fairytale friday with fairy tale about the wicker chair

Fairy Tale About The Wicker Chair
written by Hermann Hesse

     A young man sat in his solitary attic.  His greatest desire was to become a painter, but first he had to overcome quite a few obstacles.  To begin with, he lived peacefully in his attic, grew somewhat older, and became accustomed to sitting for hours in front of a small mirror and experimenting with painting self-portraits.  He had already filled an entire notebook with such sketches, and he was very satisfied with some of them.
     "Considering htat I never went to art school," he said to himself, "this sketch has turned out rather well.  And that is an interesting wrinkle there next to the nose.  You can see that I'm something of a thinker or something similar.  I need only to lower the corner of the mouth a little.  Then I'd have my own special expression, quite melancholy."
     But when he reexamined the sketches sometime later, most of them no longer pleased him.  That was irritating, but he concluded from this that he had made progress and was now placing greater demands himself.
     The young man did not live in the most desirable attic, nor did he have a very agreeable relationship with the things lying and standing around this attic.  However, it was not a bad relationship.  He hardly noticed the objects and was not very familiar with them.
     Whenever he failed to paint a good self-portrait, he read for a while from books and learned what had happened to other people who, like him, had begun as modest and completely unknown painters and then had become very famous.  He liked to read such books and read his own future in them.
     So one day he was again somewhat sullen and depressed and sat at home reading about a very famous Dutch painter.  He read that this painter had been possessed by a true passion.  Indeed, he was frenetic and completely governed by a drive to become a good painter.  The young man found that he had many traits in common with this Dutch painter.  As he read further, he also discovered many that did not exactly fit him.  Among other things he read that whenever the Dutchman had not been able to paint outside due to bad weather, he had painted everything inside, even the tiniest object that met his eyes, unflinchingly and passionately.  One time he had painted a pair of old wooden shoes, and another time an old crooked chair--a coarse, rough kitchen and peasant chair made out of ordinary wood, with a seat woven out of straw, quite tattered.  The painter had painted this chair, which nobody certainly would have considered worth a glance, with so much love and dedication and with so much passion and devotion that it became one of his most beautiful pictures.  The painter's biographer found many wonderful and appropriately touching words to say about this painted straw chair.

     Here the reader stopped and contemplated.  That was something new that he had to try.  He decided immediately--for he was a young man who made very rash decisions--to imitate the example of this great master and to try this way to greatness.
     He looked around in his attic and realized that he had actually not paid much attention to the things among which he lived.  He did not find a crooked chair with a set woven out of straw anywhere; nor were there any wooden shoes.  Therefore he was momentarily dejected and despondent, and he almost felt discouraged, as he had often felt whenever he read about the lives of great men.  At those times he realized that all the little indicators and remarkable coincidences that had played roles in the lives of the others had not become apparent in his life, and he would wait in vain for them to appear.  However, he soon pulled himself together and realized that it was now his task to be persistent and pursue his difficult path to fame.  He examined all the objects in his little room and discovered a wicker chair that could serve him very well as a model.
     He pulled the chair closer with his foot, sharpened his art pencil, took his sketch pad on his knee, and began to draw.  After a couple of light first strokes, he seemed tohave captured the form sufficiently, and now he inked in the thick outlines with a few firm and powerful strokes.  A deep triangular shadow in a corner attracted him, and he painted it full of strength, and so he continued until something began to disturb him.
     He worked a little while longer.  Then he held the sketch pad away from himself and examined his sketch carefully.  His very first glance told him that he had completely failed to capture the wicker chair.

John Foster Dyess

     Angrily he drew a new line into the sketch and fixed his eyes grimly on the chair.  The sketch was still not right.  It made him mad.
     "You demonic wicker chair!" he screamed violently.  "I've never seen a beast as moody as you are!"
     The chair cracked a little and said with equanimity, "Yes, take a look at me!  I am as I am, and I won't change myself anymore."
     The painter kicked it with his toe.  The chair swerved backward to avoid the kick and now looked completely different.
     "You dumb chair!" the young man exclaimed.  "Everything is crooked and wrong about you."
     The wicker chair smiled a little and said softly, "That's what's called perspective, young man."
     The painter jumped up.  "Perspective!" he yelled furiously.  "Now this clown of a chair comes and wants to play schoolteacher.  Perspective is my affair, not yours.  Remember that!"
     The chair said nothing more.  The painter stomped loudly back and forth a few times until someone began pounding beneath the floor with a cane.  An elderly man, a scholar, lived under him, and he could not bear the noise.
     The young man sat down and looked at his last self-portrait.  But it did not please him.  He found that he looked more handsome and interesting in reality, and that was the truth.
     Now he wanted to read his book again, but there was more in the book about the Dutch straw chair, which irritated him.  He now felt that the writer had really made much too much of it, and after all...
     The young man looked for his artist's hat and decided to go out.  He remembered that he had long ago been struck by the fact that painting was not very fulfilling.  One had nothing but bother and disappointments, and in the end even the best painter in the world could portray only the simple surface of objects.  For a man who loved the profound aspects of life, it was no profession for him in the long run.  And once more he seriously thought, as he had done many times, about following an even earlier inclination and becoming a writer instead of a painter.  The wicker chair remained behind in the attic.  It was sorry that its young master had gone.  It had hoped that a decent relationship could finally develop between the two of them.  It would have liked at times to speak a word, and it knew that it certainly had many valuable things to teach a young man.  But unfortunately nothing ever came of this.

