The Palm-wine Drinkard ; And, My Life in the Bush of Ghosts"Since its first publication in 1952, The Palm-Wine Drinkard has come to be regarded as the masterwork of one of Africa’s best and most influential writers. Drawing on the Yoruba oral folktale tradition, and embellishing his story with strong mythical and psychological implications, Tutuola describes the odyssey of a devoted palm-wine drinkard through a nightmare of fantastic adventure.In My Life in the Bush of Ghosts, the charm of his distinctive English blends with Nigerian Amos Tutuola’s extraordinary imagination and the mythology of West African tribal life to present a bewitching, nightmarish adventure story. A small boy, left alone to face the terrors of the bush, the impenetrable thickets of the topical forest inhabited only by ghosts, meets all the vile spirits of African mythology and is initiated into the worlds of fear, disease, and death. Tutuola uncannily evokes the awaking of a mortal soul in confrontation with the reality of a people’s world of legend." -- Publisher's description. |
Contents
Foreword page | 9 |
The Meaning of Bad and Good | 17 |
The SmellingGhost | 29 |
My Life with Cows | 43 |
At a Ghost Mothers Birthday Function | 52 |
My First Wedding Day in the Bush of Ghosts | 59 |
On my way to the 9th Town of Ghosts | 65 |
RiverGhosts Galaday under the River | 72 |
Barbing Day in the Town of Short Ghosts | 105 |
The Super Lady | 112 |
Where Woman Marries Woman | 123 |
On the Queer Way to Homeward | 129 |
meet my Dead Cousin in the 10th Town | 144 |
Invisible Magnetic Missive sent to Me from Home | 154 |
Televisionhanded Ghostess | 161 |
The FutureSign Tree | 167 |
In the Spiders Web Bush | 89 |
The Short Ghosts and their Flasheyed Mother | 96 |
The PalmWine Drinkard | 175 |
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Common terms and phrases
10th town Abeokuta Amos Tutuola armless asked baby body bush animals Bush of Ghosts changed chasing clothes copperish-ghost cowrie cows creatures dancing dead distance drinks earthly person earthly town entered the Bush eyes father fearful fire flash-eyed mother gave GEOFFREY PARRINDER ghosts and ghostesses glad ground guns hands head hear heard hole home town homeless-ghost hour human-beings Immediately inside juju kill kinds of ghosts king lady living loads looking marry miles minutes morning mouth noises o'clock Ogun once Orisha Palm-Wine Drinkard palm-wine tapster pitcher prominent ghosts reached replied rest road running short ghosts slave sleep slept smell smelling-ghosts smoking pipe snakes song sore spider web spiders started stood stopped surprise talking tell terrible thought told took town of ghosts travelled tree Tutuola ugly uncountable village voice wanted whole wife wives Wizard woke woman Yoruba