Category Archives: Tales /märchen

Stories which are not regarded as possibly true.

The Story of Popocatepetl and Iztaccihuatl

Context:

The informant tells of a story she learned about in Mexico through the almanacs or calendars. It featured a picture of a warrior carrying the dead body of a beautiful woman. Both were covered in Aztec cultural dress such as the feathered headgear for the warrior and the woman in a white dress. She was curious as to what it featured so she asked her grandparents. Then they told her of the story of Popocatepetl and Iztaccíhuatl.

Text:

The informant states that the story of  Popocatepetl and Iztaccíhuatl follows a war that ensued with the Aztec kingdom. Her grandparents told her that the chief of the Aztecs had a daughter born as beautiful as her mother and named her Iztaccihuatl. She eventually fell in love with Popocateptl, the most handsome warrior, but her father would not allow them to marry. The war began and the chief promised his daughter’s hand in marriage to the warrior if he brought the enemy chief’s head back to him. After many months of the war, a warrior among Popocateptl deceived the chief of the Aztecs by sending a false message stating that they had won the war but that Popocateptl had died. This was obviously false, but when the news reached Iztaccihuatl that he had died, she could not stop crying and died of sadness. As they prepared her funeral, Popocateptl returned from war victorious and found out about his love’s death. He had the warrior who sent the false message killed and took Iztaccihuatl’s body, leaving the city. He walked a long way until he got to some mountains, where he decorated her body with flowers. He knelt down over her body and died of sadness too. The Aztec gods witnessed this love story and converted their bodies into volcanoes. This story is known to the informant as “Amor Eterno” which means “Eternal Love”.

Interpretation:

The story resembles the story of Romeo and Juliet as it is denied love which results in a conflict leading to the male’s supposed death. This trick makes the female want to die as she no longer has her love by her side. When the male returns and finds his love dead in his arms, he dies as well to be by her side. This also reflects certain values that are highlighted in Aztec culture such as war and sacrifice. Sacrifice because after the God’s witnessed Popocateptl’s sacrifice, they knew they would honor them both. Additionally, the chief was only willing to give his daughter’s hand in marriage if the warrior helped them win the war

THE GREEDY BRAHMIN

Text

In the classic folktale “Greedy Brahmin” a Brahmin is asked to look after a wealthy man’s house while he is away. The Brahmin becomes greedy and steals some of the man’s possessions.  As he leaves the house with his stolen goods, he encounters a group of monkeys. The monkeys trick the Brahmin into thinking he should give them his possessions for a much greater reward. The greedy Brahmin agrees and throws his possessions into the river, only to realize too late that the monkeys have tricked him and he has lost everything.

Context

My informant is my uncle (BS) aged 65 years living in India. While growing up in the village, BS heard this from my grandparents and relatives. 

Interviewer : What does this story highlight?

Informant : “I believe the story of the greedy Brahmin highlights the dangers of greed and the importance of integrity. ”

Interviewer: What life lesson does this story teach us?

Informant: “First, it reminds us that the desire for material possessions can cloud our judgment and lead us to destruction. Next, the story emphasizes the importance of honesty and ethics in all aspects of life.”

Analysis

The Brahmin in the story becomes blinded by his desire for material possessions, leading him to steal from his wealthy employer.  His greed ultimately leads him to fall victim to the monkeys’ trickery, losing everything he has gained through dishonesty.

I believe the story emphasizes the importance of integrity and honesty, reminding us that these values are essential for leading a fulfilling and happy life.  It also highlights how greed can cloud our judgment, leading us down a path of destruction that can have far-reaching consequences.

The story of the greedy Brahmin teaches us that we should not let our desire for material possessions override our moral compass.  Instead, we should value honesty and integrity in all aspects of life, recognizing that true success and happiness come from leading an honest and virtuous life. The story serves as a reminder to prioritize our values over our desires and to live with integrity, even when no one is watching.

虎姑婆 Grandaunt Tiger: A Taiwanese Bedtime Story

Context: Informant is a mother with two daughters. She was telling this story as a bedtime story to the younger daughter. This is a traditional bedtime story for Taiwanese people. The story is normally told when the child is refusing to go to bed. Since it’s a has a scary plot in it, the child will usually get scared and then complied.