James Gulliver Hancock

    

fairytale friday with appleless

Enjoy Life, It's Delicious

Appleless
written by Aimee Bender
found within Fairy Tale Review

     I once knew a girl who wouldn't eat apples.  She wove her walking around groves and orchards.  She didn't even like to look at them.  They're all mealy, she said.  Or else too cheeky, too bloomed.  No, she stated again, in case we had not heard her, our laps brimming with Granny Smiths and Red Deliciouses.  With Galas and Spartans and yellow Golden Globes.  But we had heard her, from the very first; we just couldn't help offering again.  Please, we pleaded, eat.  Cracking our bites loudly, exposing the dripping wet white inside.

Apples of New York

      It's unsettling to meet people who don't eat apples.
     The rest of us, now, eat only apples, to compensate.  She has declared herself so apple-less, we feel we have no other choice.  We sit in the orchard together, cross-legged, and when they fall off the trees into our outstretched hands, we bite right in.  They are pale green, striped red-on-red, or a yellow and orange sunset.  They are the threaded Fujis, with streaks of woven jade and beige, or the dark and rosy Rome Beauties.  Pippins, Pink Ladies, Braeburns, Macintosh.  The orchard grows them all.

Pommes De France

  
     We suck water off the meat.  Drink them dry.  We pick apple skin out from the spaces between our teeth.  We eat the stem and the seeds.  And for the moment, there are enough beauties bending the branches for all of us to stay fed for awhile.  We circle around the core, teeth busy, and while we chew, we watch the girl circle our orchard, in her long swishing skirts, eyes averted.

Apple Picking

      
     One day we see her, and it's too much.  She is so beautiful on this day, her skin as wide and open as a river.  We could swim right down her.  It's unbearable to just let her walk off, and all at once, we abandon our laps of apples and run over.  Her hair is so long and wheatlike you could bake it into bread.  For a second our hearts pang for bread.  Bread!  We've been eating only apples now for weeks.
     We close in; we ring her.  Her lips fold into each other; our lips skate all over her throat, her bare wrists, her empty palms.  We kiss her like we've been starving and she tilts her head down so she doesn't have to look at us.  We knead her hair and kiss down the long line of her leg beneath the shift of her skirt.  We pray to her and our breath is ripe with apple juice.  You can see the tears start races down her face while our hands moe in to touch the curve of her breasts and scoop of her neckline.  She is so new.  There are pulleys in her skin.  Our fingers, all together, work their way to her bare body, past the voluminous yards of cloth.  Past those loaves of hair.  We find her in there, and she is so warm and so alive and we see the tears, but stop?  Impossible.  We breathe in, closer.  Her eyelashes brighten with water.  Her shoulders tremble like doves.  She is weeping into our arms, she is crumpling down and we are inside her clothes now and our hands and mouths are everywhere.  There's no sound at all but the slip of skin and her crying and apples in the orchard thumping, un-caught:  our lunches and dinners and breakfasts.  It's an unfamiliar sound, because for weeks now, we have not let even ove single fruit hit dirt.

Apples of New York

     
     She cries through it all and when we're done and piled around her, suddenly timid and spent, suddenly withered nothings, she is the first to stand.  She gathers her skirts around herself, and smoothes back down her hair.  She wipes her eyes clear and folds her hands around her waist.  She is away from the orchard before we can stand properly and beg her to stay.  Before we can grovel and claw at her small perfect feet.  We watch her walk and she's slow and proud but none of us can possibly catch her.  We splay on the ground in a circle instead as she gets smaller and smaller on the horizon.
     She never comes by the orchard again, and in a week, all the apples are gone.  They fall off the trees and the trees make no new ones.  The air smells like snow on the approach.  No one dares to mention her but every morning, all of our eyes are fixed on the road, waiting, hoping, staring through the bare branches of an empty orchard.  Our stomachs rumble, hungry.  The sky is always this same sort of blue.  It is so beautiful here.

John Westrock

fairytale friday with the zoology fables

STORIES FROM ZOOLOGY
Leo Tolstoy
 
THE OWL AND THE HARE
     It was dusk.  The owls began to fly through the forest to find some prey.  A large hare leaped out on a clearing and began to smooth out his fur.  An old owl looked at the hare, and seated himself on a branch; but a young owl said to him, "Why do you not catch the hare?"  The old owl said, "He is too much for me:  if I get caught in him, he will drag me into the woods."  But the young owl said, "I will stick one claw into his body, and with the other I will clutch a tree."  
     The young owl made for the hare, and stuck one claw into his back so that all his talons entered the flesh, and the other claw it got ready to push into the tree.  The hare yanked the owl, while the owl held on to the tree, and thought, "He will not get away."  The hare darted forward and tore the owl.  One claw was left in the tree, and the other in the hare's back.  
     The next year a hunter killed that hare, and wondered how the owl's talons had grown into the hare's back.

HOW THE WOLVES TEACH THEIR WHELPS
     I was walking along the road, and heard a shout behind me.  It was the shepherd boy who was shouting.  He was running through the field, and pointing to something.  I looked, and saw two wolves running through the field: one was full grown, and the other a whelp.  The whelp was carrying a dead lamb on his shoulders, and holding on to one of its legs with its teeth.  The old wolf was running behind.  
     When I saw the wolves, I ran after them with the shepherd, and we began to shout.  In response to our cries came peasants with dogs.  The moment the old wolf saw the dogs and the people, he ran up to the whelp, took the lamb away from him, threw it over his back, and both wolves ran as fast as they could, and disappeared from view.  Then the boy told what had happened:  the large wolf had leaped out from the ravine, had seized the lamb, killed it, and carried it off.  The whelp ran up to him and grasped the lamb.  The old wolf let the whelp carry the lamb, while he himself ran slowly beside him.  
     Only when there was danger, did the old wolf stop his teaching and himself take the lamb.

