National Library Week & Westervelt - Maui - Keeping the Public in Public Domain

 

National Library Week: April 19-25 this year encourages library lovers to "Find Your Joy" including the way you dress! 

 

Hawaii especially is mentioned in these suggestions: 

1. Wear Hawaiian shirts or tourist clothes from places you’ve visited because “reading takes us places” - Sunday the 19th
2. Wear a hat because we take our “hats off to reading” - Monday the 20th
3. Wear your favorite color because we are a “rainbow of readers” - Tuesday the 21st
4. Wear a shirt with a positive message or message about reading because “we positively love books” - Wednesday the 22nd
5. Wear something with a rainbow or wear multiple colors/colors of the rainbow to celebrate Reading Rainbow - Thursday the 23rd
6. Wear your favorite college gear because reading makes our futures bright - Friday the 24th
7. Wear animal print or pattern because we are “wild about reading” - Saturday the 25^th

Of course stories from Hawaii should also be told and read. The biggest problem is finding story sources that don't get too filled with Hawaiian words for those of us called "haole" or "foreigner."

Being unfamiliar with most Hawaiian words, I found the easiest version of the stories to tell in William Drake Westervelt's Hawaiian Historical Legends. The book isn't well-known compared to Padraic Colum's At the Gateways of the Day which I have included here before. 

Why didn't I once again use Colum? I decided to tell about Maui (no, not the island, but the Polynesian demi-god who is THE main Hawaiian figure) and Colum gives too much for quick easy storytelling. 

Nowadays when the character Maui is presented it's quite possible you or your storytelling audience think about Maui as seen in the movie Moana. Keep in mind that Disney's version of the mythological figure has faced criticism from prominent Polynesians for cultural insensitivities.

Westervelt fell in love with Hawaii and wrote a lot about its history and legends, but I think it was because he was a pastor originally from Ohio. As a result he was sensitive to all of us "foreigners" he wanted to introduce to Hawaii. As a result he looked at existing collections and then hit just the right note for us, shortening and simplifying those stories and the use of the Hawaiian language for names and places. If you go to him on Project Gutenberg, you will find five of his anthologies.

I also find it interesting that so many cultures explain how fire was found.

Enjoy! or as National Library Week tells us, "Find Your Joy!" especially when it means traveling there in a story.

MAUI THE POLYNESIAN

Among the really ancient ancestors of the Hawaiian chiefs, Maui is one of the most interesting. His name is found in different places in the high chief genealogy. He belonged to the mist land of time. He was one of the Polynesian demi-gods. He was possessed of supernatural power and made use of all manner of enchantments. In New Zealand antiquity he was said to have aided other gods in the creation of man.

Nevertheless he was very human. He lived in thatched houses, had wives and children, and was scolded by the women for not properly supporting his family. Yet he continually worked for the good of men. His mischievous pranks would make him another Mercury living in any age before the beginning of the Christian era.

When Maui was born his mother, not caring for him, cut off a lock of her hair, tied it around him and cast him into the sea. In this way the name came to him, Maui-Tiki-Tiki, “Maui formed in the topknot.”

The waters bore him safely. Jellyfish enwrapped him and mothered him. The god of the seas protected him. He was carried to the god’s house and hung up in the roof that he might feel the warm air of the fire and be cherished into life.

When he was old enough he came to his relations while they were at home, dancing and making merry. Little Maui crept in and sat down behind his brothers. His mother called the children and found a strange child, who soon proved that he was her son. Some of the brothers were jealous, but the eldest addressed the others as follows:

“Never mind; let him be our dear brother. In the days of peace remember the proverb, ‘When you are on friendly terms, settle your disputes in a friendly way; when you are at war, you must redress your injuries by violence.’ It is better for us, brothers, to be kind to other people. These are the ways by which men gain influence—by labouring for abundance of food to feed others, by collecting property to give to others, and by similar means by which you promote the good of others.”

Thus, according to the New Zealand story related by Sir George Grey, Maui was received in his home.

