ANANSI STORIES - 13 West African Anansi Children's Stories: 13 Anansi, or Aunt Nancy, Stories for children

By Anon E. Mouse and Narrated by Baba Indaba

The 13 ANANSI stories in this short volume were originally, and unusually, includes as an appendix to Popular Tales from the Norse by Sir George Webbe Dasent. Abela Publishing has elected to re-publish these as a volume in their own right as an aide to Edgbarrow School’s fundraising campaign supporting the SOS Children’s Village in Asiakwa, Ghana.

The Stories in this volume are:

• Anansi And The Lion,
• Anansi And Quanqua,
• The Ear Of Corn And The Twelve Men,
• The King And The Ant's Tree,
• The Little Child And The Pumpkin Tree,
• The Brother And His Sisters,
• The Girl And The Fish,The Lion,
• The Goat And The Baboon,
• Anansi And Baboon,
• The Man And The Doukana Tree,
• Nancy Fairy,
• The Dancing Gang

ANANSI or Ahnansi (Ah-nahn-see) “the trickster spider” is a cunning and intelligent being and is one of the most important characters of West African and Caribbean folklore. The Anansi tales are believed to have originated in the Ashanti tribe in Ghana. (The word Anansi is Akan and means, simply, spider.) They later spread to other Akan groups and then to the West Indies, Suriname, and the Netherlands Antilles. On Curaçao, Aruba, and Bonaire he is known as Nanzi, and his wife as Shi Maria.

He is also known as Ananse, Kwaku Ananse, and Anancy; and in the Southern United States he has evolved into Aunt Nancy. He is a spider, but often acts and appears as a man. The story of Anansi is akin to the Coyote or Raven the trickster found in many Native American cultures.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Abela Publishing
• Release date: Apr 18, 2017
• ISBN: 9781907256523

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Acknowledgements

Abela Publishing acknowledges the work that

Sir George Webbe Dasent

did in translating and publishing

Anansi Stories

in a time well before any electronic media was in use.

* * * * * * *

33% of the net profit from the sale of this book

will be donated to

Edgbarrow School

Crowthorne, Berkshire, England

to assist with fundraising for their Ghana Project

supporting the

SOS Children’s Village

in

Asiakwa, Ghana

Contents

Acknowledgements

Contents

Introduction

Note

ANANSI STORIES

Why The Jack-Spaniard's Waist Is Small

Anansi And The Lion

Anansi And Quanqua

The Ear Of Corn And The Twelve Men

The King And The Ant's Tree

The Little Child And The Pumpkin Tree

The Brother And His Sisters

The Girl And The Fish

The Lion, The Goat And The Baboon

Anansi And Baboon

The Man And The Doukana Tree

Nancy Fairy

The Dancing Gang

INTRODUCTION

TO

ANANSI STORIES

THE Negroes in the West Indies still retain the tales and traditions which their fathers and grandfathers brought with them from Africa. Some thirty years back these Anansi Stories, as they are called, were invariably told at the Negro wakes, which lasted for nine successive nights. The reciters were always men. In those days when the slaves were still half heathen, and when the awful Obeah was universally believed in, such of the Negroes as attended church or chapel kept their children away from these funeral gatherings. The wakes are now, it is believed, almost entirely discontinued, and with them have gone the stories. The Negroes are very shy of telling them, and both the clergyman of the Church of England, and the Dissenting Minister, set their faces against them, and call them foolishness. The translator, whose early childhood was passed in those islands, remembers to have heard such stories from his nurse, who was an African born; but beyond a stray fragment here and there, the rich store which she possessed has altogether escaped his memory. The following stories have been taken down from the mouth of a West Indian nurse in his sister's house, who, born and bred in it, is rather regarded as a member of the family than as a servant. They are printed just as she told him, and both their genuineness and their affinity with the stories of other races will be self-evident. Thus