The transmission and reproduction of folktales with special reference to Nanana Bosele

Abstract

The genre 'folktales' is one of the oldest forms of oral tradition which amongst other things, was used to impart and store knowledge from generation to generation. It is very important and is regarded as the wealth and the treasure chest of the nation. Different types of research have been done on folktales but surprisingly, many scholars seem to have ignored the subject of how they are disseminated. A tale when passed on from one individual to another, from one community to anotller, from one generation to the next, undergoes some form of metamorphosis. As each person repeats the story as s/he imagines or recalls what s/he has heard from the previous narrator, 'it undergoes many successive changes before it, at length, arrives at that relatively fixed form at which it may become current throughout a whole community' Bartlett (1965:247). The aim of this article is to examine three versions of the same story in order to reveal how, over decades, a story can been transmitted, altered, augmented and retold by different performers/authors. The discussion will commence with the most original one, followed by the intermediate and end with the latest version of the story.