The younger brother was surprised that the cat could talk but apparently got over that pretty fast and did what the cat asked. After the cat donned his fancy new boots, he gathered up a burlap sack of wheat and went walking away on his back feet. Using the wheat to trap some fat partridges, the cat then went off in search of a king.
Category: #FairytaleTuesday
#FairytaleTuesday: Dreams of the Ghost Kingdom
In Spring of 2022 , Shannon Quist, an author and adoptee, wrote her Master's thesis on these gaps in knowledge and the methods that some adoptees have turned to in order to better understand their lives and their stories, including the use of auto-fiction. As you read the following guest post, I ask that you try to look at it through the eyes of someone who didn't know her story and how her journey--and that of other adoptees--has been one of tales and truth and the ways in which she has sought to find the balance between and write her own story.-- Elizabeth
#FairytaleTuesday: Clever Hans
Well, for a nice change of pace we have a maiden that is being sought by a man and when she realizes how thoughtless and rude he is, she sends him packing. This is one of the few stories we've had that shows a fairytale maiden taking charge of her agency and deciding her own fate, though admittedly, it does take a bit.
#FairytaleTuesday: The Maiden Without Hands
A miller, who was so poor that he had nothing else but his mill and a large apple tree behind it, went into the forest to fetch wood. While there he met an old man who said: 'Why are you torturing yourself so much? I’ll make you rich if you promise to give me what’s behind your mill. In three years I’ll come and fetch what’s mine.'
#FairytaleTuesday: Little Louse and Little Flea
A little louse and a little flea were living together in a house and were brewing beer in an eggshell when the louse fell in and was scalded. Then the flea began to scream as loud as he could, and the little door to the room asked: “Why are you screaming, little flea?”
Fairytale/Folklore Hiatus
My comps have to be completed by April 15th and my oral defense has to be completed by April 30th. So, I'll get back into the good stuff after that. I promise...
#FairytaleTuesday: The Devil with the Three Golden Hairs
This is not a story that I was super-familiar with but apparently the rest of everyone is VERY familiar with it! It's really long for a Grimm tale, it has multiple tale types, multiple variants in multiple countries, and it MAY have influenced Tolkien. It's like a little hidden folklore bomb!
#FairytaleTuesday: The Singing Bone
Okay! So this is a relatively short story that has just an unbelievable number of variations and adaptations. I'll be using the Grimm story in this entry but we will discuss some of the variations because they are important to the conversation. Having said that, there are surprisingly few images of this variation so I included the entire story instead.
#FairytaleTuesday: Death and the Goose Boy
In reading the story, it's wildly obvious that this is a Christian allegory. And while I immediately understood the reference to "Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob," I was a little thrown as to who the Goose Boy actually was. I mean, I may know an absurd amount when it comes to mythology and folklore but the Bible has never been an area of focus for me. So my first thought was that it was about King David, of "David and Goliath" fame.
#FairytaleTuesday: Little Red Cap
The basic theme of all of these stories, however, is that little girls that stray from the path will find themselves at the mercy of a Big Bad Wolf (or another vicious beastie). And no, in the Western versions we're not talking about actual wolves. IT'S A METAPHOR, PEOPLE!
