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jennifermreads's review
2.0
Inspired by the new picture book Jump at the Sun, I was eager to read some Zora Neale Hurston … but I didn’t want to start where everyone does, with Their Eyes Were Watching God. And what better place to begin than a book of stories for children, right? Because they’ll be short and easily digestible? Except …
I feel like the middle and end were missing from the stories, and, that the pieces that make them folktales, were buried or eliminated. Was the adaptation poorly done? These cannot be Hurston’s words, can they? I’ve heard such gushing over Joyce Carol Thomas’s work and how she is to be credited, with Alice Walker, for bringing Hurston’s work to the world rather than letting in languish in archives. I’m baffled enough that I requested the original book from which these tales were taken, Every Tongue Got to Confess: Negro Stories from the Gulf States so that I can judge on the original text and collection.
I feel like the middle and end were missing from the stories, and, that the pieces that make them folktales, were buried or eliminated. Was the adaptation poorly done? These cannot be Hurston’s words, can they? I’ve heard such gushing over Joyce Carol Thomas’s work and how she is to be credited, with Alice Walker, for bringing Hurston’s work to the world rather than letting in languish in archives. I’m baffled enough that I requested the original book from which these tales were taken, Every Tongue Got to Confess: Negro Stories from the Gulf States so that I can judge on the original text and collection.
jonbrammer's review
4.0
The Skull Talks Back is a spooky collection of six ghostly folk tales retold by renowned author and anthropologist Zora Neale Hurston. During the 1930s, Hurston studied the folk culture, stories, and songs of Black communities in the American South and the Caribbean. This folk culture is an important component of her most acclaimed novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, in which she captures not just the culture of her hometown of Eatonville, Florida, but also the everyday language of the people in the town.
The Skull Talks Back introduces young readers to this world through scary stories told in vernacular language that combines the supernatural with a humorous edge, and that usually ends up with a character running away in terror. From a rebellious talking mule to a skin-shedding witch, children learn how folk tales are told to remind the listener about the rules of society, and the difference between right and wrong. The evocative illustrations by Leonard Jenkins, cast in dark tones with renderings of skulls, witches, and black cats, add to the uncanny feeling. The Skull Talks Back is a fantastic entry into the world of Zora Neale Hurston, as well as a delightfully scary example of our diverse cultural heritage.
The Skull Talks Back introduces young readers to this world through scary stories told in vernacular language that combines the supernatural with a humorous edge, and that usually ends up with a character running away in terror. From a rebellious talking mule to a skin-shedding witch, children learn how folk tales are told to remind the listener about the rules of society, and the difference between right and wrong. The evocative illustrations by Leonard Jenkins, cast in dark tones with renderings of skulls, witches, and black cats, add to the uncanny feeling. The Skull Talks Back is a fantastic entry into the world of Zora Neale Hurston, as well as a delightfully scary example of our diverse cultural heritage.
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