ABC 7. The Talking Vegetables

For the third Anansi Book Club book in June (see the website for more), we have The Talking Vegetables by Won-Ldy Paye and Margaret Lippert. It was published in 2006, and it's just a click away at the Internet Archive. So, read the book, and share your thoughts at Twitter if you are so inclined; our hashtag is #AnansiBookClub.

As you can see from the cover, this is an Anansi story. In fact, it is our first actual story about Anansi for the Anansi Book Club, so that's exciting! The illustrations are by Julie Paschkis, and as you can see, she has decided to render Anansi in his spider form; this is Anansi hiding when the other animals come to get him to help do the work on the farm:

As you can guess, Anansi is lazy and doesn't want to work on the farm, but he is also greedy and wants to eat the food... which is how things come around to the talking vegetables, but I don't want to give away the whole plot here!

The author Won-Ldy Paye is from Liberia, and this is a traditional story of the Dan people; you can find out more about the Dan people and their culture at Wikipedia: Dan people. Paye's grandmother initiated him into the storytelling tradition, and he is also a drummer and dancer. You can find out more at his website, and you can also enjoy his work in the form of videos too! For example, here is The Bird that Ate the Bull.

Paye cowrote The Talking Vegetables with Margaret Lippert, a folklorist and author who has collaborated with him on some other books also; they began working together in Seattle in the 1990s (Paye is now based in Connecticut). 

And for today's update to the post, I wanted to add this wonderful commentary from the beginning of the book about the meaning the authors want people to take away from the story, so make sure to read that if/when you read the story: The Talking Vegetables is a traditional story from the Dan people of northeastern Liberia. Every Dan village has a community farm, and everyone works hard to make this farm a village treasure. When somebody in the village gets sick, friends pick vegetables from the farm for the family. When there is an important celebration, villagers harvest vegetables from the farm for everyone to enjoy. Dan parents and grandparents will often tell children The Talking Vegetables to remind them that they are important members of their families and that their work is needed so the community will thrive.

I also wanted to share the first book by Won-Ldy Paye that I found at the Internet Archive, thanks to the fact that it has illustrations by... Ashley Bryan! Htere's that book: Why Leopard Has Spots: Dan Stories From Liberia.

There are 6 stories in this book, including a version of the story of the talking vegetables: Why Leopard Has Spots ~ Mrs. Chicken and the Hungry Crocodile ~ The Talking Vegetables ~ The Hunger Season ~ Why Spider Has a Big Butt ~ Spider Flies to the Feast. You'll recognize Bryan's style for the illustration right away; this is how he renders Spider:

In addition to that book illustrated by Ashley Bryan, Paye and Lippert have published two other books with illustrations by Julie Paschkis which you can find at the Internet Archive also:  Mrs. Chicken and the Hungry Crocodile (I just retold a version of that story myself, "The Crocodile and the Chicken" at my readers theater project, although in a quite different version from the one told by Paye's grandmother!) and Head, Body, Legs. 

Mrs. Chicken and the Hungry Crocodile

Head, Body, Legs

Finally, I wanted to share a big book of stories from Liberia featuring Anansi if you are interested in reading more: Royal Antelope and Spider: West African Mende Tales by Marion Kilson. This book contains the Mende text for 100 stories, including the Mende text goo!

I've really enjoyed spending this week sharing more materials to help put this book in context, and tomorrow on June 22 we'll be starting our final June book; you can get a preview at the Anansi Book Club website calendar for June.

The Talking Vegetables

by Won-Ldy Paye and Margaret Lippert