African Diaspora at Internet Archive: Ring of Tricksters

As promised in yesterday's post wrapping up the African folklore project at this blog, today begins the Diaspora project, writing about African American and Caribbean folktales in order to explore the vast legacy of African storytelling traditions in the Americas.

I decided to start with a beautiful book by Virginia Hamilton that I wrote about way back in May when this all got started: A Ring of Tricksters: Animal Tales from America, the West Indies, and Africa. The book is just a click away at the Internet Archive, thanks to the power of Controlled Digital Lending.

As you can see from the title, the premise of Hamilton's book is the circle connecting the tricksters of Africa, the Caribbean, and the United States. That is the question that got me started (where did those Brer Rabbit stories come from?), and Hamilton's book is a great place to start pondering that question with 4 stories from the United States, 3 from the Caribbean, and 4 from Africa. Here are the story links:

United States: Buh Rabby and Buh Gator / Buzzard and Wren Have a Race / The Cat and the Rat / Bruh Wolf and Bruh Rabbit Join Together

Caribbean: That One, Anansi / Magic Anansi / Cunnie Anansi Does Some Good

Africa: Cunnie Rabbit and Spider Make a Match / How Chameleon Became a Ride / Old Mister Turtle Gets a Whipping / The Animals Share

The illustrations are by Barry Moser (find out more at Wikipedia), who is one of the Hamilton's regular collaborators. Here's his wonderful two-page spread for Bruh Rabbit and Bruh Wolf:

And here's his illustration for a story involving Parrot and Tiger.

As you can see, Mower opted to depicted Tiger as an actual tiger, and in her notes to the stories Hamilton suggests that the Indo-Caribbean storytelling traditions would encourage the identification of "tiger" as an actual tiger. 

As the same time, "tiger" can refer in varieties of African English to a leopard or cheetah or other big cat,. As a result, "tiger" shows up in African folktales told in English or pidgin, and as a result "tiger" is also a character in African American folktales as well as in Caribbean stories.

For another beautiful book by Virginia Hamilton with illustrations by Barry Moser, here's In the Beginning: Creation Stories from Around the World.

So, enjoy! And this is just the first of what will be many posts about beautiful books of African American and Caribbean folktales, including more books to come by Virginia Hamilton (you can read more about her life and career at Wikipedia). Enjoy!

A Ring of Tricksters:

Animal Tales from

America, the West Indies, and Africa

by Virginia Hamilton