Reading Notes: Nigerian Folk Stories, Part B

The lightning and thunder story was a good read. I like how the central focus for Nigerian Folk Stories focuses on attributing certain things for why they are the way they are. For instance, in this lightning and thunder story, thunder was the mom and lightning was the son causing destruction. The lightning was always causing havoc and burning things down and the thunder was yelling at her son for doing so. They were eventually banished from town and were sent to another place where they did the same thing and that is why there were sent so far away into the sky. They couldn't harm anyone from there. Bringing things to life from nature would make for an interesting story! There are so many takes I could make a spin off of.

(Lightning storm)

The next story I enjoyed in Part B of the reading was about a hippo who no one knew of his name. The hippo had many wives and threw many feasts for people. During his feast, he asked if anyone knew his name and no one knew the answer. Eventually he made a deal that if someone knew his name he would go live out his days in the water. The tortious snuck his way around the hippo so he could get one of his many wives to call him by name. This fold story is another one of those legends for why hippos stay in water. Thinking I could do something like this story about another animal or so.

The last story that I wanted to comment on was about two birds that were competing for the king. The king promised that he would make whoever could endure pain the longest chief of his tribe. Two different birds were both up to the challenge. One was larger and therefore thought of himself more fit than the other. The other bird was not fit, but rather very witty. They had to build a house and go seven days without food. The smaller, but wittier bird skillfully planned his house to where there was a whole he could go in and out of to get food. The king inspected it and didn't notice the whole. At the end of the seven days the smaller bird had been able to get in and out of his cage and get to food, while the larger bird had died. He became the chief appointed by the king. I like how the story transitioned into why these types of birds are hard to shoot. They are small and witty.

I very much liked reading through these different stories. They were all similar and different at the same time. There were reoccurring instances of some characters and some similar themes. What I think I could use to make my own story might possibly have to do with creating why something does or is the way it is. I could also alter one of the stories. Stay tuned to see what I come up with this week! 

Bibliography - Nigerian Folk Stories by Elphinstone Dayrell