Folk Tales of the Congo — Part 1 (The Vanishing Wife · Another Vanishing Wife · The Wonderful Child · How Kengi Lost Her Child · How the Spider Won and Lost Nzambi's Daughter)
Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices.
Part one — the premiere of a new shelf. Five tales of the Fjort (Vili) people of the Loango coast, collected by R. E. Dennett and published in his Notes on the Folklore of the Fjort (French Congo) (1898). In The Vanishing Wife, the despised Buite wins a dream-wife, a great house and nine servants — all held by one condition about the fish he brings home, and lost the ninth time he breaks it. In Another Vanishing Wife, the maltreated Mavungu pulls a leaf from the fuba-tree and finds a wife who transforms him and builds him a town — until his own family coaxes the secret out of him, garment by garment. In The Wonderful Child, a newborn speaks, hunts an elephant, and wins his father's recognition with a song. In How Kengi Lost Her Child, two co-wives' own agreement decides who keeps a child, in a palaver judged by Manilombi. And in How the Spider Won and Lost Nzambi's Daughter, the spider's embassy climbs his own thread to the blue roof of heaven to fetch Nzambi Mpungu's fire — and the helpers' rival claims cost him the bride. The episode opens and closes with its theme, Spotlight After Midnight, heard also briefly between the stories.
Chapters
0:37 The Vanishing Wife
5:50 Another Vanishing Wife
10:52 The Wonderful Child
13:04 How Kengi Lost Her Child
15:42 How the Spider Won and Lost Nzambi's Daughter
Other tales of the book are not read on this shelf, each excluded by name after a full reading: The Smart Man and the Fool · Zinga · How Nsassi (Gazelle) Got Married (IV) · The Jealous Wife (VII) · Ngomba's Balloon (VIII) · The Wicked Husband (IX) · The Twin Brothers (XII) · The Chimpanzee and Gorilla (XIV) · The Antelope and the Leopard (XV) · The Turtle and the Man (XVII) · The Gazelle and the Leopard (XIX) · The Wild Cat and the Gazelle (XX) · The Rabbit and the Antelope (XXIII) · The Leopard and the Crocodile (XXVI) · Nzambi's Daughter and Her Slave (Appendix I). One further tale, Why Some Men Are White and Others Black (XXVII), is held for a ruling and is not read. No claim of completeness for the book is made.
From Notes on the Folklore of the Fjort (French Congo) by R. E. Dennett (1898), public domain — tales V, VI, X, XI and XVI, complete and in book order. Narrated by Violetta. Theme: Spotlight After Midnight.
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