The Pot of Wisdom: Ananse Stories

Drawing on the rich vein of traditional African stories featuring the spider Ananse, Ghanaian author Adwoa Badoe and Malian illustrator Baba Wagué Diakité bring young readers a marvelously witty and entertaining collection of ten tales about this legendary spider swindler. The tales deal with important issues that everyone faces — justice, money, marriage, vanity, self-respect, and more — but couch the heavy lessons in lively folktales. Ananse sometimes succeeds; other times he makes a fool of himself and is ashamed — but never for long. Many elements of these stories can be found in other trickster tales, including those of African origin like the Uncle Remus stories and those of aboriginal American groups like the Native American show more coyote tales and the jaguar tales of Central and South America. show less

Adwoa Badoe, who trained as a physician in her native Ghana, has turned her attention to music and storytelling since moving to Canada - something for which readers can be very thankful! This collection of ten Ananse stories, as told to Badoe when she was a child, is immensely entertaining, featuring selections both familiar and strange. The accompanying illustrations by Malian artist Baba Wagué Diakité - created on handmade polychromed and glazed earthenware tiles - are simply gorgeous: colorful, humorous, attention-grabbing!

Here the reader (or listener) will discover Why Ananse Lives on the Ceiling, in which the spider trickster, so ashamed at being caught stealing food from his sons, climbs up to the highest corner of the house, in show more order to hide his face. In Ananse and the Feeding Pot, Ananse's jealousy of his own son, Ntikuma, and his inability to follow directions, lead to a humiliation in front of the entire village! Ananse Becomes the Owner of Stories chronicles our hero's capture of an entire house of honeybees, Aboatia of the forest dwarves, and Nanka the python; while Ananse, the Even-handed Judge sees his defeat, when he thinks to attend a funeral and wedding at the same time.

Six other selections round out The Pot of Wisdom, from the titular Ananse and the Pot of Wisdom, which I recognized from Joyce Cooper Arkhurst's The Adventures of Spider: West African Folktales, where it is called How the World Got Wisdom; to The Mat Confidences, which I had not previously encountered. Well-written and well-illustrated, this collection is one Ananse lovers will not want to miss! Highly recommended! show less

West African tales. One of the stories explains how the stories of West Africa became about Anansi (or Ananse), sometimes as a spider and sometimes as a person. It is a really good complement when talking about Ancient West Africa.

Bem-humoradas e repletas de ensinamentos, as histórias de Ananse, transmitidas oralmente e muito populares em Gana, falam de costumes, tradição, ética e respeito, mantendo-se vivas na memória do povo há muito tempo. Ananse é uma aranha que se comporta como gente. Às vezes ele se dá bem, às vezes arranja confusão...