HARES AND WOLVES
     The hares feed at night on tree bark; the field hares eat the winter rye and the grass, and the threshing floor hares eat the grain in the granary.  Through the night the hares make a deep, visible track through the snow.  The hares are hunted by men, and dogs, and wolves, and foxes, and ravens, and eagles.  If a hare walked straight ahead, he would be easily caught in the morning by his tracks; but Mother Nature has made a hare timid, and his timidity saves him.  
     A hare goes at night fearlessly through the forests and fields, making straight tracks; but as soon as morning comes and his enemies wake up, and he hears the bark of dogs, or the squeak of sleighs, or the voice of peasants, or the crashing of a wolf through the forest, he begins to toss from side to side in his fear.  He jumps forward, gets frightened at something, and runs back on his track.  He hears something again, and he leaps at full speed to one side and runs away from his old track.  Again something makes a noise, and the hare turns back, and again leaps to one side.  
     When it is daylight, he lies down.  In the morning the hunters try to follow the hare tracks, and they get mixed up on the double tracks and long leaps, and marvel at the hare's cunning.  But the hare did not mean to be cunning.  He is merely afraid of everything.

fairytale friday with the silent castle

The Silent Castle
by Rosemary Lake

     Once there was a little girl who, after the death of her parents, went to live near a great woods with her old uncle and his two grandsons.  They were rather stupid, but they treated her very well, aside from thinking girls were no good for anything useful.
     One day the boys set out together in search of adventure, and were not heard from for a long time; and her uncle became very sad.  So the girl, whose name was Belinda, said, "I will go and look for them."
     "No, no," said the old man, "you are just a girl.  Where they have met danger, what could you do?" 
     Belinda didn’t want to argue with him, so she just said, "Well, maybe I could find some help, or let you know where they are."  So the old man agreed, and gave her a good horse and a purse of gold for the journey.
     Belinda rode along the edge of the forest, asking everyone she met about the boys.  Soon she found them washing dishes in an inn, for they had foolishly gambled away all their money.  From her uncle’s money-bag she paid their debts, and they thanked her kindly.  "You’re welcome," Belinda said.  "Now, shall we three go in search of adventure?"

Nell Brinkley 1919

 
    
     Reluctantly the boys agreed.  So Belinda wrote her uncle a letter saying all was well, and the three rode on together.
     As they rode along, after a while they came to an anthill.  The two boys wanted to poke it with sticks to disturb the ants; but Belinda said, "Leave them alone, they have not hurt us."  So, to please her, the boys went on.
     Soon they came to a lake with many small ducklings swimming in it.  The boys wanted to catch the little ducks and cook them for supper; but Belinda said, "Leave them alone, they have not hurt us."  So the boys went on, and they found plenty of fruit and mushrooms for supper.
     Then they came to a hollow tree with a bees’ nest in it, with honey running out of holes in the trunk.  The boys wanted to make a fire and smother the bees with smoke and take all the honey.  But Belinda said, "Leave them alone, they have not hurt us."  So the boys took only the honey that was running out, and they rode on.
     That evening they came to a strange gray stone castle hidden in the deep woods, beyond a still shining lake.  No moving thing could be seen.  The stables were full of gray stone horses.  The door was unlocked, the halls were richly furnished, but no people could be found.
     "Well, this is certainly an adventure," said Belinda.
     The elder boy laughed.  "Fit for a girl, anyway.  Nothing is happening!"
     Then they came to a little door hidden deep inside the castle, which had three locks on it, and one small window in the middle.

Enchanted Castle by Samantha Storey

 























