Tag Archives: story

Cannibalism Legend in Europe

Age: 22

Text:
“So my sister had a friend who’s older sister had a friend who studied abroad in Milan her junior jear of college. When she was studying abroad, she, like other normal college students, wanted to go on a date. So she ended uo going on a date with this guy. She went back home with him, and everything was going well until he asked to give her a massage. He gave her a massage. She thought something was up and felt something was weird, so she just left. Then after a few days, a rash started to develop on her back. She was like, ‘What is this?’ So she went to the Italian doctor, and the Italian doctor was like, ‘For some reason, the fibers of your skin are starting to break down. This could leech into your muscles. Good thing you came in, but how did this happen? The only way this would have happened is with a flesh dissolver.’ She said, ‘What? What are you talking about?’ Less than a month later, the guy that she went on a date with got arrested for killing multiple women and eating them, meaning he was preparing her to be skinned and eaten after giving her that massage.”

Context:
A boy from Kansas City, Missouri telling a story he heard from his sister (who heard the story from a friend) about a date-from-hell while a girl was studying abroad in Milan.

Analysis:
Interestingly enough, this is not the first time I’ve heard this story. I’d like to think that it’s a legend or greatly exaggerated story from being retold indefinitely (hopefully). Regardless, it serves as an example for how folklore spreads through storytelling, often leading to multiplicity and variation between each iteration.

The Boy Who Cried Wolf

Context:
JM: “I mean it’s a pretty common story people get told [throughout] their childhood. It’s [about] this boy that lies to his village that there’s a wolf trying to eat the sheep, but when a real wolf comes to eat the sheep, no one believes him.”

Q: When did you hear about the story?

JM: “I heard about the boy who cried wolf from my older sister and parents, not really at school just at home.”

Your school didn’t cover The Boy Who Cried Wolf?

JM: “I mean I could be wrong but where I went to school, I only remember them covering the story in like 3rd grade maybe.”

Q: Have you seen The Boy Who Cried Wolf anywhere else?

JM: “I guess on social media discourse? But the saying and the interpretation were the same.”

Q: Why do you think the story itself is memorable?

JM: “It’s memorable because it targets childhood fears of being ignored, at least, that’s what I think. At the end, the boy is ignored by the whole village and I’m pretty sure all the sheep died haha…”

Analysis: The Boy Who Cried Wolf is a common fable told to many at a young age. It follows the story of a boy who tricks his entire village into believing a wolf is coming to eat the sheep, only for a wolf to truly come when the village refuses to believe the boy after his previous tricks. The informant, JM, explains that the story tackles the fears of being ignored by society even when telling the truth. It has become a recognizable story amongst kids for its message of liars losing their credibility and not being seen as trustworthy.

Yankees Eating Contest

Nationality: American

Occupation: Corporate Event Planner

Residence: New York, NY

Language: English

Text:

In 1919, during Yankees spring training in Florida, a Yankees player boasted that he could eat more spaghetti than anyone else on the team. His teammates did not argue with him, because they had seen how much spaghetti he could eat. Eventually, his teammates got tired of him talking about how much he could eat, so they arranged for a spectacle of a competition they were sure he would lose; they would have him compete in an eating contest against an ostrich. Somehow they set up this eating contest between a ballplayer and an ostrich, and in the end the ballplayer won. He passed out after eating eleven plates of spaghetti, and the ostrich ran away after eating seven, making him the winner.

Context:

My aunt told me this story, and she first heard it from her great-uncle Pete Sheehy, who is famous for being the equipment manager and clubhouse attendant of the New York Yankees for 50 years. Sheehy had not yet joined the Yankees in 1919, so he would have heard this story from other players or employees that he worked with. When I asked her if she had any folk stories to share, she said that there were tons of stories involving the Yankees that were famous and well known, and she listed some like Babe Ruth calling his shot and Lou Gehrig’s farewell speech, but then she remembered and shared this story as a more niche Yankee moment.

