The Ananse Chronicles

One day - as the legend goes - Ananse decided to take knowledge and wisdom away from all human beings, everywhere. He collected all the wisdom from the earth, and tried to hide it on top of the tallest tree in the forest. When he placed the pot behind himself, Ananse fell, and the pot broke. Wisdom was scattered all over the world, and everyone got a piece of knowledge.

Can you see the moral of this tale? The answer is found in my book, How the Spider Became Bald. This story may also be available from Electric Bookworm Publishing.

How the Spider Became Bald -- 25 short folktales and legends from West Africa.   Perfect for reading aloud.

Stories about Ananse and other folk heroes, are a very important part of African culture. As parents and grandparents shares the stories with their children and grandchildren, the stories teach each new generation the community's values and virtues.

How the Spider Became Bald: Folktales and Legends from West Africa is available from Amazon.com, and from Barnes & Noble.

Remembering the Home Spirits: A Journey Back to Africa

Writing and telling stories is my strength, inherited from a long line of storytellers. This collection of stories and a play continues this tradition. This collection is full of wonderful and satisfying odd twists and turns. However, each story encourages the reader to surrender to its enchantments, twists, turns, and learn much about the African people and culture.

The stories provide insights into the continent of Africa as experienced by the writer over a period of more than forty years with all the dramatic challenges, tensions, and changes as found for example in the play, "The Coup," as Africa enters the modern age.

These stories introduce characters one can readily identify with; for these fears, emotions, and entities are universal. Every reader can identify with the story of my growing up with my friend in the story, " Freddie and Me and the Kite." Many of the characters are clever and even sincerely philosophic, such as the characters in the story, "In the Company of Good Spirits." Many of the characters are even comical such as those in the Ananse folktale, "There Is No Right Way to Do A Dumb Thing."

These stories are perhaps autobiographical, an interconnected set of stories capturing perfectly the myriad stages of my life over a long period of time. This is graphically demonstrated beginning with stories from childhood like "Freddie and the Kite," "My Father's Twin Sister," "The Legend of Anna the Midwife," and then moving to the trauma and polemical drama of returning home in the story, "Looking Back from the Hill," and then to contemporary Africa with the story, "The Death of Innocence."

"Looking Back from the Hill," is the story that stands out for me. In essence, this collection is a parable of what happens when things fall apart, from the loss of my coat of arms (an elephant leaning against a palm tree) to the trickster, Ananse, the spider. Thus, the collection is an insightful and sometimes factual tour through important moments in my life and my own understanding of the peoples and cultures of Africa via my own country of Ghana.

Remembering the Home Spirits is a lovely collection of Rev. Addo's boyhood experiences in Ghana West Africa, African tales, stories of hope and freedom, and even a short play to give the reader a taste of freedom lost. Available on CD from amazon.com, as well as from Electric Bookworm.

Ghana Folktales, another book of my Ananse stories, may be available at your local public library. Or for more information, contact me by e-mail.