     Taking turns, the children looked through the little hole.  Inside the room they saw a little grey-haired man sitting at a table.  They knocked, once, twice and he did not move; but at the third knock, he came to the door, slowly unlocked all the locks, and came out and bowed to them; never speaking a word.
     Silently the little man led them through a carpeted hall to a table loaded with all sorts of good things to eat, and when they had eaten and drunk their fill, he led them each to a comfortable bed-chamber.  And by this time they were so tired and sleepy that they all fell asleep without further ado.
     Next morning the little man awakened the eldest cousin and took him downstairs, leaving the other two children still sleeping soundly.
     Still without speaking, he led him to a glass casket, within which was scroll, only partly unrolled, which said:
There are three tasks, which if done will deliver this castle from its enchantment; and a great reward will be given to the hero who succeeds.
Task the First. Under the moss and leaves of the forest, are scattered a thousand pearls belonging to the Queen. All must be found by sunset of a single day, or the seeker shall be turned to stone.
     Upon reading this, the elder cousin rushed out to the woods and began looking for the pearls.  He searched all day, but the pearls were so scattered and so deeply hidden under the moss and leaves, that by sunset he had found scarcely one hundred.  So as soon as the last beam of sun left his hair, he was turned to stone.  All day the middle cousin and Belinda rested in the castle, wondering where he had gone.
     Next morning the little man woke the middle cousin and took him downstairs, leaving Belinda still sleeping soundly, and showed him the scroll.  The middle cousin too ran out to look for the pearls, but found only two hundred before sunset, and was also turned to stone.  When she woke and found herself alone, Belinda supposed that the cousins had decided to go on without her.  She spent the day exploring the castle and reading old books in its library, then had another fine dinner and went to sleep.
     Next morning the little man woke her at dawn.  Without speaking, her led her to the glass casket and showed her the scroll.
     "I wonder what are the other tasks," she said.  "It would be silly to risk getting turned to stone for the pearls, then find the other tasks were quite impossible."
     The little man smiled, bowed, and nodded reassuringly.
     "You mean," Belinda said, "that the other tasks are no worse?"
     He nodded.
     Belinda went outside, saw her cousins’ tracks, followed their trail, and found them both turned to stone.  She ran back and asked the little man, "Is there any way I can help them?"
     The little man nodded, and pointed at the scroll.
     "You mean – if I deliver the castle from its enchantment, my cousins will come back to normal too?"
     The little grey man nodded again, and pointed toward the stable with its stone horses, and smiled beseechingly.
     "Very well," said Belinda, "I will try."
     So Belinda took a sack, put in it the three hundred pearls the brothers had already found, and went out to search in the moss for the rest.  The moss and fallen leaves smelled wonderful, but by noon-time she had found only one dozen more pearls, and her back ached, and her fingers were sore with the digging and sifting dirt.  "I cannot do this!" she said, and sat down and wept.
     As she sat weeping, along came the King of the Ants, whose anthill Belinda had saved from her thoughtless cousins.  "What is your trouble?" he asked.
     When Belinda told him, the King of the Ants sent word, and soon five thousand ants came and searched under the moss, and it was not very long before the little insects had collected all the pearls and put them in a heap (including the three hundred pearls that her cousins had already found).  Belinda thanked them kindly, and they gave her their blessing and departed.
     So Belinda put the pearls in the sack and took them back to the little man, who beamed with happiness at the sight.  He placed the sack on the glass casket, and at once the scroll unwound to show the following words:
Task the Second: Somewhere in the mud of the lake, is hidden the key to the Queen’s bedchamber. It must be found by sunset of a single day, or the seeker shall be turned to stone.
     "How ever am I to do that?" thought Belinda.  But she went along to the lake, and there came swimming the little ducks whom she had saved.  They dived below and quickly found the key.
     Belinda gave the key to the little man, who laid it on the glass casket. The scroll unwound to show:
Task the Third: In the Queen’s bedchamber, she lies sleeping with two of her Ladies in Waiting. You must choose which is the true Queen.
     "How ever am I to do that?" thought Belinda. But she went along to the lake, and there came swimming the little ducks whom she had saved.  They dived below and quickly found the key.  Belinda gave the key to the little man, who laid it on the glass casket. The scroll unwound to show:      "Well, that might not be so hard," thought Belinda.  But when she came to the bed-chamber and opened it with the key, she found three ladies asleep, all so beautiful and wearing such soft white bed-clothes that there seemed no way to distinguish among them.
     So Belinda looked round the chamber.  On a little marble table were three cups: two of silver, containing the dregs of hot chocolate, and one of gold, containing the dregs of ambrosia and rosewater.  "Well, probably the Queen drank the rosewater," Belinda sighed, "but how does that help me find her?"
     Just then, through the window flew one of the bees whom Belinda had saved.  When Belinda told her the story, the bee at once went and sniffed the lips of each lady, and settled upon the one who had drunk the rosewater.
     So Belinda went to that lady's bed, stood straight, and said loudly: "This lady is the Queen!’
     At this the three ladies all sat up and smiled at Belinda, and the Queen said, "Welcome to our castle, my dear."  Outside, all the stone horses came back to life and began neighing and prancing.  The other people of the castle, who had been simply vanished, reappeared also; and all was life and celebration again.
     Belinda’s cousins also were restored, and when they ran back to the castle, found a great crowd on the lawn cheering Belinda as their rescuerer.  The Queen invited them all to live with her, and even sent for the old uncle as well.  She gave him and his sons a nice game-keeper’s cottage; but Belinda she took to live in the castle and gave the title of Princess. 
     So they all lived happily in great splendor and merriment from then on, and many years later after the Queen’s death, Belinda became Queen in her stead.

Queen of Hearts by Hajra Meeks

fairytale friday with rootabaga stories

Rootabaga Stories Part One
written by Carl Sandburg
illustrated by Michael Hague
copyright 1922

