Children of Wax: African Folk Tales

Children of Wax (1989) is a collection of African folk tales. These stories were obtained on two widely separated trips among the Ndebele people of Zimbabwe, who are descended from an offshoot of the Zulus. There are certain similarities to the tales of neighboring tribes. These tales often include a moral, but are essentially designed to entertain an audience. These stories are about animals that talk and about people who can be swallowed by animals or quicksand, yet survive. Several tales are about the tricky hare who outsmarts the lion; in America such stories were told about Br'er Rabbit. Other tales tell of tricky Guinea fowl, baboons, strange animals and even humans; the tricky humans, however, usually found themselves to be losers at the end. The author seems to have captured much of the native mode of story telling in these folk tales. These stories also have a simplicity and phraseology that should be very familiar to fans of Precious Ramotswe and The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency. Some of this style must be inherent to the author, but much has to be adopted from the people themselves. This collection contains twenty-seven folk tales. These stories, with thirteen others, are also included in a more recent collection: The Girl Who Married a Lion. Highly recommended to fans of McCall Smith and to anyone else who enjoys exotic folk tales of strange yet familiar lands. -Bill Jordin