Virginia Hamilton's "The People Could Fly"

Paper Summary:

This paper discusses how Virginia Hamilton's collection of American black folktales, "The People Could Fly" (1985), portrays the tales of both animals and humans who are faced with hardships analogous to those of black slaves. It looks at how through Hamilton's careful preservation of history, her tales are laced with the recurring theme of flight. It also discusses how the notion of flying Africans seems to symbolize the black slaves' desire for liberation and transcendence over slavery, and remains a significant phenomenon in several accounts of slaves of native African origin.

From the Paper:

"According to folklorist Alan Dundes, a myth is a sacred tale describing how the world and man came to exist in their modern form, and whose purpose is to "contribute to the maintenance of the norms and values of the culture out of which 'sacred narrative' emerges" (Awkward 485). Authors of African American literature frequently make reference to Afro-American legends of slaves who had the natural ability of flight, and who used it to break out of slavery in America; that is, in essence to rise above captivity. However, flight in most American black folktales operates not just as a universal or individual symbol of transcendence, but also as a cooperative symbol of resistance by a particular cultural group within a socio-historical framework (Wilentz 21). In Virginia Hamilton's The People Could Fly, flight outwardly presents a means of escape for the Africans, but on a much broader scale represents the effective opposition to slavery, a state of being that was "too immature, fixed [and] final" (Wilentz 21). "

Sample of Sources Used:

• Awkward, Michael. "Unruly and Let Loose: Myth, Ideology, and Gender in song of Solomon." Callaloo, Volume 13, Issue 3. Maryland: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990. 482-498. Stable URL:http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=01612492%281 99022% 2913%3A3%3C482%3A %22ALLMI%3E2.0.CO%3B2-1.
• Drums and Shadows: Survival Studies among the Georgia Coastal Negroes. Savannah Unit Georgia Writer's Project. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1940.
• Lester, Julius. Black Folktales. New York: Grove, 1969.
• Weatherford, W.D. The Negro from Africa to America. New York, NY: George H. Doran Company, 1924.
• Wilentz, Gay "If You Surrender to the Air: Folk Legends of Flight and Resistance in African American Literature."MELUS, Vol. 16, No. 1, Folklore and Orature. (Spring, 1989 - Spring, 1990), pp. 21-32. Stable URL:http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0163755X %28198921%2F199021%2916%3A1%3C21%3AIYSTTA%3E2.0.CO%3B2-H.

More papers on Virginia Hamilton's "The People Could Fly":

• Book Review # 74173 : "Chinua Achebe's 'A Man of the People'"
• Essay # 73676 : "The Leader Of The People"
• Book Review # 55499 : "Fairy Tales"

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