How They Broke Away to Go to the Rootabaga Country

Gimme the Ax lived in a house where everything is the same as it always was.
     "The chimney sits on top of the house and lets the smoke out," said Gimme the Ax.  "The doorknobs open the doors.  The windows are always either open or shut.  We are always either upstairs or downstairs in this house.  Everything is the same as it always was."
     So he decided to let his children name themselves.
     "The first words they speak as soon as they learn to make words shall be their names," he said.  "They shall name themselves."
     When the first boy came to the house of Gimme the Ax, he was named Please Gimme.  When the first girl came she was named Ax Me No Questions.
     And both of the children had the shadows of valleys by night in their eyes and the lights of early morning, when the sun is coming up, on their foreheads.
     And the hair on top of their heads was a dark wild grass.  And they loved to turn the doorknobs, open the doors, and run out to have the wind comb their hair and touch their eyes and put its six soft fingers on their foreheads.
     And then because no more boys came and no more girls came, Gimme the Ax said to himself, "My first boy is my last and my last girl is my first and they picked their names themselves."
     Please Gimme grew up and his ears got longer.  Ax Me No Questions grew up and her ears got longer.  And they kept on living in the house where everything is the same as it always was.  They learned to say just as their fther said, "The chimney sits on top of the house and lets the smoke out," said Gimme the Ax.  "The doorknobs open the doors.  The windows are always either open or shut.  We are always either upstairs or downstairs in this house.  Everything is the same as it always was."
     After a while they began asking each other in the cool of the evening after they had eggs for breakfast in the morning, "Who's who?  How much?  And what's the answer?"
     "It is too much to be too long anywhere," said the tough old man, Gimme the Ax.
     And Please Gimme and Ax Me No Questions, the tough son and tough daughter of Gimme the Ax, answered their father, "It is too much to be too long anywhere."
     So they sold everything they had, pigs, pastures, pepper pickers, pitchforks, everything except their ragbags and a few extras.
     When their neighbors saw them selling everything they had, the different neighbors said, "They are going to Kansas, to Kokomo, to Canada, to Kankakee, to Kalamazoo, to Kamchatka, to the Chattahoochee."
     One little sniffer with his eyes half shut and a mitten on his nose, laughed in his hat five ways and said, "They are going to the moon and when they get there they will find everything is the same as it always was."
     All the spot cash money he got for selling everything, pigs, pastures, pepper pickers, pitchforks, Gimme the Ax put in a ragbag and slung on his back like a rag picker going home.
     Then he took Please Gimme, his oldest and youngest and only son, and Ax Me No Questions, his oldest and youngest and only daughter, and went to the railroad station.
     The ticket agent was sitting at the window selling railroad tickets the same as always.
     "Do you wish a ticket to go away and come back or do you wish a ticket to go away and never come back?" the ticket agent asked wiping sleep out of his eyes.
     "We wish a ticket to ride where the railroad tracks run off into the sky and never come back--send us far as the railroad rails go and then forty ways farther yet," was the reply of Gimme the Ax.
     "So far?  So early?  So soon?" asked the ticket agent wiping more sleep out his eyes.  "Then I will give you a new ticket.  It blew in.  It is a long slick yellow leather slab ticket with a blue spanch across it."
     Gimme the Ax thanked the ticket agent once, thanked the ticket agent twice, and then instead of thanking the ticket agent three times he opened the ragbag and took out all the spot cash money he got for selling everything, pigs, pastures, pepper pickers, pitchforks, and paid the spot cash mone to the ticket agent.
     Before he put it in his pocket he looked one, twice, three times at the long yellow leather slab ticket with the blue spanch across it.
     Then with Please Gimme and Ax Me No Questions he got on the railroad train, showed the conductor his ticket and they started to ride to where the railroad tracks run off into the blue sky and then forty ways farther yet.
     The train ran on and on.  It came to the place where the railroad tracks run off into the blue sky.  And it ran on and on chick chick-a-chick chick-a-chick chick-a-chick.
     Sometimes the engineer hooted and tooted the whistle.  Sometimes the fireman rang the bell.  Sometimes the open-and-shut of the steam hog's nose choked and spit pfisty-pfoost, pfisty-pfoost, pfisty-pfoost.  But no matter what happened to the whistle and the bell and steam hog, the train ran on and on to where the railroad tracks run off into the blue sky.  And then it ran on and on more and more.
     Sometimes Gimme the Ax looked in his pocket, put his fingers in and took out the long slick yellow leather slab ticket with the blue spanch across it.
     "Not even the Kings of Egypt with all their climbing camels, and all their speedy, spotted, lucky lizards, ever had a ride like this," he said to his children.
     Then something happened.  They met another train running on the same track.  One train was going one way.  The other was going the other way.  They met.  They passed each other.
     "What was it--what happened?" the children asked their father.
     "One train went over, the other train went under," he answered.  "This is the Over and Under Country.  Nobody gets out of the way of anybody else.  They either go over or under."
     Next they cam to the country of the balloon pickers.  Hanging down from the sky strung on strings so fine the eye could not see them at first, was the balloon crop of that summer.  The sky was thick with balloons.  Red, blue, yellow balloons, white, purple and orange balloons--peach, watermelon and potato balloons--rye loaf and wheat loaf balloons--link sausage and pork chop balloons--they floated and filled the sky.
     The balloon pickers were walking on high stilts picking balloons. Each picker had his own stilts, long or short.  For picking balloons near the ground he had short stilts.  If he wanted to pick far and high he walked on a far and high pair of stilts.
     Baby pickers on baby stilts were picking baby balloons.  When they fell off the stilts the handful of balloons they were holding kept them in the air till they got their feet into the stilts again.
     "Who is that away up there in the sky climbing like a bird in the morning?" Ax Me No Questions asked her father.
     "He was singing too happy," replied the father.  "The songs came out of his neck and made him so light the balloons pulled him off his stilts.
     "Will he ever come down again back to his own people?"
     "Yes, his heart will het heavy when his songs are all gone.  Then he will drop down to his stilts again."
     The train was running on and on.  The engineer hooted and tooted the whistle when he felt like it.  The fireman rang the bell when he felt that way.  And sometimes the open-and-shut of the steam hog had to go pfisty-pfoost, pfisty-pfoost.
     "Next is the country where the circus clowns come from," said Gimme the Ax to his son and daughter.  "Keep your eyes open."
     They did keep their eyes open.  They saw cities with ovens, long and short ovens, fat stubby ovens, lean lank ovens, all for baking either long or short clowns, or fat and stubby or lean and lank clowns.
     After each clown was baked in the oven it was taken out into the sunshine and put u to stand like a big white doll with a red mouth leaning against the fence.
     Two men came along to each baked clown standing still like a doll.  One man threw a bucket of white fire over it.  The second man pumped a wind pump with a living red wind through the red mouth.
     The clown rubbed his eyes, opened his mouth, twisted his neck, wiggled his ears, wriggled his toes, jumped away from the fence and began turning handsprings, cartwheels, somersaults and flipflops in the sawdust ring near the fence.
     "The next we come to is the Rootabaga Country where the big city is the Village of Liver-and-Onions," said Gimme the Ax, looking again in his pocket to be sure he had the long slick yellow leather slab ticket with the blue spanch across it.
     The train ran on and on till it stopped running straight and began running in zigzags like one letter Z put next to another Z and the next and the next.
     "It seems like we go half way and then back up," said Ax Me No Questions.
     "Look out of the window and see if the pigs have bibs on," said Gimme the Ax.  "If the pigs are wearing bibs then this is the Rootabaga Country."
     And they looked out of the zigzagging windows of the zigzagging cars and the first pigs they saw had bibs on.
     The checker pigs had checker bibs on, the striped pigs had striped bibs on.  And the polka dot pigs had polka dot bibs on.
     "Who fixes it for the pigs to have bibs on?" Please Gimme asked his father.
     "The fathers and mothers fix it," answered Gimme the Ax.  "The checker pigs have checker fathers and mothers.  The striped pigs have striped fathers and mothers.  And the polka dot pigs have polka dot fathers and mothers."
     And the train went zigzagging on and on running on the tracks and the rails and the spikes and the ties which were all zigzag like the letter Z and the letter Z.
     And after a while the train zigzagged on into the Village of Liver-and-Onions, known as the biggest city in the big, big Rootabaga Country.
     And so if you are going to the Rootabaga Country you will know when you get there because the railroad tracks change from straight to zigzag, the pigs have bibs on and it is the fathers and mothers who fix it.
     And if you start to go to that country remember first you must sell everything you have, pigs, pastures, pepper pickers, pitchforks, put the spot cash money in a ragbag and go to the railroad station and ask the ticket agent for a long slick yellow leather slab ticket with a blue spanch across it.
     And you mustn't be surprised if the ticket agent wipes sleep from his eyes and asks, "So far?  So early?  So soon?"

