Bourne hopes Bajan Anansi can spark reading revival among children

The donation of copies of Bajan Anansi to Milton Lynch Primary School on Tuesday was more than a literary gesture for acclaimed author Shakirah Bourne.

Launching the National Cultural Foundation’s (NCF) Bajan Anansi school tour at the Water Street, Christ Church boys’ school, Bourne said the initiative is aimed at returning the iconic folk character to the communities that created and preserved the stories while encouraging children to develop a love for reading at a time when concerns persist about literacy levels among students.

“I think I just wanted to bring justice to Anansi, to bring the stories back to the people who they belong to, honestly,” she said.

The school tour comes one day after acting Chief Education Officer Julia Beckles revealed that significant deficits remain in English language usage and expository text comprehension among students sitting this year’s Barbados Secondary Schools’ Entrance Examination.

Addressing students during a read-aloud session, Bourne explained that her connection to Anansi began when she was a pupil herself further up Water Street at Christ Church Girls’ School.

“I read Anansi books and I loved Anansi because I loved that Anansi was very mischievous and he liked playing tricks to get his way.”

She told students that although Anansi is a small spider originating from Ghana, the character succeeds through intelligence rather than strength.

“Anansi is very small but he’s also very, very smart. So even though he’s a tiny spider, he still wins against these big animals like Tiger using his intelligence. Sometimes he wins, sometimes he loses. But we always learn something from Anansi’s adventures.”

The idea for the book emerged after discovering that many of the most widely available Anansi stories were written by people outside the region, Bourne said.

“A friend of mine messaged me about Anansi stories in the Caribbean and she couldn’t find any. And I was so confused because I was like, why can’t you find Anansi stories written by Black and Caribbean and African authors?

“And when I did a search, I found that the most popular Anansi books were written by people who were outside of the community. And you know, that really got on my nerves.”

She approached the NCF with the idea of producing a collection of Barbadian Anansi tales and spent months researching the folklore, the author said.

“I started off wanting to read seven books and I ended up reading 78 books and finding the first Anansi story from 1817, the first recorded Anansi story.”

The result is a collection of 14 illustrated stories featuring distinctly Barbadian settings, characters and traditions.

“There are right now 14 stories in the book. So we have like ‘Why Bajans Eat Pigtails’. That’s one of my favorites. We have a ‘Cawwait’ story. We have ‘How the Blackbelly Sheep’s Belly Became Black.”

One of Bourne’s main goals is to make reading enjoyable for children “because we have to foster a love for reading at this age”, she said. 

“People expect a child to just pick up a book and start reading. No, they need to be trained. They need to find a love for reading.”

She added that children are more likely to engage with stories that reflect their own culture and experiences.

“I do think that they will relate to a character that they understand, to a culture that they understand. And we use a lot of Barbadian dialect as well.”

Reflecting on the response from students at Milton Lynch, Bourne said she was encouraged by their enthusiasm.

“The boys were engaged, they were listening, they were enjoying the story, they were singing the songs.

“And I think that after today that they will be interested in reading the book with parents and with librarians and other classmates.”

Bourne’s work spans award-winning children’s fiction, short stories, plays and feature films rooted in Caribbean life and folklore. 

She first gained regional attention with the comedy-drama film “Payday” and later with William Shakespeare adaptation “A Caribbean Dream”, while her middle-grade novels such as “Josephine Against the Sea” and “Nightmare Island” have brought contemporary Caribbean stories to international audiences.

Three more school visits have already been confirmed, Bourne said, with organisers hoping to complete five schools this week and expand the programme later in the year.

(LE)