After reading this story, I could clearly see why many people believe that the Disney movie of The Lion King is based on this story. To tell the truth, after reading this, it is definitely difficult to comprehend how Disney could say that The Lion King was a completely original story created by Disney. Therefore Disney must have been lying.
The stories and life of Sundiata Keita apparently comes from oral tales that were written and later translated by Europeans. This sort of goes back to what we discussed in class in the beginning of the semester of how oral tales were written down and soon transformed into the genre of fairy tales we now know today.
To discuss the story, the plot of this story almost exactly follows the plot line of the Lion King movie and thus I found many similarities or things that reminded me of the movie. First of all, many characters in this story corresponded to several supporting characters in the film. The griot loosely reminded me of Zazu, who serves a sort of helper and advisor. The king of Mema that took Sundiata in and treated him almost like a son reminded me of Timón and Pumba, who also took the lion king in as their son and teached him their ways. In regard to the overall plot, it is about the same with the addition of some new characters, such as the half brother and his mother. Sundiata is born and hated by the bad guy, who in this story is Sassouma Bérété and her son. She immediately hates Sundiata, like Scar in the film, because she wants her son to take the throne. Sundiata is eventually driven away because of Sassouma Bérété, where he is then raised and mentored by the King of Mema. Eventually, someone from his kingdom finds him and begs Sundiata to come back to save them and take the throne as the rightful king. In the film, Nala would have been the “messenger” that convinced Simba to come back. Sundiata then comes back and defeats the bigger villain, the sorcerer and takes his place as the lion king. There is also this idea that everyone is connected and has a place in this kingdom, just like in the film where each and every animal has a part to play in their land and in the circle of life.
There was also talk about kings of the past and lessons of the past when the Griot begins to tell the story of Sundiata in this story, which is sort of covered in the movie as well
Some of the biggest differences however is that there are more enemies or villains such as the King’s other child in addition to a sorcerer. Also, the father is not murdered but dies when it is his time.
Overall, I enjoyed reading this story and definitely do not believe that Disney came up with the Lion King film all on their own.
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