Week 6/7 Story Lab: Anansi and the Chain of Victims

For this Story Lab I revised an old story I wrote; for the revisions, I worked on the author's note, connecting up to parallel stories that I have now found online.

---

This is a story about ANANSI, the trickster spider:

Anasi was broke and needed some money. So he made a plan. A very sneaky plan.

First he went to Hog and said, "Brer Hog, lend me a dollar! I'll pay you back! Just come to my house tomorrow, twelve o'clock sharp."

Brer Hog said okay, and he gave Anansi a dollar.

Next he went to Dog and said, "Brer Dog, lend me a dollar! I'll pay you back! Just come to my house tomorrow, three minutes after twelve."

Brer Dog said okay, and he gave Anansi a dollar. That made two dollars.

Then he went to Monkey and said, "Brer Monkey, lend me a dollar! I'll pay you back! Just come to my house tomorrow, six minutes after twelve."

Brer Monkey said okay, and he gave Anansi a dollar. That made three dollars.

Next he went to Tiger and said, "Brer Tiger, lend me a dollar! I'll pay you back! Just come to my house tomorrow, nine minutes after twelve."

Brer Tiger said okay, and he gave Anansi a dollar. That made four dollars.

Finally he went to Lion and said, "Brer Lion, lend me a dollar! I'll pay you back! Just come to my house tomorrow, twelve minutes after twelve."

Brer Lion said okay, and he gave Anansi a dollar. That made five dollars.

Anansi took the money and had himself a big feast that night.

The next day, precisely at noon, Hog came knocking.

"Who's there?" Anansi said.

"It's me, Brer Hog!"

Anansi said, "Come on in!"

While he and Hog stood there talking, someone knocked at the door. It was three minutes after twelve o'clock. Anansi said, "Who's there?"

"It's me, Brer Dog!"

Anansi looked worried. "Brer Hog," he said, "you better go run in the other room there and hide under the bed. Brer Dog is a bad man. He told he wants to catch you and eat you up!"

Brer Hog ran into the other room, and Anansi opened the door. Brer Dog came in. While he and Dog stood there talking, someone knocked at the door. It was six minutes after twelve o'clock. Anansi said, "Who's there?"

"It's me, Brer Monkey!"

Anansi looked worried. "Brer Dog," he said, "you better go run in the other room there and hide under the bed. Brer Monkey is a bad man. He told he wants to catch you and eat you up! If you find Brer Hog in there already, you better kill him to keep him from squealing. That Brer Hog is a squealing fool! He'll give you away for sure."

Brer Dog ran into the other room, and Anansi sang to himself:

Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na bom,
Eb-ry-bod-y
Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na bom,
Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na.
Po' Hog dead and gone.

Then Anansi opened the door. Brer Monkey came in. While he and Monkey stood there talking, someone knocked at the door. It was nine minutes after twelve o'clock. Anansi said, "Who's there?"

"It's me, Brer Tiger!"

Anansi looked worried. "Brer Monkey," he said, "you better go run in the other room there and hide under the bed. Brer Tiger is a bad man. He told he wants to catch you and eat you up! If you find Brer Dog in there already, you better kill him to keep him from barking. That Brer Dog is a barking fool! He'll give you away for sure."

Brer Monkey ran into the other room, and Anansi sang to himself:

Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na bom,
Eb-ry-bod-y
Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na bom,
Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na.
Po' Dog dead and gone.

Then Anansi opened the door. Brer Tiger came in. While he and Tiger stood there talking, someone knocked at the door. It was twelve minutes after twelve o'clock. Anansi said, "Who's there?"

"It's me, Brer Lion!"

Anansi looked worried. "Brer Tiger," he said, "you better go run in the other room there and hide under the bed. Brer Lion is a bad man. He told he wants to catch you and eat you up! If you find Brer Monkey in there already, you better kill him to keep him from chattering. That Brer Monkey is a chattering fool! He'll give you away for sure."

Brer Tiger ran into the other room, and Anansi sang to himself:

Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na bom,
Eb-ry-bod-y
Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na bom,
Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na.
Po' Monkey dead and gone.

Then Anansi opened the door. Brer Lion came in. As soon as Brer Lion came in, Anansi told him, "You came at just the right time: I've got something good for you! Brer Tiger is in the other room there: if you hurry, you can kill him and eat him!"

Brer Lion went running into the other room, and Anansi sang to himself:

Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na bom,
Eb-ry-bod-y
Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na bom,
Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na.
Po' Tiger dead and gone.

As he was singing, Anansi went and dug a big hole outside the back door and shouted, "Brer Lion, come on out here! I've got a big stew pot where we can cook up all that meat! Grab Tiger and Monkey and Dog and Hog and put them in the pot so we can have a feast!"