Maui’s home in Hawaii was for a long time enveloped in darkness. According to some legends the skies pressed so closely and so heavily upon the earth that when the plants began to grow all the leaves were necessarily flat. According to other legends the plants had to push up the clouds a little, and thus the leaves flattened out into larger surface, so that they could better drive the skies back. Thus the leaves became flat and have so remained through all the days of mankind. The plants lifted the sky inch by inch until men were able to crawl about between the heavens and the earth, thus passing from place to place and visiting one another. After a long time Maui came to a woman and said: “Give me a drink from your gourd calabash and I will push the heavens higher.” The woman handed the gourd to him. When he had taken a deep draught he braced himself against the clouds and lifted them to the height of the trees. Again he hoisted the sky and carried it to the tops of the mountains; then, with great exertion, he thrust it up to the place it now occupies. Nevertheless, dark clouds many times hang low along the great mountains and descend in heavy rains, but they dare not stay, lest Maui, the strong, come and hurl them so far away that they cannot come back again.

The Manahiki Islanders say that Maui desired to separate the sky from the earth. His father, Ru, was the supporter of the heavens. Maui persuaded him to assist in lifting the burden. They crowded it and bent it upward. They were able to stand with the sky resting on their shoulders. They heaved against the bending mass and it receded rapidly. They quickly put the palms of their hands under it, then the tips of their fingers, and it retreated farther and farther. At last, drawing themselves out to gigantic proportions, they pushed the entire heavens up to the very lofty position which they have ever since occupied.

On the island Hawaii, in a cave under a waterfall, dwelt Hina-of-the-fire, the mother of Maui.

From this home Maui crossed to the island Maui, climbed a great mountain, threw ropes made from fibres of plants around the sun’s legs, pulled off many and then compelled the swift traveller of the heavens to go slowly on its way that men might have longer and better days.

Maui’s home, at the best, was only a sorry affair. Gods and demi-gods lived in caves and small grass houses. The thatch rapidly rotted and required continual renewal. In a very short time the heavy rains beat through the decaying roof. The home was without windows or doors, save as low openings in the ends or sides allowed entrance to those willing to crawl through. Here Maui lived on edible roots and fruits and raw fish, knowing little about cooked food, for the art of fire-making was not yet known.

By and by Maui learned to make fire by rubbing sticks together.

A family of mud hens, worshipped by some of the Hawaiians in later years, understood the art of fire-making.

From the sea Maui and his brothers saw fire burning on a mountain side but it was always put entirely out when they hastened to the spot.

Maui proposed to his brothers that they go fishing, leaving him to watch the birds. But the Alae counted the fishermen and refused to build a fire for the hidden one who was watching them. They said among themselves, “There are three in the boat and we know not where the other one is, we will make no fire to-day.”

So the experiment failed again and again. If one or two remained or if all waited on the land there would be no fire—but the dawn which saw the four brothers in the boat, saw also the fire on the land.

Finally Maui rolled some kapa cloth together and stuck it up in one end of the canoe so that it would look like a man. He then concealed himself near the haunt of the mud-hens, while his brothers went out fishing. The birds counted the figures in the boat and then started to build a heap of wood for the fire.

Maui was impatient—and just as an old bird began to select sticks with which to make the flames he leaped swiftly out and caught her and held her prisoner. He forgot for a moment that he wanted the secret of fire-making. In his anger against the wise bird his first impulse was to taunt her and then kill her for hiding the secret of fire.

But the bird cried out: “If you are the death of me—my secret will perish also—and you cannot have fire.”

Maui then promised to spare her life if she would tell him what to do.

Then came a contest of wits. The bird told the demi-god to rub the stalks of water plants together. He guarded the bird and tried the plants. Then she told him to rub reeds together—but they bent and broke and he could make no fire. He twisted her neck until she was half dead—then she cried out: “I have hidden the fire in a green stick.”

Maui worked hard but not a spark of fire appeared. Again he caught his prisoner by the head and wrung her neck, and she named a kind of dry wood. Maui rubbed the sticks together but they only became warm. The twisting process was resumed—and repeated until the mud-hen was almost dead—and Maui had tried tree after tree. At last Maui found fire. Then as the flames rose he said: “There is one more thing to rub.” He took a fire stick and rubbed the top of the head of his prisoner until the feathers fell off and the raw flesh appeared. Thus the Hawaiian mud-hen and her descendants have ever since had bald heads, and the Hawaiians have had the secret of fire-making.

Maui was a great discoverer of islands. Among other groups he “fished up from the ocean” New Zealand and the Hawaiian Islands with a magic hook. One by one he pulled them to himself out of the deep waters. He discovered them.

Thus Maui raised the sky, lassoed the sun, found fire and made the earth habitable for man. 

