Le riche et le pauvre et autres contes bamanan du Mali (review)

This collection of Bamana folktales from Mali reprints material that Annik Thoyer first collected in 1971 and published privately in 1981-82 in two different volumes. The book offers fourteen tales of varying length, presented in bilingual format, with Bamana and French texts on opposing pages. The shorter tales run perhaps two pages in length, and deal with amusing topics such as the way in which men and women first got together, with the aid of beer (161-66). The longest tale, the title story, gives us a familiar and widespread theme of two people with the same name but differing states, and how each helps the other. It is a fully developed and well-told story, and an additional feature of some interest is the teller: the late jeli (griot) Tayiru Banbera of Ngoyi who is best known for his expertise on the history of Segou, the eghteenth-century Malian kingdom (see David Conrad, ed,. A State of Intrigue, Oxford: Oxford UP, 1990, for the fullest example of Tayiru's knowledge). Here he turns his narrative skill to a well established story type in which we find, in the occasional digression or comment, a glint of his more serious skills. Another longer and important narrative is that of the "Hyena and the Brides" ("L'Hyène et les nouvelles mariées," 91-121), a variant on the story of the animals who try to trap the hunter and which features a rather grim bargaining session between the hunter and two old hyenas that he has trapped. And a final familiar tale worth mentioning is that of the "Hare and God" (167-78): the hare went to God to ask to be made clever, and God asked the hare for three things: the lioness's milk, balls of flies, and to come riding the hyena. When the hare accomplished these things, God said he was clever enough. Readers will recognize here echoes of the American Brer Rabbit riding the fox and also the spider Ananse, who paid God's price for stories in a very similar manner.

The stories are annoted with some comparative notes, largely limited to current French publications, and these should be much broader, especially in the case of a reissued work. Many of the stories are reported outside the Bamana world, and their occurrence and variations are significant. The study of African folklore should look beyond national borders. But the presentation of Tayiru Banbera's text alone makes this a unique and valuable collection.