Lion grabbed Tiger in one paw and Monkey in another paw and Dog in his mouth and then he picked up Hog with his tail, and he came hopping as quick as he could.

"I'm here out back," Anansi shouted.

Hop, hop, hop, Lion came on out back and fell right into that hole and broke his neck.

Anansi cackled and danced around the hole singing:

Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na bom,
Eb-ry-bod-y
Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na bom,
Si-lay-na, Si-lay-na.
Po' Hog dead and gone.
Po' Dog dead and gone.
Po' Monkey dead and gone.
Po' Tiger dead and gone.
Po' Lion dead and gone.

"I picked your pockets clean, and now I'll pick your bones clean too!"

Anansi had himself another big feast that night.

So you better watch out if Anansi ever asks you to loan him a dollar.

Author's Note

This was a lot of fun to write! I started out with the "chain of victims" story about Anansi and it has the basic plot, where Anansi borrows money from the five victims and then has the victims kill each other so that when he kills Lion himself in the end, they are all dead. That story was written in dialect, so I wrote it out in more standard English, and I also fixed a gap in the story; in the version Beckwith collected, Anansi didn't actually tell Monkey to kill Dog. I made sure my story didn't have any gaps.

Then I started filling things up with more details until I hit 999 words. I added the little song, based on a song that Anansi sang in another story about Tiger (Tiger as Riding-Horse). I added the parts where Anansi tells each animal why they should kill the animal before them; that is a typical chain-tale detail where the sounds that animals make are often how you create the chain (like in Old MacDonald Had a Farm). I spread out the animals coming at noon so there was a three-minute gap in-between each one. I also added the part where Anansi tells Lion to bring the other animals with him when he comes outside; it was fun imagining the Lion trying to carry them all, kind of like in a cartoon.

I love the repetition in stories like these. Children love these kinds of stories too, and I don't see why adults should not enjoy them just as much! Folktales like this show that such stories were told by and for adults, not just confined to children's stories. It's good that there is the 1000-word limit because I probably would have found all kinds of other repetitions to weave into the story if I did not have to stop!

Bibliography

Chain of Victims, in Jamaica Anansi Stories by Martha Warren Beckwith (1924). For this story, her informant was: Richard Morgan, Santa Cruz Mountains.

For my own future reference, I am copying out Beckwith's comparative notes here, I am adding links to where you can read these stories online, replacing Beckwith's page number citations with the actual story titles and links where available: "Common as is the story of the "chain of victims" in Africa, Falconer gave me the only version I heard in Jamaica. Compare Koelle, Fable of a Weasel and His Wife; Dayrell, How a Hunter Obtained Money; Nassau, A Chain of Circumstances; Tremearne, How the Spider Obtained a Feast and The Spider Pays His Debts; Lenz, 39-40 [German]; Boas, Tale of the Rabbit (this is an extraordinary recitation; the chain of victims starts at the bottom of page 207); Rattray, A Story about a Beetle."

Also, the Herskovits collection of Suriname folklore (published in 1936, so not cited by Beckwith) opens with this tale type, and in two versions: Outwitting Creditors: Chain of Victims (with detailed bibliography) and Version 2. Plus there are variations: Outwitting Creditors: Escape Inside Gourd: Talking Gourd, Outwitting Creditors: How Slavery Began, and Outwitting Creditors: Anansi Tricks Banker Buffalo.

The ATU Tale Type is 2024: Rabbit Borrows Money. A rabbit borrows money from a beetle, a hen, a fox, a dog, a tiger, and a hunter. When the beetle asks for the money back, the rabbit tells him to wait behind to count the money. Instead, the hen eats the beetle, then the fox eats the hen, etc. Here is the bibliography: Haavio 1929f. I; Schwarzbaum 1979, 331 not. 6 [I checked; no African citations there]; Petitat/Pahud 2003, 26. Greek: cf. Megas/Puchner 1998, No. *2024; Spanish-American, Mexican: Robe 1973; Mayan: Penalosa 1992, No. 2024; Venezuelan: Hansen, 1957, No. **2024.

It is strange that there is no African material cited in ATU! This story looks like a prime example where we desperately need a true African story index that is organized as an African index, reflecting those story patterns first, and only then looking for comparative indications.

Images

SVGSilh Hog.
SVGSilh Dog.

Wikimedia Monkey.

Wikimedia Tiger.

Lion Coloring Pages.

How to Draw a Cartoon Spider. I made the animation by turning the spider into a circle gif using LunaPic and then rotating it with GIMP.