fairytale friday with the nis and the mare

Nis by Lennart Helje

Nis by Wayne Anderson

There was a man who lived in the town of Tirup, who had a very handsome white mare.  This mare had for many years gone, like an heirloom, from father to son, because there was a Nis attached to her, which brought luck to the place.
This Nis was so fond of the mare, that he could hardly endure to let them put her to any kind of work, and he used to come, himself, every night and feed her of the best; and as for this purpose he usually brought a superfluity of corn, both threshed and in the straw, from the neighbours' barns, all the rest of the cattle enjoyed the advantage of it, and they were all kept in exceeding good case.

It happened at last that the farm-house passed into the hands of a new owner, who refused to put any faith in what they told him about the mare, so the luck speedily left the place, and went after the mare to his poor neighbour who had bought her; and within five days after his purchase, the poor farmer who had bought the mare began to find his circumstances gradually improving, while the income of the other, day after day, fell away and diminished at such a rate, that he was hard set to make both ends meet.

Nis by Lennart Helje

If now the man who had gotten the mare had only known how to be quiet, and enjoy the good times that were come upon him, he and his children, and his children's children after him, would have been in flourishing circumstances till this very day.  But when he saw the quantity of corn that came every night to his barn, he could not resist his desire to get a sight of the Nis.  So he concealed himself one evening, at nightfall, in the stable' and as soon as it was midnight, he saw how the Nis came from his neighbour's barn and brought a sackful of corn with him.  It was now unavoidable that the Nis should get a sight of the man who was watching; so he, with evident marks of grief, gave the mare her food for the last time, cleaned, and dressed her to the best of his abilities, and when he had done, turned round to where the man was lying and bid him farewell.
From that day forward the circumstances of both the neighbours were on an equality, for each now kept his own.

Nis by John Bauer

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

fairytale friday with the witches' excursion

The Witches' Excursion
from Legends of Irish Witches and Fairies
written by Patrick Kennedy 1866-1870
Shemus Rua was awakened from his sleep one night by noises in his kitchen.  Stealing to the door, he saw half a dozen old women, sitting round the fire, jesting, and laughing, his own old housekeeper, Madge, quite frisky and gay, helping her sister crones to cheering glasses of punch.  He began to admire the impudence and imprudence of Madge, displayed in the invitation and the riot, but recollected on the instant her officiousness in urging him to take a comfrotable posset, which she had brought to his bedside just before he fell asleep.  Had he drunk it he would have been just now deaf to the witches' glee.  He heard and saw them drink his health in such a mocking style as nearly to tempt him to charge them, besom in hand, but he restrained himself.  The jug being emptied, one of them cried out, "It is time to be gone," and at the same moment, putting on a red cap, she added
By yarrow and rue,
And my red cap too,
Hie over to England.

Making use of a twig which she held in her hand as a steed, she gracefully soared up the chimney, and was rapidly followed by the rest.  But when it came to the housekeeper's turn, Shemus interposed.  "By your leave, ma'am!" said he, snatching twig and cap, "Ah, you desateful ould crocodile!  If I find you here on my return, there'll be wigs on the green."
By yarrow and rue,
And my red cap too,
Hie over to England.
The words were not out of his mouth when he was soaring above the ridge-pole, and swiftly ploughing the air.  He was careful to speak no word (being somewhat conversant in witch lore), as the result would be a tumble, and immediate return of the expedition.  In a very short time they had crossed the Wicklow hills, the Irish Sea, and the Welsh mountains, and were charging at whirlwind speed the halldoor of a castle.  Shemus, only for the company in which he found himself, would have cried out for pardon, expecting to be mummy against the hard oak door in a moment, but all bewildered he found himself passing through the keyhole, along a passage, down a flight of steps, and through a cellar door keyhole, before he could form any clear idea of his situation.
Waking to the full consciousness of his postion, he found himself sitting on a stillion, plenty of lights glimmering round, and he and his companions, nobbing and drinking helths as jovially and recklessly as if the liquor was honestly come by, and they were sitting in Shemus's own kitchen.  The red birredh had assimilated Shemus's nature for the time being to that of his unholy companions.  The heady liquors soon got in their brains, and a period of unconsciousness succeeded the ecstasy, the headache, the turning round the barrels, and the scattered sight of poor Shemus.  He woke up under the impression of being roughly seized, and shaken and dragged upstairs, and subjected to a disagreeable examination by the lord of the castle, in his state parlour.  There was much derision and laughter among the whole company, gentle and simple, on hearing Shemus's explanation; and as the thing occurred in the dark ages, the unlucky Leinsterman was sentenced to be hung as soon as the gallows could be prepared for the occasion.
The poor Hibernian was in the cart proceeding on his last journey, with a label upon his back, and another on his breast, announcing him as the remorseless villain who for the last month had been draining casks in my lord's vaults every night.  He was striving to say a prayer, when he was surprised to hear himself addressed by his name, and in his native tongue, by an old woman in the crowd.  "Ach, Shemus, alanna! is going to die, you are in a strange place, without your cappeen dearg!"  These words infused hope and courage into the victim's heart.  He turned to the lord, and humbly asked leave to die in his red cap, which he supposed had dropped from his head in the vault.  A servant was sent for the headpiece, and Shemus felt lively hope warming his heart while placing it on his head.  On the platform he was graciously allowed to address the spectators, which he proceeded to do in the usual formula composed for the benefit of flying stationers:  "Good people all, a warning take by me;" but when he had finished the line, "My parents reared me tenderly," he unexpectedly added,  
By yarrow and rue,
And my red cap too,
Hie over to England.
and the disappointed spectators saw him shoot up obliquely through the air in the style of a skyrocket that had missed its aim.  
It is said that the lord took the circumstance muchto heart, and never afterwards hung a man for twenty-four hours after his offence.