Analysis:

There are tons of stories about the New York Yankees in the early 20th century that have become legends, but almost all of those stories are about how dominant the team was and how great all of the players were. This story is not about a great player, nor is it even about baseball. It is just a bizarre story. However, the detail that the food being eaten in the contest was spaghetti jumped out at me. The Yankees fan base has always had a large Italian American population, and at the time of this story Italian Americans were a marginalized group. The fact that a member of the “Murderer’s Row” Yankees, which is often still regarded as the best baseball team ever, was Italian and ate a lot of spaghetti would be incredibly significant to the Italian American fans who were underrepresented at that point in time. Given how my aunt repeated numerous times that the food was spaghetti, it was clearly an important part of the story.

What to do With a Runaway Horse

Nationality: Irish

Occupation: Horse Race Track Manager

Residence: Waterford, Ireland

Language: English

Text:

“O’Flangagan had a racehorse, the fastest racehorse in Ireland. Every race, the horse won by at least ten lengths, it was never close. But everytime the horse came to the end of the race, instead of crossing the finishing post, it would veer off the side and run off into a field. O’Flanagan was going mental with this horse, so he went to see Seamus, the town vet, he said “I’ve got the fastest horse in Ireland, but every time he gets near the winning post he runs off to the side into a field and the next horse wins. What am I ever going to do?” Seamus said “I am familiar with that problem and I have the solution for you, you must get a small lump of lead and put it in the horse’s left ear, that will solve the problem, guaranteed.” O’Flanagan asked “How will I get the lump of lead in the horse’s ear?” to which the vet replied, “With a gun.”

Context: Before my aunt told me this story/joke, she spent a while nervously laughing and going on about how dark it is. She owns two horses and leases two more, and her job is entirely built around horse races. Her reluctance to share this story shows her admiration for horses, as well as their admiration across rural Ireland. She, along with many of her friends, have had to put down sick horses, and from our conversation it seemed like telling this story reminded her of those experiences and helped her laugh about such a difficult experience.

Analysis:

This joke reveals a lot about the way in which horses are viewed; they are both loved and thought of as precious, but also can be incredibly frustrating and uncooperative, and are still seen as animals below humans. The idea of killing a horse because it ran a race wrong is ridiculous, but the idea of needing to shoot a horse to put it down is not. Combining a ridiculous reason for putting a horse down with the somber act of actually putting it down brings a sense of humor into a difficult situation, similar to other dark humor. The fact that putting a horse down requires this type of humor to cope shows how horses are treasured and loved in this rural area in the South of Ireland.

Story About a Priest at a Wedding Party

Nationality: Irish

Occupation: Horse Race Track Manager

Residence: Waterford, Ireland

Language: English

Text:

Back in the day Murphy got married, but he hardly remembers it because of how much he had to drink, oh far far too much. At one point during the ceremony the priest came over to him and said “Murphy you are drunk” and Murphy said “how do you know father?” and the priest said “Because you are lying on the floor”. Murphy looked up at the priest and said “that may be true, but the best man is drunker than me” and the priest says “don’t you mean ‘drunker than I’?” and Murphy says “no father, nobody is drunker than you”.

Context:

When my aunt told me this story, she acted like it happened at a wedding that she went to as a child growing up in Dublin; only when I pressed further did she admit it was a story she heard, not one she observed. It is unclear if there was a specific wedding that this actually happened at, but the story had been passed down from her mother, and her friends had heard similar stories elsewhere. When I pressed more, she said that one of her friends heard that story but said it happened in Kerry (in the West of Ireland), and if the story took place there that would feed into stereotypes Irish people have about Kerry.

Analysis:

The way that my aunt acted like this story had happened at a wedding she went to reveals a lot about Irish communities. The idea of a priest being drunk at a wedding is funny, but the story works as a joke because it isn’t completely unreasonable. In many parts of Ireland (less so in Dublin, which is how I knew the story wasn’t a true experience of hers), the priest is a major part of the town’s social network, where he would know everyone and be at any major event like a wedding. However, a priest would also be willing to join in the celebration, which opposes their day to day holy life. Many people in rural Ireland have experienced priests acting in a very normal way outside of their holy work, but this is generally not talked about; this joke is a way of bringing up how priests are human just like everyone else.