African Diaspora at Internet Archive: More Virginia Hamilton

Before Black History Month ends, I wanted to make sure to share two more books by Virginia Hamilton here. The first is a wonderful re-vision she has done of a book of folktales first published in the 19th century: When Birds Could Talk and Bats Could Sing: The Adventures of Bruh Sparrow, Sis Wren, and Their Friends.

The stories in this book come from Martha Young's Plantation Bird Legends, published in 1868. Young was a folklorist in Alabama, and a publisher of books in dialect, much like Joel Chandler Harris's "Uncle Remus" books. In the same way that Julius Lester tackled the problem of Harris with his wonderful Brer Rabbit books, I am really glad that Virginia Hamilton has done the same here with Martha Young's stories; I'll have more to say about Martha Young in a later post when I get around to addressing the legacy of dialect writing by white authors in the American South.

Here is a list of the story titles linked to the Archive: When Bruh Sparrow and Sis Wren Lost Out / Still and Ugly Bat / Blue Jay and Swallow Take the Heat / Bruh Buzzard and Fair Maid / Hummingbird and Little Breeze / When Miss Bat Could Sing / Cardinal and Bruh Deer / Little Brown Wren.

This book has illustrations by Barry Moser, one of Hamilton's regular collaborators. There are some beautiful two-page spreads like this illustration for the hummingbird's story:

The other book is an anthology of folktales, legends, and true stories: Her Stories: African American Folktales, Fairy Tales, and True Tales.

Here is a list of the story titles in this book linked to the Archive: Little Girl and Buh Rabby / Lena and Big One Tiger / Marie and Redfish / Miz Hattie Gets Some Company / Catskinella / Good Blanche, Bad Rose, and the Talking Eggs / Mary Belle and the Mermaid / Mom Bett and the Little Ones A-Glowing / Who You! / Macie and the Boo Hag / Lonna and Cat Woman / Malindy and Little Devil / Woman and Man Started Even / Luella and the Tame Parrot / The Mer-Woman out of the Sea / Annie Christma / Millie Evans: Plantation Times / Lettice Boyer: From Way Back / Mary Lou Thornton: My Family.

This book has illustrations by the great Leo and Diane Dillon, also frequent collaborators with Hamilton. This is their illustration for the famous story of the talking eggs:

Finally, there is also a collection of Hamilton's writings about her writings: Virginia Hamilton: Speeches, Essays, and Conversations.

Of course, this is all on top of all the other books by Virginia Hamilton that I've shared previously at this blog; you can see all the posts about Virginia Hamilton together on one page. Thanks to the power of the Internet Archive and Controlled Digital Lending, these wonderful books are just a click away:

When Birds Could Talk and Bats Could Sing

by Virginia Hamilton

Her Stories: African American

Folktales, Fairy Tales, and True Tales

by Virginia Hamilton

Speeches, Essays, and Conversations

by Virginia Hamilton