Amazonia: Indigenous Tales from Brazil by Nikolai Popov (Illustrator), Daniel Munduruku (Narrator) › Visit Amazon's Daniel Munduruku Page search results for this author Daniel Munduruku (Narrator), Jane Springer (Translator) (23-Apr-2013) Hardcover

by Daniel Munduruku

Excellent Book

Genres: Indigenous, Childrens, Brazil, Nonfiction, Folklore

Hardcover

First published May 14, 2013

About the author

Escritor indígena, graduado em Filosofia, tem licenciatura em História e Psicologia.
Doutor em Educação pela USP.
É pós-doutor em Linguística pela Universidade Federal de São Carlos - UFSCar.
Diretor presidente do Instituto UKA - Casa dos Saberes Ancestrais.
Autor de 52 livros para crianças, jovens e educadores é Comendador da Ordem do Mérito Cultural da Presidência da República desde 2008. Em 2013 recebeu a mesma honraria na categoria da Grã-Cruz, a mais importante honraria oficial a um cidadão brasileiro na área da cultura.
Membro Fundador da Academia de Letras de Lorena.
Recebeu diversos prêmios no Brasil e Exterior entre eles o Prêmio Jabuti, Prêmio da Academia Brasileira de Letras, o Prêmio Érico Vanucci Mendes (outorgado pelo CNPq); Prêmio Tolerância (outorgado pela UNESCO). Muitos de seus livros receberam o selo Altamente Recomendável outorgado pela Fundação Nacional do Livro Infantil e Juvenil (FNLIJ).
Em 2017 foi contemplado com o Prêmio Jabuti na categoria Juvenil.
Ganhador do Prêmio da Fundação Bunge pelo conjunto de sua obra e atuação cultural, em 2018.
Reside em Lorena, interior de SP.

Reviews

[Jen · Rating 4 out of 5]

The myths of a culture give us many clues to what kind of people the culture hopes the boys and girls who hear the stories will become. In Japan, the traditional tale of Momotaro (Peach Boy) shows how the culture values men who work well with others and are brave and strong.

Since this collection features myths from different cultures around the Amazon, we get insights into what Munduruku, Bororo, Manao and other peoples want their children to value.

My kids' favourite story is The Brothers Bacororo and Itubore, which is about two siblings who convinced a number of animals to stop preying on people. This creative duo tricked some animals and won fairly against others to extract promises from them to become herbivores.

One of the things we liked most about the book was the exotic plants and animals! It was fun looking up jabiru storks and harpy eagles and pawoe fish. You can see that they look as if they could be predators!

Another favourite is The Beautiful Deer, about a young man named Piripiri who turns into a deer (a weredeer?) and has a special bond with his mother. My kids said that they thought Piripiri would turn out to be dangerous because piripiri means to tingle in Japanese- I guess he made their spidey senses tingle!

We read the stories in this book before bedtime over a week and what my kids are left with are two major impressions: there are a lot of tribes and a lot of animals in the rainforest of Brazil, and smells are important to all of them.

This was a fascinating look into a variety of myths from the Amazon area of Brazil, and it's very interesting to try to compare these stories with others from other cultures like Momotaro or Odysseus, and see how similar themes crop up all over the world.

[Csenge · Rating 4 out of 5]

A beautifully illustrated collection of indigenous myths from Amazonia. Gorgeous book, and interesting stories that are often strange to the European reader. As a storyteller, I would not venture to tell any of them, but it was a good reading experience to be transported into another world. A very quick read, though, I could have done with some more stories.

[Edward Sullivan · Rating 3 out of 5]

A handsomely illustrated and designed collection of magical tales from indigenous peoples native to Brazil's Amazon region. There is a glossary but this collection would be stronger with source information on the stories and background on the indigenous peoples represented.

[Baroness · Rating 1 out of 5]

I wanted to like this book but the stories lacked the connection I was hoping to find.

[Sarah · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really wanted to like this book but I found it to be really sexist. Boys and men are the center of every story. Even the Sun & Moon are both male. The only time girls or women are included are either as breeders for main characters or because they are doing something unhelpful. Perhaps the editor didn't have access to women's or girl's stories - maybe the only tales collected from this part of the world have been by men for men... In any case as a collection of stories, I will NOT recommend this book.

[Dávid Ursiny · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very good and quite representative collection (although in such small scale) of Brazilian indigenous oral tradition edited by Daniel Munduruku, which is member of Mundurucu tribe of Brasilian Amazonia (Rio Tapajós basin).
It would be interesting to have look on russian original of the book, which I think contains more tales. Also illustrations of Nikolai Popov are great example of fusion of two completely different worlds of imagination. Nikolai Popov was awarded Grand Prix at BIB 1975.

[Sylvie Gold · Rating 2 out of 5]

A beautifully illustrated compendium of folktales from various indigenous peoples of the Brazilian rainforest, but I found the stories to be rather disturbing.

[Barbara · Rating 3 out of 5]

Twelve interesting stories from Brazil feature talking mermaids, women intent on a relationship with a handsome shapeshifting man, and a woman with a fierce appetite. The stories are lively and full of interesting details that allow readers to take a glimpse into the Amazon region. Taken alongside the lovely illustrations, this is a fascinating book. I wish there had been more illustrations, though.