Tales with a Texas Twist: Original Stories And Enduring Folklore From The Lone Star State

by Donna Ingham, Paul G. Hoffman (Illustrator)

Overview

Storytelling is both an art form and a means of passing on significant elements of a culture—the history, the traditions, the humor, the pathos. It is a way of entertaining and being entertained. With this compilation of Texas—and Texanized—favorite myths and legends, award-winning tale teller Donna Ingham applies her own unmistakable voice to traverse her home state through such stories as: • "The Coming of the Bluebonnet"—an oft-collected Commanche myth about love and sacrifice and the origin of the Texas state flower—"The Story Behind the Story"—about two early cattlemen and the basis for an episode in Larry McMurtry's "Lonesome Dove"—"The Life and Times of Pecos Bill"—a selection of tales about this legendary folk hero—"Diamond Bill"—about an east Texas rattlesnake who fought in the Civil War—"Cupid Was a Mama's Boy"—a Texanized classic Greek myth ...And much more!

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780762738991
Publisher:	Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Publication date:	10/01/2005
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	160
Product dimensions:	5.25(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.44(d)
Age Range:	3 Months to 17 Years

About the Author

Donna Ingham leads workshops and training sessions on storytelling and has taught storytelling classes at the University of Texas in Austin. Her repertoire includes original stories and tales based on history, folklore, and outrageous lies. She has five audio recordings and is listed as a Texas Touring Artist by the Texas Commission on the Arts and a Heartland Arts Fund Regional Artist through the Mid-America Arts Alliance. As a humorist and folklorist, she takes the ancient art of storytelling and gives it a Texas twist to entertain audiences of all ages. She lives in Spicewood, Texas, with her husband, Jerry, and has one son, Christopher. Artist Paul G. Hoffman has illustrated books of many genres, including the Globe Pequot Spooky series. For this title he recalled the storybooks of his childhood.

Read an Excerpt

From "Cupid Was a Mama's Boy" Cupid was a mama's boy. He was. If you've read any of the stories about him, you'll remember he was always doing the bidding of his mama, Venus, who just happened to be, of course, the goddess of love. These days we see Cupid as a fat little naked boy-child with a toy bow and arrow who's full of mischief, flying around shooting people and making them fall in love with one another. But he wasn't always that way. No sir. When some Roman fellow—Lucius Apuleius, his name was—wrote about Cupid back in century ought-two A.D., he made him a perfectly handsome young man. But he was still a mama's boy. One day, you see, his mama called him in and said, "Son, I've got a job for you." "Yes ma'am," Cupid said. You would go far to find a boy that was any more agreeable. "There's this girl named Psyche," Venus said, "the king over yonder's youngest daughter. They say she's pretty enough to make a man plow through a stump, and I just can't take the competition. Why, folks have stopped coming to my temples and lighting fires in the altars. They're all over at the king's place fairly worshipping this mere mortal of a girl-destined to get old and ugly and die some day, but I can't wait. So here's what I want you to do. . ." From "The Life and Times of Pecos Bill" Way back, when little Bill was just a baby, his ma and his pa decided it was getting a might too crowded where they were because some new neighbors had moved in just a mere hundred miles away. So they loaded everything they owned into one of those Conestoga wagons—one of those covered wagons—and headed west with little Bill and his sixteen brothers and sisters in the back. Some folks say little Bill was having a fine time bouncing along in the back of that wagon when he just bounced right out as the wagon was crossing the Pecos River. Others say no, that's not right. What happened was that Bill decided as long as they were crossing a river, he'd just throw him a fishing line in and see if he couldn't catch something. Sure enough, one of those big old Texas catfish came along, grabbed Bill's line, and jerked him into the river. Well, whichever way it happened, there he sat on the banks of the Pecos River watching his whole family still moving west. They didn't even miss him for several weeks until they finally took a head count. Meanwhile, Bill was about lower than a gopher hole, and his prospects didn't look too good.. . .

Table of Contents

Tales with a Texas Twist: Original Stories and Enduring Folklore from the Lone Star State

Table of Contents

Lone Star Storytelling [Introduction]
1. The Myth of Cora Persephone
2.Cupid Was a Mama's Boy
3. The Coming of the Bluebonnet
4.The Ghost at Hornsby's Bend
5.The Legend of El Muerto
6. Lobo Girl of Devil's River
7.The Ghost Light on Bailey's Prairie
8. The Babe of the Alamo
9.Yellow Rose of Texas
10.The White Comanche of the Plains
11.Sam Bass, the Texas Robin Hood
12.The Story Behind the Story
13.Mollie Bailey Was a Spy
14.Arizona Bill
15.Diamond Bill
16.Bigfoot Wallace and the Hickory Nuts
17.The Life and Times of Pecos Bill
18.The Meandering Melon
19.One Turkey-Power
20.The Texan and the Blue Lambs
21.The Texan and the Grass Hut
22.The Story of the Three Bubbas
23.Teeny Tangerine Twirling Rope
24.Pedro y El Diablo
25.The Old Woman and the Robbers
26.Pretty Polly and Mr. Fox
27.Br'er Rabbit's Share Cropping
28.Br'er Rabbit, Br'er Coon, and the Frogs

Bibliography