the ogress and the snake

"People! I smell people!" growled the Ogress, looking towards the pen where the sheep and goats were settling down to sleep. "Catch them! Hook them! Kill them! Cook them!"

I collected the tales in this book from many Somali storytellers on the eastern fringe of Ethiopia, where large communities of Somali people live. In Jijiga I sat with teachers and their pupils in the shade of a tree; I was entertained in people's homes, over braziers of incense and I crowded in with a group of laughing midwives. In the ancient walled city of Harar, I leaned on cushions, while a cloth merchant kept me spellbound with his magnificent stories. In this little book you'll find princes and villains, a great whale, a mischievous fox and, of course, an ogress and a snake. As far as I know, these stories haven't been translated into English or written down before.