Compair Lapin and Piti Bonhomme Godron (The Tar Baby)

This book was published on the 100th anniversary of the publication of the Louisiana Folk Tales (in 1995). Alec Fortier collected the stories during the 1880s and published two books, Bits of Louisiana Folklore (1888) and Louisiana Folktales (1895). Fortier dedicated his life to recording the vanishing creole culture and teaching others about it. These tales made their way to America aboard slave ships bound for Louisiana in the 1720s. Passed down orally for centuries from the Gambian region of Africa, many of the stories revolved around two popular Compair Lapin, a mischievous clever rabbit, and Bouki, a strong but foolish hyena. The tales are told in creole dialect, a language the reflected the unique dialect of French and the African tribal dialect, Wolof.

 Staplebound quarto in illustrated cardstock.