The Orphan Girl and Other Stories: West African Folk Tales

To compile these tales, Kent State professor and storytellerBuchi Offodileboth drew from his own childhood experiences growing up in West Africa and searched villages for elders who remembered the old stories. These forty-one tales are culled from a lifetime of listening, reading, and researching. The Orphan Girlincludes a fascinating introduction exploring the roots of the storytelling tradition in the history and culture of West Africa. History's boundaries divide this book by nation, from Mauritania into the continent's interior, to the hinterlands of Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger, and down the Atlantic coast as far as Cameroon. Each country is represented by several stories, a map and brief information.