Reading Notes: West African Folktales Part B
West African Folktales - collected in Accra, Ghana
The Moon and Stars
The Moon and Stars
- What does an African dragon look like? I would love some visual description here
- This is different from the rest - dragons and gods rather than farming and hunting
- People becoming animals seems like a pretty prominent theme.
- More poetry/song included in the dialogue
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| Moeflon (Mouflon) 0031 by Zweer de Bruin via Flickr |
- Short paragraphs, telling the story one or two lines at a time
- Evil was being done because there was no ruler
- Problem was not resolved! Loose ends
- Animals are alternately characters and livestock
- Spider's greediness leads to him losing everything
- Clear rules about morality
- No visual descriptions of environment or people
- Somewhat formal dialogue, old-fashioned language ("you need fear nothing")
- I really liked this one
- What are West African fairies? Similar to English fairies?
- Yams and maize - local vegetables
To be honest, I don't have a lot to say about the writing style or contents of this set of stories. The personified animals are interesting to me, and I like the trickster characters and the clear morals.
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