ABC 14. Why Dog Left the Forest

It's time for the second book of August for the Anansi Book Club; here's the August schedule for all the books. This week we're looking at a book from a wonderful book series: the Sparrow Readers published by East African Educational Publishers in Nairobi, Kenya. Here's the book: Why Dog Left the Forest by Barrack Muluka, published in 1996.

The name of the illustrator is not given, but the illustrations are a big plus for this book, and there are illustrations on (almost) every page, as you can see here on the opening two-page spread:

As you can see, there is a lot of text, and that is because these books were specifically meant to encourage English-language-learners. There's a glossary of the more difficult words and phrases in the back of the book, explaining them in more simple English.

In this book, Hyena is a typical trickster: greedy, dangerous, and cruel. Hyena's friend Dog is his victim, and they are both going to end up being put on trial by the end of the book for their bad behavior. This just goes to show how you cannot predict just what role any animal might play in a folktale: often Hyena is the victim of a trickster (especially Jackal), but in this story it's Hyena who is the trickster character.

This type of story, where trickster and his companion go on a journey, is found all over African, and it is also a popular tale type in the African Diaspora also. For an example, here's a story about Baboon and Rabbit, where Rabbit finally gets angry at Baboon, as Dog does at Hyena in Muluka's book. You can read about Baboon and Rabbit here: How Isuro the Rabbit Tricked Gudu, which is a Shona story from southern Africa. There are some specific motifs shared with Muluka's story about Hyena and Dog, like throwing their food into the water... although the Baboon only pretends to throw his food in, unlike the poor trusting Rabbit; the illustration is by Henry Justice Ford.

And for a Diaspora story where the trickster tricks his traveling companion so that he gets to eat all the food, consider this Anansi story from Jamaica, where Anansi tricks the Sheep into giving up his spoon so that Anansi gets all the food not once, but twice (this is from Beckwith's collection of Anansi stories, and she has a similar story with Anansi and Tiger); here's my 100-word version of the story: Anansi and Sheep and their Spoons.

Anansi and Sheep were out walking. They each carried a spoon.

"Your spoon sure looks heavy!" Anansi said. "Bury it here. You can come fetch it when we find food."

Sheep buried his spoon.

Finally they found a house with food.

"Go get your spoon!" said Anansi.

Then, when Sheep was gone, Anansi ate all the food.

Sheep came back. "I'm hungry! And I'm tired from carrying my spoon!"

"Well, leave the spoon here," said Anansi.

They found another house at dinnertime. Sheep went back to get his spoon, and Anansi ate all the dinner.

Sheep didn't get anything again.

Woe betide the person who travels with a trickster. Because the trickster is always hungry, and is going to do whatever it takes to eat all the food.

In addition to being a trickster tale, though, Muluka's story about Hyena and Dog is also an aetiological or "why" story: why dog left the forest, why the hyena is spotted, and why the hyena's back legs are shorter. I won't tell you the answers that Muluka's story gives (*spoilers*), but you can find lots of African folktales on the subject of why dogs live with people instead of in the wild, and also about the coat and the legs of hyena. Often the hyena's short legs are the result of a fall, like in this story where the hyena is the victim of the trickster jackal; this is a Khoekhoe story from Namibia: The Jackal and the Hyena.

Jackal climbed a cloud high in the sky and ate the cloud; it was very tasty.

“I’m coming down now!” he shouted to Hyena. “Catch me! I’ll do the same for you.”

Hyena caught Jackal, and then Hyena climbed the cloud and ate her fill.

“I’m coming down now,” she shouted to Jackal. “Catch me!”

Jackal reached up his paws to catch her, but then jumped aside. “Ow, a thorn has pricked me! So sorry! Ow! Not my fault!”

Hyena crashed into the ground and was badly hurt.

To this day, Hyena limps because she was injured in that fall.

Meanwhile, here's a different "falling" story from Angola: The Hyena and the Squirrel.

Hyena and Squirrel were friends.

"I'm hungry!" said Hyena one day, so Squirrel gave Hyena some nuts.

"Nuts are no good," Hyena said, whining. "I need meat. Or honey! Bring me meat or honey!"

Squirrel had no meat, so he brought Hyena some honeycomb.

Hyena squealed happily and began eating.

Eagle heard Hyena squealing and landed nearby. "Give me some!" he said.

"No!" snarled Hyena.

"Then I'll feed you to my chicks," shouted Eagle, grabbing Hyena in his talons.

Hyena struggled and finally broke free, but when she fell to the ground, she injured her hind legs. 

Hyena still limps.

Of course there are lots of stories also about why dogs came to live with people, and with men in particular, including a story from eastern Africa that we had in a book back in May: "Why Dogs Live with men" in When the Stones Were Soft: East African Fireside Tales by Eleanor Heady. The illustration is by Tom Feelings!

I also wanted to share another one of the Sparrow Readers that is available at Internet Archive, and this one is by Chinua Achebe! The book is How Leopard Got His Claws.

The story, first written by John Iroaganachi and later revised by Achebe, uses traditional African folktale characters to create a literary fable inspired by the Biafra conflict. The “Lament of the Deer” included in the story was composed by Christopher Okigbo, a Nigerian poet who died fighting for Biafran independence.

Achebe wrote another book for the Sparrow Reader series, The Drum. It is not available at the Internet Archive (and it is very rare: a used copy will run you hundreds of dollars, because... Achebe), but there is ANOTHER wonderful book where you can read Achebe's The Drum: it's in Chasing the Sun: Stories from Africa, edited by Véronique Tadjo. 

Meanwhile, enjoy: Barrack Muluka's book about the adventures of Hyena and Dog is just a click away at the Internet Archive.

Why Dog Left the Forest

by Barrack Muluka