Sequoyah and his talking leaves a play about the cherokee syllabary coleman wim perrin pat feeney siri weber amazoncomau books. Sequoyah and his talking leaves a play about the cherokee syllabary by wim coleman and pat perrin illustrated by siri weber feeney this is a childrens book about sequoyah s si qua ya and his creation of a cherokee writing system or syllabary this book is is a play in four acts with twelve parts about sequoyah during the time he created the written language of the cherokee. Sequoyahs invention of a written cherokee language is retold as a short stage play prolific nonfiction writers and husband and wife team coleman and perrin re create the story of native american metalsmith sequoyah who fascinated by the white mans talking leaves fashions a syllabary not an alphabet despite the misgivings of some of his people. Sequoyah and his talking leaves sequoyah and his talking leaves for fluency stage the setting about the play sequoyah was a native american cherokee like most of his people he was illiterate that means that he could not read and write but there was no written cherokee language for anyone to read or write not until sequoyah . He had seen non native soldiers reading from what he called talking leaves words on paper and was determined to find a way for the cherokee to do the same sequoyah ca 1776 ca 1843 was used to making tools for his work as both a blacksmith and a silversmith creating talking leaves however was quite another matter but he listened hard to his language and found that it lent itself not to letters of an alphabet but to syllables one symbol for each of 85 syllables