This week, we continue revisiting conversations which happened before the publication of my book, The Runaway Princess and Other Stories. Now, you may all know the “Runaway Princess” is Yennenga of the Mossi-Dagomba, but who are the women in the other stories?
In this episode, we read and talked about three of the original stories on which my retellings are based:
The Spirit in the Tree (Zulu, SA) which I retold as a sweet love story with heavy Cinderella undertones.
Tale #1 (Lake Nyasa area, Malawi) which I retold as "Eternal Love". Eternal Love is one of my favorite stories in the book! The original story is unnamed and comes from Odette St Lys’ “From a Vanished German Colony: A Collection of Folklore, Folk Tales and Proverbs From South-West-Africa”. From the author’s notes:
This story was told in Swahili by a girl in the School of the Universities Mission at Zanzibar, who was brought as a slave from the country near Lake Nyassa; she describes herself as an Mkipeta, apparently a branch of the Nyassa nation, and said she had heard these tales in her own old home.
The Monkey Girl which I retold as "The Alledjenu Princess" (Kordofan region, Sudan). This story is not available online but you can read fantasy author Midori Snyder’s fantastic analysis of it here. You can also read an excerpt of my retelling and enjoy some original art from the story here.
Speaking of art, as you may know, I am currently working to make print copies of the book available via Amazon. One of the updates to this edition would be making the art larger so there’s more to enjoy!
If you just can’t wait to get into the stories you can visit the “Runaway Princess” project page for more information and ways to buy the book.
Next week, we’ll revisit the conversation in which I talk about my research process, the importance of validating material found in possibly biased sources, telling stories that are sensitive to history and relevant to current times, and...pounded yam!
The Other Stories