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Palm-Wine Drinkard and His Dead Palm-Wine Tapster in the Dead's Town
Palm-Wine Drinkard and His Dead Palm-Wine Tapster in the Dead's Town | Amos Tutuola
9 posts | 8 read | 9 to read
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review
rwmg
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Panpan

When the un-named narrator's palm-wine tapster falls from a tree and dies, the narrator travels through a mythological landscape to find him in the Dead's Town and bring him back.

Noteworthy as the first English-language novel written by an African and published outside Africa rather than for its intrinsic interest. A Pan seems overly harsh but it just wasn't for me.

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rwmg
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Bookwomble I love this book! Tutuola is fantastic. Have you 2y
Bookwomble (clumsy fingers!) Have you read the tagged book? I think I prefer it by a cat's whisker. 2y
rwmg @Bookwomble I found this one heavy-going so I don't think I'll be reading another of his, sorry. 2y
Bookwomble @rwmg Yeah, if you didn't like this, you won't like any of his as they're all cut from the same cloth. 2y
15 likes4 comments
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Billypar
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Pickpick

I want to give some examples of the parade of vaguely human creatures that the title character meets on his quixotic quest, but I would feel like I'm spoiling them. Part of the fun is that you have no idea what bizarre nightmares are waiting offstage. Written in the style of an African folk tale, it has an ancient feel, even though many elements are like contemporary fantasy. A perfect book if you're jaded: short, weird, memorable, and well-told.

vivastory This has been on my TBR FOREVER. Need to get to it 5y
Billypar @vivastory It was on mine for a little while before I picked it up.It's always exciting to me when I'm at a bookshop and I recognize a TBR book without looking for it. 5y
BarbaraBB Those are great moments indeed @Billypar 5y
See All 7 Comments
LeahBergen What a great review! 5y
Billypar @LeahBergen Thanks! ☺ 5y
batsy Love this review! This has been on my TBR for a long time 5y
Billypar @batsy Thanks! I guess it's been on a few of our TBR's, but also in good company no doubt 🙂 5y
46 likes3 stack adds7 comments
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Billypar
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Does anyone else get curious about the life of used books before they reach you? I just peeled off the price tag of my current read and found this one traveled quite a distance.

Lcsmcat Yes! I love finding evidence of a book‘s previous life. 5y
Sunraven I like it when there‘s a bonus item tucked inside the book, like an old receipt or a note, too. ☺️ 5y
Billypar @Sunraven A cell phone receipt from 2013 fell out of one of mine recently 😁 5y
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Sunraven Haha! One of my thrifted books from years ago had a photo in it, which of course made me wonder if anyone would miss it. 🤔 5y
Billypar @Sunraven Oh wow - I never got a photo before! 5y
Sunraven Sometimes I consider leaving little papers with notes on them in my library books for the next reader. 😉 5y
Billypar @Sunraven Good thought - I like it ☺ 5y
Sunraven Or bookmarks — that would be fun! Honestly, the main thing that stops me is not knowing if it‘s against some kind of library rule. And I know I could ask, but I‘d hate to ask and have them tell me it is against a rule ... I‘d rather think of the library with pure and unstained appreciation. 😂 5y
Billypar @Sunraven I've never found anything in a library book that I can remember - maybe they're better about checking? But a bookmark would be a treat! 5y
Sunraven I‘ve found old library receipts in my library books occasionally, but I can‘t recall for sure finding anything else. I did find a fortune (like from a fortune cookie) once, but I have a suspicion I stuck it in there and forgot until I opened the book the next time. 😆 5y
45 likes10 comments
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Bookwomble
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Pickpick

The full title of Tutuola's first book gives a better impression of what lies within: "The Palm-Wine Drinkard and his Dead Palm-Wine Tapster in the Deads' Town". I found this book more fantastic, less horrific than his next novel, "My Life in the Bush of Ghosts", which takes the macabre elements a notch higher in intensity.
This book is dense despite its short length, and reads like a Jungian case study of primal archetypes. I just loved it!

Bookwomble Despite being his first novel, "Drinkard" refers passages in "My Life" as if Tutuola had not only written already, but as of it had been published and the reader would already have knowledge of it. A fantastical twisting of literary time and perceived time. 5y
11 likes1 comment
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Bookwomble
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I loved reading Tutuola's "My Life in the Bush of Ghosts" last year, so here I am starting his first novel, "The Palm-Wine Drinkard". Only 12 pages in and it's already rather disorienting: Tutuola's style is powerful and intensely ideosyncratic.
Today's reading experience is enhanced by the happy discovery that I'm 400kcals below my daily intake and that a martini is only 200kcals! Don't mind if I do ???

batsy I have this one and I've been pretty intimidated to read it 😆 5y
Bookwomble @batsy I've only just started it, but it seems like it's pretty similar to My Life..., which I've read and enjoyed, so I'd say, jump in! 😀 5y
14 likes2 comments
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2BR02B
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I found a 1953 edition! I adore the patina on the pages of old paperbacks. 😍

batsy That's a great find! 7y
27 likes1 stack add1 comment
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parasolofdoom
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Finished my #LitsyAtoZ challenge! Here are M-R @bookishmarginalia

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balletbookworm
Pickpick

I really got into this short novel that Tutuola wrote to keep young Nigerians (circa 1950) interested in Yoruba culture. It's so amazing that, in all the ways we try and create differences between cultures, our folktales rely on the same magic and tricksters and great feats no matter where on Earth.