Today's story is another from Amber's World Lit class. "The Brahmin's Dream" is also from India, a part of the The Panchatantra.
A poor Brahmin lived in a village. He begged for a living and one day got some barley-meal. He ate a bit and put the rest in a pot that he hung by his cot. As he stared at the pot, he began to daydream.
He dreamt that if a famine came to the land, then he could sell it for a hundred rupees. With these silver coins, he would buy a pair of goats. They would have kids in every six months and soon he would acquire a herd of goats. Then he would trade the goats for cows and then buffaloes and then mares. The mares would have horses and he would sell them. with the gold he earned he would buy a large house. Soon, a wealthy man would come buy and offer his daughter in marriage, along...
I know I'm posting a day late, but I just got busy yesterday.
Today's story is one Amber actually told me the other day when she came home from school. She read it in her World Lit class. She and I talk about what we're reading fairly often. The story is "Slow, the Weaver." It's from India, a part of the The Panchatantra. The Panchatantra is a collection of fables and stories from ancient India - five books in one. Some parts are in prose, others in verse. Animals act and talk in some of them, and suggest Indian living, tricks of survival, cunning and idiocy and adaptations. You can read "Slow, the Weaver" at The Gold Scales, but I'm going to try to retell it like she told me.
Slow is the weaver's name. One day he goes out to cut a tree down, but the fairy tells him not to. Instead, she'll grant him a wish. Uh, oh, I think....
I'm not feeling quite up to par today, so I went digging in my archives and found "Tamlane," a story I had forgotten. It's a tale of a young man and the woman who loves him, both children of earls, told by Joseph Jacobs in More English Fairy Tales, 1894. I like this one because it's the woman who has to come to the man's rescue.
Tamlane and Burd Janet grew up together and had known since they were young that they would marry, but when the time comes near, Tamlane up and disappears to no one knows where. Many days later, Burd Janet takes a walk in the Carterhaugh Wood and is picking flowers from a bush when who should appear but Tamlane. She asks where he's been, and he responds that he's been in Elfland, a knight of the Queen. He says it's a wonderful place, except he misses her and he's afraid that he is going to be...
I've got one of Aesop's best known fables today, "The Tortoise and the Hare."
A Hare one day ridiculed the short feet and slow pace of the Tortoise, who replied, laughing: "Though you be swift as the wind, I will beat you in a race." The Hare, believing her assertion to be simply impossible, assented to the proposal; and they agreed that the Fox should choose the course and fix the goal. On the day appointed for the race the two started together. The Tortoise never for a moment stopped, but went on with a slow but steady pace straight to the end of the course. The Hare, lying down by the wayside, fell fast asleep. At last waking up, and moving as fast as he could, he saw the Tortoise had reached the goal, and was comfortably dozing after her fatigue.
Yes, slow but steady wins the race, but I think even more appropriate, over-confidence and cockiness can lose the race. As...
Today's tale, "Zelinda and the Monster," comes from Italy and was retold in Italian Popular Tales by Thomas Frederick Crane, published 1885. I was kind of surprised that I actually found a "Z" fairy tale. It's a variation of "Beauty and the Beast."
Zelinda is the youngest daughter of a poor man. I like when fairy tale characters have actual names, rather than being referred to as the princess or the youngest. Zelinda is of course lovely and kind and her two older sisters were jealous of her, but of course she is her father's favorite. The father has to go to the market in a neighboring town and offers to bring back gifts for his daughters. He easily purchases a dress for one and a shawl for the other, but can't find the rose Zelinda requested.
On the way home, the father passes a garden with a partially open gate. He quietly enters and sees a gorgeous rosebush, but there is...
I have mixed feelings about Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tales. Some are just so moralistic and some just too sad. "Thumbelina," however, has a happy ending and though there are a few sad moments it's overall an enjoyable story. The version I read was from Hans Andersen's Fairy Tales by Hans Christian Andersen, translated by Mrs. Henry H. B. Paull, 1875.
The tale opens in a rather traditional way with a woman who desperately wants a child. She goes to a fairy for help and the fairy sells her a barleycorn which she plants in a flower-pot. It grows a lovely flower and when the flower opens, a tiny girl, Thumbelina, also called Tiny, emerges. Thumbelina has a lovely life with the woman until one night, when she is asleep in her walnut-shell cradle, she gets carried off by a toad who wants the miniature maiden as a bride for her son. With the help of friendly fish and a butterfly,...