The second animal folklore I wanted to add to this collection comes from the classic Aesop’s Fables, once again as performed by my mother over a phone call when I had asked her to reread portions of some of my favorite animal folklore from when I was a child. Along with Kipling’s classic, I remember I loved when she would read stories from Aesop’s Fables to me as well. There are many versions of these fables, as they go back to Greek and Roman traditions. The story my mother chose from these collections is one of her own personal favorites, “The Ass in the Lion’s Skin.”

The story is essentially about a very vain donkey that dawns on the skin of a lion he finds that was left by a hunter. He puts the skin on and begins to terrify the local animals, who think he is really a lion. It is only the clever fox that eventually discovers that he is not a lion after the donkey, absolutely pleased with himself, neighs in his donkey voice. At that moment, the fox realizes he is not a lion, telling him “if you had kept your mouth shut you might have frightened me too! But you gave yourself away with that silly bray!” The underlying moral of this fable is that you may be able to deceive some with false looks created through one’s appearance and clothing, but it will always come out who you really are.

Since this is my mother’s favorite of the whole collection, she was very excited to read it. It was short, but her excitement made it even shorter. She was rushed to get to the part about the fox, because she really appreciates the fox character in all of Aesop’s Fables. He is sly, clever, and cunning—able to outsmart much more powerful opponents with his intelligence. However, in this story, my mother appreciates the fact that he serves as a bit of comic relief. The situational irony exposes the donkey’s secret to the reader earlier on, and it is nice to see the donkey’s farce revealed. My mother always gives a very sarcastic and cool tone to the dialogue of the fox, as she tries to impart these characteristics with the underlying nature of this character. I think this is why she really likes this tale above all else, because the reader can see the true sarcastic nature of the fox that does compliment is wittiness developed in the other fables.

Again, I wanted to add folk tales from cultures that had not been represented yet in this growing collection. Thus, I searched on YouTube for Indian folktales and found another short children’s cartoon from Geethanjali Kids as part of their Rhymes and Stories series. They aim to help keep Indian culture alive by presenting various folk tales to children in an entertaining manner. The folk tale I found for this collection is called “Mind Your Business.”

The “Mind Your Business” story features a washer man who had a pet donkey and dog. Each had a job for the man, as the dog was a guard and the donkey carried his “stack of clothes to the river and brought it back.” The two animals slept outside but had different views of their relationship with the man. The dog “was proud of his duties and boasted a lot.” One night, he teased the donkey about how he does not have to work as hard as the donkey. The dog calls him a “beast of burden,” insulting the donkey who did not respond. A few nights later, a thief robbed the man’s house. The dog saw the thief but did not bark, which was a violation of his own duty. Instead, the donkey saw the thief and questioned the dog’s inaction. The dog said, “mind your own business, don’t talk to me about my duties.” The dog explains how he is upset with his master because he feels he is not treated well enough. So, he lets the thief in, and the donkey protests, saying “you fool, this is not a time to complain, this is a time for action!” So, the donkey made the noise and chased the thief away. The man thought the donkey was making noise for no reason and he beat the donkey. The tale ends with “it is always better to mind your own business.”

The story also begins with “once upon a time,” which may be a strategy to connect the folk tale with an English-speaking audience. As stated in the last entry, most folk tales begin with some version of this, even though some of them come from very different cultures. I am assuming that in the English translation of the tales, narrators choose to use some version of this opening because it reinforces to the viewer that this is a folk tale. It helps with the introduction and setting certain expectations within the reader, as there will be a situation, resolution, and clear moral lesson within that resolution. However, the lesson comes in a much darker format compared to other animal fables, as there is no consequence for the man beating the donkey. I was expecting the donkey to be rewarded for his service, but the tale took a very unexpected end with the presence of animal abuse.

Source: Geethanjali Kids. “Mind Your Business.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9CsiPMBsCU

For the last entry, I wanted to use a performance of a folktale that was close to me. This is a story my grandmother used to tell me when I was young. I do not know where it is written in a book or collection of short stories, as she used to tell be it verbally, memorized by heart. She used to tell my siblings, cousins, and I this story when we were staying over at her house for babysitting. It was a story she would often tell us around the time she was putting us to bed. I am going to recount her performance of the story from my memory for this collection.

In an ancient city in Iran, an old wood cutter and his daughter lived a humble life. The daughter, however, asked her father to get some extra dates to make cakes one day. So, the woodcutter went out again late, but could not find any dates. He came home and was disappointed, telling a man he met on the road. But the man explained that Friday nights are Holy nights (Shabbat) and that God would help the man if he helped others. However, he failed to heed the man’s advice. During the meantime, his daughter was chosen by the princess to be her hand maiden. Eventually, the princess claimed the daughter had stolen a necklace and soldiers came to look for her. Instead, the arrested the father who cursed himself for not doing charity on Friday nights like the man had told him to do. While in jail, the woodcutter was sad and lonely. He stopped a beggar boy and gave him some of the food that the jailer had given him. The boy was grateful, as he had not eaten that day. It was this little bit of charity that turned the woodcutter’s fate around because the next day the princess went back to the lake she swam in and found her necklace!

I remember my grandmother would always enunciate the ending part of the story that demonstrated how charity helps provide for others to be kind to you. In many ways, she was trying to install the importance of the Sabbath as well with the emphasis on Friday night being holy. Her voice was soft throughout the whole story until that ending bit where the necklace was found, and the woodcutter was freed. Interestingly, the moral is very similar to a few of the folktales added in this collection about how the energy one puts out into the world comes back to you, especially in the form of good works.