and there is detailed bibliography for the few stories he reprinted from other sources), and for each country there is a helpful map and introductory materials to help situate the country and its stories in the West African context. For example, here is how the Cameroon section begins:

There is also an extremely helpful introduction full of reminiscing about the stories, proverbs, and riddles he heard while growing up, along with a quick historical overview of West Africa.

The stories are organized by country, but you will find an index in the back of the book where the stories are grouped by categories, along with an index of African words and phrases used in the texts.

There are so many excellent stories in this book! One of my favorites is a story about how the trickster Spider managed to outwit God himself, Nyame, by managing to get a beautiful bride when he had only a single grain of corn to bargain with. In general trickster stories are always my favorites, but you will also find mythological stories here, fairy tales, along with cumulative tales, dilemma tales, and so on. Very highly recommended! 

So, if you are looking for a crash course in the folktale traditions of West Africa, this book is an ideal place to start... and it's just a click away, thanks to the Internet Archive.

The Orphan Girl and Other Stories

collected and retold by Buchi Offodile

online borrowing link