Text:
Informant: Once upon a time, there was a tiger who wished to become human through magical practices, which involves eating human children. One day, the tiger heard that a mom left the home to visit the sick grandma, leaving the house with only two kids. Before she left, the mom reminded the kids that they should not open the door for anyone other than her. The tiger saw this as an opportunity, but he needed to figure out a plan to trick the children to open the door for him. He used his magic power to transform into an old woman. He knocked the door and yelled, “Open the door. Your mom asked me to come take care of your guys.” The kids responded through the door, “Mom said not to open the door for anyone.” “But I’m old and walked so far to come here. Please let me in to rest and drink some water.” The kids opened the door for the old woman. As the old woman was resting in a chair, the kids asked more about who she is and where she is more. The old woman, played by the tiger, answered with her hoarse voice, “I’m your distance relative. Your mom told me to come take care of you two while she is away to visit your grandma.” Hearing what she said, the kids let down their guard; they thought no stranger would know about their grandma being sick. They invited the old woman to stay the night. At night, when everyone was asleep, one of the kid heard an unusual noise. Crackling noise coming from the other side of the bedroom. Through the shadow projected on the wall, the kid discovered the scariest thing. The old woman was eating the other kid. She ran out of the bedroom and climb all the way up on the nearby tree. The tiger noticed the kid was gone, hurrying out to chase her down. The kid was stuck in the tree with a tiger pacing around underneath; fortunately, the tiger don’t know how to climb a tree. The kid came up with a plan to get herself out of danger. She said to the tiger, “Eat me raw is too plain. How about you heat up a pot of hot oil and carry it here? I will jump in the pot and you can enjoy the tasty fried meat afterwards. I promise I won’t runaway while you are heating the oil” The tiger couldn’t resist the idea of the delicious food he could get, so he went in the kitchen and brought out a big pot of hot oil. The kid was still on the tree. She asked the tiger to use a rope and hang the pot all the way up where she was so that she could jump in the pot herself. The tiger found a rope and hung the pot up onto the tree. The kid said,”Now close your eyes and imagine the delicious meat while I get into the pot.” The tiger close his eyes. The kid dumped the whole pot of hot oil onto the tiger. The tiger screamed in pain and died beneath the tree. The kid slowly climbed down the tree, walked out the front yard, and found her mom who just got back home.

Analysis:
The story can also be found in Southeast China where most of the Taiwanese came from. The story is classified as AT333, same as Little Red Riding Hood. There are numerous variations of the story. In some, the kid was offered a piece of her siblings to eat. Sometimes the older kid was eaten, and other times the younger one. The genders of the two children also vary from version to version. The gender of the tiger is unknown, but usually portrayed with deeper voice and more male-like manner. The tale was meant to terrorize the kid to go to bed, but many times it causes the kid to be too scared to full asleep. The parent usually would say something along the line with “If you don’t sleep right now, Grandaunt Tiger will come and eat you.” However, that is exactly why the kid got eaten in the story: they went to bed and the tiger ate one of them. The contradiction is interesting and seemingly illogical. One possible explanation is that because the parent is present in these situation, they will protect the kid. It is more like “I will let bad things happen to you if you don’t do what I say.” The story of Grandaunt Tiger is adapted into traditional Taiwanese puppet show and there is a lullaby evolved from the story also named Grandaunt Tiger. The lyric attached below:

好久好久的故事 是媽媽告訴我
在好深好深的夜裡 會有虎姑婆
愛哭的孩子不要哭 他會咬你的小耳朵
不睡的孩子趕快睡 他會咬你小指頭
還記得還記得 瞇著眼睛說
虎姑婆別咬我 乖乖的孩子睡著囉

Transliteration:
The story from long, long time ago. My mom told me
In the deep deep night, there will be Grandaunt Tiger/
Baby who cries do not cry. He will bite your little ear
Baby who don’t sleep quickly goes to sleep. He will bite your little pinky.
Still remember. Still remember. Squinting my eyes and say
“Grandaunt Tiger don’t bite me. This good kid is already falling asleep.”

好久好久的故事 是媽媽告訴我
在好深好深的夜裡 會有虎姑婆
愛哭的孩子不要哭 他會咬你的小耳朵
不睡的孩子趕快睡 他會咬你小指頭
還記得還記得 瞇著眼睛說
虎姑婆別咬我 乖乖的孩子睡著囉

The Little White Snake

Text:

AX: “This is very common. If you ask any Chinese person, they could tell you about it. So there’s this little white snake. My tale is… a long time ago, there was a little white snake, and she wanted to become a human and go to school. For context, I was a little girl who did not want to go to school, by the way. As she was slithering down the mountain, a hunter caught her and was about to kill her, but then the hunter’s apprentice, this little boy, was like no, she’s innocent, let’s just let her go! So the hunter released her, and she never forgot about this. So centuries pass by, and this little white snake has been training and learning to be a human forever, and then when she does it, she runs into the reincarnation of that apprentice, and they fall in love… happy story. They have a child. But then the monks found out she was actually a snake, so they locked her up under a tower. This little boy grows up, went to school trying to save his mother. He ended up being smart enough and gained enough credibility to force the tower to come down, and that’s how he freed his mother. There’s a lot of variations of it. I think in other variations, there’s no child, it’s just the snake falling in love with her lover, and in others, it’s not even a lover: she grows up and has a child with someone we don’t name, and she frees herself from the monks.”

