The domei is a popular narrative art form among the Mende people of
Sierra Leone. Although it is a traditional form, the narratives are not
remembered or retold, but on each occasion the performers recreate out
of a common stock of characters and plots domeisia, which are singular
and sometimes brilliant expressions of a singular, and often brilliant,
culture. In this book Donald Cosentino presents a large selection of
these narratives, as he collected them in dramatic performance on the
verandahs and around the cooking fires of a Mende village. The domei is
told to please, and Dr Cosentino details the various elements that
constitute the pleasure of an oral performance. But beneath the surface
glitter of these ironic, horrifying, bawdy and haunting narrative
performances, there is an intellectual hardness of argument and debate
which shines through the domeisia included here. Dominating these
performances, and emblematic of the entire artistic tradition, are the
'everywoman' figure of the Defiant Maid, Yombo, and the 'everyman'
Stubborn Farmer, Kpana.