fairytale friday with when the root children wake up

When the Root Children Wake Up
by Helen Dean Fish, Copyright, The Green Tiger Press, Inc., 1988
based on Etwas von der Wurzelkindern originally published in 1906

All Winter long the trees are bare, the wind in cold and fields are empty.
But very early in the Spring the Sun begins to grow warmer, the air softer and the sky bluer.  And boys and girls grow happier though they cannot tell just why.
Down underground something is happening.
Something secret and wonderful.
The root children who have been sleeping soundly all Winter are awakened by the Earth Mother.  She comes with her candle and her little firefly helpers to tell them they must be up and at work for it will soon be Spring.  They are very sleepy at first but soon begin to stretch and open their eyes and be glad that it is time to wake.

Wide awake at last, in their root house, the root children work busily on their new Spring dresses.  Each chooses the color she loves best--violet, yellow, blue, white, orange or red--and with needle, thread and thimble, sews happily till her work is done.
Above them, in the little village by the sea, the sky and water are growing bluer.

The root children take their dresses to show to the good Earth Mother, where she sits comfortably with her tea and her knitting.  Her busy ant helpers are about her.  She is pleased when she sees how well each root child has made her Spring dress.

It is time to be ready, for above them the ice on the little brook has melted and the water is slipping merrily over its pebbles.  In the barns the sheep and lambs feel the Spring air and wish to be in the green fields again.

While the little root girls are sewing Spring dresses, the root boys are busy with their share in making ready for Spring.  They wake up the sleeping insect--the beetles, grasshoppers, ladybugs, crickets, bumble bees, fireflies and june bugs.  They sponge them and brush them and paint their shells with bright Spring colors, while the filds over their heads are growing greener and the leef buds on the trees are swelling in the warm Spring air.

Then, when all is ready, Spring comes!
First the meadow grasses fare out over the countryside, green and lovely, waving in the wind.
Then the busy insects, eager to do their work in fields and woods and gardens, singing and humming and leaping.
Next the good grains push their heads above the ground.
Last, and most beautiful of all, come the flowers in a sweet and gay procession--snowdrop and stargrass, forget me not and aster, violet, dandelion, columbine, daisy and primrose; hepatica, lily, anemone and poppy, cornflower, clover and bluebell.
Out they troop joyfully, out of their earth home into the lovely world, where birds fly in the blue sky above green meadows.

The flower children scatter far and wide.  Some choose the deep woods, and as lillies of the valley and violets, bloom shyly under the trees.  Gay butterflies hover above them, scarlet mushrooms brighten the moss, and the slow snail creeps out of his house to play, glad that Spring has come again.  

Others hurry to the pond side and play there all day long, making it gay with water lillies, forget me nots and wild iris.  Spiders spin lovely webs that shine in the sun.  The reeds wave and rustle in the passing wind, and dragon flies dart hither and thither.

Still others play in the meadows, dancing merrily, under the sunny sky with the beetles and butterflies, to the music of grasshoppers' chirping and bees' humming.  Each little root child is now a poppy or a daisy, a cornflower or a bluebell, or a graceful yarrow flower.

And so they play all Summer long, until a day comes when the air is chill and the leaves, turned red and gold and brown, are fluttering down to earth.  The flower children come running over hills and valleys, from meadows, woods, and brookside, back to the Earth Mother, who welcomes them to their warm earth home to rest and sleep the cold Winter through, until Spring comes again next year!

fairytale friday with the magic pot

Once there was a funny little demon.  He looked around and he looked around.  "Hucka-pucka, hucka-pucka," said the demon, and turned himself into a black iron pot.  He sat himself down at the side of the road.  The road went by a little hut where an old man and his old wife lived.
In a little while, along came the poor old man.  He had been to the rich man's house to beg for work and a bit of bread.  He saw the pot.  "Well, something is better than nothing," se said, and he took it home.

His old wife met him at the door.  "Did you get some work and a bit of bread?"
"I did not," said the old man.  "All I got was hard words and a few hard whacks.  'If you're too old to work, then you're too old to eat,' they said."
"What will become of us?" cried the old woman.  "We have sold the pig.  We have sold the cow.  We have only ourselves and the cat left."  And she began to cry.
"Don't cry," said the old man.  "Look, I found this pot beside the road.  In a little while, I will go and sell it."  And the old man lay down to rest.