Context: AX is a freshman at USC studying English—she’s a fellow student in the folklore class and knows the material well. She grew up in Chino, a small suburb outside of Los Angeles. She’s of Asian descent.

AX: “Now that I’m saying it out loud, it’s so obvious that my mom was trying to get me to go to school! I was like oh my God, I want to learn how to go to school and learn how to free snakes!”


Analysis: The informant acknowledges the existence of other versions, enforcing the fact that it’s a folk narrative with variation. It reflects both the individual and community—the story is very uniquely AX’s, drawn from her community but affected by her mother’s telling. As for the category, it’s a tale, primarily aimed at AX as a child, updated to reflect her need to go to school. On a separate note, the coloration of the snake is loaded with symbolism. Going back to Vaz da Silva’s examination of the chromatic symbolism, the snake was white at first, representing purity. On top of that, the snake is described as little, which reflects its age. It’s childlike in size, adding onto the white coloration to create the image of purity. However, when she grows up and reaches maturity, she loses the form of a white snake and thereafter gives birth, a symbolic loss of purity with sex. In this particular variation, the snake appears to have agency until after giving birth, after which her son makes the major choices in the story. Her loss of agency may reflect the patriarchy of society, where a matriarch is only in control of herself until she bears an heir, after which he takes control.

Pretend to Play the Yu

Text:

Title: 滥竽充数

Literal translation: Pretend to Play the Yu

Dynamic translation: Pretending to be something that you are not

XX: This story is about a musician. The musician- he couldn’t really play any instruments. Anyway, one day, he heard that there is an audition going on, and he went for it anyway. When he got to the place, he found that he’s going to be playing among a group, a group of instruments, in an orchestra in front of the emperor. So anyway, he got into the audition, and he passed it as a group, and the whole orchestra got employed by the emperor, and he got famous after that. So, he got famous, and after decades and decades, he played in the group for the emperor, to entertain him. So after the emperor passed away, his son succeeded his crown, and his son is someone who prefers to hear solo music, so one day, he gathered this whole orchestra and had every musician play to him one by one. And when it was the musician’s turn–the emperor finally found out that the man couldn’t play any instrument, so then the emperor executed him. That’s the story–that’s how we tell people that you cannot lie about your skill if you don’t know how.

Me: Oh wow–I was expecting this to be some sort of wholesome children’s story–so your grandpa would tell you this before you slept?

XX: Yup, but I’m not really bothered by the execution part, because I feel like he deserved it, right? Because he’s a liar.

Context:

XX mentioned that they heard this story almost every day as a young child. Their grandfather would tell this to them during the “little time we had before we all went to bed.” It was “just a little educational lesson my grandpa wanted to give me.” Their grandfather was never one to “say something really obvious–” he liked to “inspire you to know something.” While XX said that the story was mainly just a typical part of their daily nighttime routine, they also learned something from it: don’t lie about having a skillset you lack. It has been a while since XX last told this story, and this was the first time they told it in English.

Analysis:

When people first started to think of folklore, the bedtime stories told by nannies and babysitters came to mind. Bedtime stories and lullabies are meant to put children to sleep, but the text and lyrics themselves can be ambiguous. Perhaps introducing kids to these valuable lessons–don’t pretend to be something you’re not–in a relaxed, tranquil setting will resonate with them more vividly as they grow up and become acclimated to the world around them. This idea of “double vision” that parents/grandparents hold rings true: while they want to comfort their children, they also want to warn them and give them lessons and pieces of advice that they will carry on with them through adulthood. These stories balance the weight of consequences with lighthearted fun. However, it is questionable whether we associate these stories with their actual lessons or more with the fonder memories of childhood and bedtime.

Nonetheless, being set in a distant past and intertwining fictive elements with real world morals, these tales open up children to important pieces of knowledge to function in society, rather than shielding them in a romanticized image of the world. While execution is an exaggerated consequence of lying, the tale’s ending provides a vivid warning on what happens if you’re caught for fabricating your identity. These stories are effective because they are memorable–they spread messages creatively and even with a negative, violent ending, children want to hear them over and over because it is ingrained into their night routine. They’re comforting because they’re consistent–they’re told by the same, reliable person at the same time. The last words children hear before falling asleep often get at the heart of the bedtime story, so it lingers in their memory. These tales can contain universal values: its message is clear across language barriers, which reveals the foundational similarities amongst different variations.