The old wife put the pot on the shelf, took the broom and began to sweep.  The pot turned around on its three iron legs.  It hopped off the shelf.
"Hucka-pucka," said the pot
"Where will you hucka-pucka to?" cried the old woman.
"To the rich man's house and back again," said the pot.  And hucka-pucka, hucka-pucka, out the door and down the road went the pot.

Hucka-pucka, into the rich man's kitchen it went.
"Ah ha!" said the cook.  "Just the pot I need to hold all this good stew!"  Into the pot went the stew.
"Hucka-pucka," said the pot.
"Where will you hucka-pucka to?" cried the cook.
"To a place the rich have never been," said the pot.  And before the cook could grab it, the pot went back down the road toward the poor man's hut.
The poor old man was awake.  His old wife was crying, for the pot was gone.
When they saw it come back, and smelled the good stew, they laughed for joy.  They filled their bowls and ate until they could eat no more.  They thanked the pot.  The old woman washed it and the old man set it back on the shelf.
In a little while, the pot turned around on its three iron legs.  It hopped off the shelf.
"Hucka-pucka," said the pot.
"Where will you hucka-pucka to?" said the old man.

"To the rich man's house and back again," said the pot.  Out the door and down the road it went.
The door to the rich man's dairy was open.  The dairymaid was churning butter.  There was so much butter she had run out of tubs.  Hucka-pucka, hucka-pucka, in came the pot.
"ah ha!" cried the dairymaid.  "Just the pot I need to put the butter in!"  And she filled the pot with good, sweet butter.
"Hucka-pucka," said the pot.
"Where will you hucka-pucka to?" said the dairymaid.
"To a place the rich have never been," said the pot.  Before the dairymaid could grab it, the pot went hucka-pucka, back down the road to the poor man's hut.
The old woman looked into the pot.  Her eyes popped open.  "Butter!  Good, sweet butter!  Some to eat and some to sell!"  And she and the old man clapped for joy.
Off went the old man to trade some butter for eggs and bread.  The old woman washed the pot.  She hugged it and thanked it and put it on the shelf.
She sat down with her mending by the fire.  The pot sat quietly for a little while.  Then it turned on its legs and hopped off the shelf.
"Hucka-pucka," said the pot.
"Where will you hucka-pucka to?" said the old woman.
"To the rich man's house and back again," said the pot.  Out the door and down the road it went.
The pantry door was open.  The butler was polishing the silver.  Hucka-pucka, hucka-pucka, into the pantry went the pot.  It stood very still.
"Ah ha!" cried the butler.  "Just the pot I need to hold some of this silver!"  And into the pot went silver spoons and knives and forks and cups and plates and bowls.
When it was full to the top, the pot said, "Hucka-pucka."
"Where will you hucka-pucka to?" said the butler.
"To a place the rich have never been," said the pot.  Before the butler could stop it, down the road and back to the poor man's hut went the pot.
Hucka-pucka, hucka-pucka, in came the pot.  When the old man and his wife saw the pot full of silver, they skipped for joy.
They took out the silver.  They hugged the pot, and thanked it, and put it back on the shelf.

The old man took some of the silver and went off to trade it for a cow.  The old woman put the rest of the silver away.
The pot rested for a little while.  Then off the shelf it hopped.
"Hucka-pucka," said the pot.
"Where will you hucka-pucka to?" said the old woman.
"To the rich man's house and back again," said the pot.  Out the door and down the road it went, hucka-pucka, hucka-pucka.
A window was open.  Inside, the rich man was counting his gold and locking it up.  Up hopped the pot and sat on the table.
"Ah ha!" cried the rich man.  "Just the pot I need to hold the rest of this gold!"  And into the pot he poured the gold.
"Where will you hucka-pucka to?" said the butler.
"To a place the rich have never been," said the pot.  Off the table it hopped, and out the window.  Hucka-pucka, hucka-pucka, down the road it went.
The rich man went running after it.
"Stop!" he yelled.  "Come back with my gold!"  But the rich man was too fat to run very far.  He had to sit down to catch his breath.
Hucka-pucka, hucka-pucka, back to the hut went the pot.
The old man had traded some of the silver for a nice brown cow.  He was bringing in a pail of milk when the pot danced through the door.
The old man and his old wife looked into the pot.  They were so happy they danced for joy around and around the hut.  The pot danced around with them.  And so did the cat.
The old man and his old wife took the gold and put it away.  They hugged the pot, and thanked it, and put it back on the shelf.
"Hucka-pucka," said the pot.
"There is no need," said the old man and his old wife.  "You have brought us enough to last the rest of our days."
"To the rich man's house and I won't be back again," said the pot.  And hucka-pucka, off he went.

The rich man was fishing in his pond.  He saw the pot and he said, "Ah ha!  Just the pot I need!"
But it wasn't fish he put into the pot.  He began filling it with stones and mud from the pond.  "You won't fool me again," yelled the rich man.  And he dumped more and more mud and stones into the pot.

The pot began to hop up and down on its three iron legs.  Then it began to sweel up--bigger and bigger and bigger.  As the rich man angrily stuffed more mud into it, the pot lifted him high into the air.  Head over heels went the rich man, down into the pot full of mud.  Into the mud went his fine clothes, his gold rings and chains.
"Help!  Help!" cried the rich man, trying to get out.  But it did him no good.
"Hucka-pucka," said the pot.
"Where will you hucka-pucka to?" spluttered the rich man, his mouth full of mud.
The pot just grinned, and hucka-pucka, hucka-pucka, off they went and were never seen again.