********** 

This is part of a series of postings of stories under the category, “Keeping the Public in Public Domain.” The idea behind Public Domain was to preserve our cultural heritage after the authors and their immediate heirs were compensated. I feel strongly current copyright law delays this intent on works of the 20^th century. My own library of folklore includes so many books within the Public Domain I decided to share stories from them. I hope you enjoy discovering them.

At the same time, my own involvement in storytelling regularly creates projects requiring research as part of my sharing stories with an audience.  Whenever that research needs to be shown here, the publishing of Public Domain stories will not occur that week.  This is a return to my regular posting of a research project here.  (Don't worry, this isn't dry research, my research is always geared towards future storytelling to an audience.)  Response has convinced me that "Keeping the Public in Public Domain" should continue along with my other postings as often as I can manage it.

See the sidebar for other Public Domain story resources I recommend on the page “Public Domain Story Resources."

 

Colum - The Fish-Hook of Pearl - Keeping the Public in Public Domain

Here in the Great Lakes, with many additional inland lakes, fishing is very popular. This month is Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month bringing attention to Hawaii. For some reason, back in 1922 Irish writer and folklorist Padraic Colum "was commissioned to write versions of Hawaiian folklore for young people. This resulted in the publication of three volumes of his versions of tales from the islands." Why wasn't a Hawaiian asked? I've no idea, but the best known of those books, At the Gateways of the Day, not only has the much-loved story of "Pu-nia and the King of the Sharks" but another tale of unusual fishing. Colum obviously knew how to get the most out of his four months in Hawaii! It's worth reading his Introduction to the book talking about the Polynesian differences from European folktales and his re-telling.

The book includes "Helps to Pronunciation", but it would be a good idea to look further online. Hawaiian Alphabet: a complete beginner's guide/ is a good starting point, followed by searching out audio pronunciation of specific words. Getting comfortable with the names is probably the hardest part to non-Islanders telling their stories.

The book contains many tales about the great Hawaiian hero, Maui, also the Hawaiian little people, the Menhune, and talks about Hawaiian mythology, but I find the stories about "ordinary people" like Punia and this tale of a family fishing much more approachable.

Oh, and a fathom is approximately six feet, but originally was the span of a man's outstretched arms, so the ten fathom canoe was quite large. 

Happy telling while you fish!

800-year-old pearl-shell fish hooks at the National Museum - Cook Islands

The Fish-Hook of Pearl.

There are fish-hooks and fish-hooks, but the most wonderful fish-hook that any one ever heard of was the fish-hook owned by Ku-ula. It was a fish-hook of pearl-shell; and every time Ku-ula went fishing he took a canoe, not five fathoms or eight fathoms in length, but ten fathoms, and when he fished with that hook (Ka-hu-oi was the name it had) the canoe would be filled up with the catch.

And it was the finest of fish, the aku fish, that would rise to that hook. He would let it down into the water, and the aku would throw themselves into the canoe. Ku-ula was rich because of all the fine fish he could catch with his pearl hook. It had been given to him by a bird that was called Ka-manu-wai, and this bird would sit on the rail of the canoe that Ku-ula went fishing in and eat some of the fish that Ku-ula caught.

One day when Ku-ula went fishing outside of Mamala the King of that place went fishing there too. The King caught few fish, and none of them were fine ones. He looked, and he saw Ku-ula fishing, and he saw that the aku fish were jumping in hundreds around the hook that the fisherman let down. His attendants told him of the pearl hook that was called Ka-hu-oi, and the King made up his mind to have this hook. He sent for Ku-ula, and he made him give up the hook that the bird Ka-manu-wai had given him.

After that Ku-ula caught no more aku fish; the bird Ka-manu-wai, not getting the food it liked, flew away; its eyes were closed with hunger where it roosted, and the place where that bird roosted is called Kau-maka-pili, “Roosting with Closed Eyes,” to this day. And Ku-ula got poorer and poorer, and he and his family got more and more hungry from that day.

And so it came about that when his child Ai-ai was born they had no food for him. They let him float down the stream, putting him in just above the place where the bird Ka-manu-wai roosted. The child floated down; a rock in the stream held him, and there little Ai-ai stayed in the shallow water. That very day the King’s daughter, who was then a young girl, was bathing in the stream with her attendants. She found little Ai-ai, and she took him to the King’s house; there Ai-ai grew up, and he was tended by the King’s daughter while he was a child.

When he grew up he was a strong and handsome youth. The King’s daughter who had saved him came to love him; she would have him marry her, and at last he and she got married.

It happened that one day after they were married his wife was sick, and she asked Ai-ai to get her some fish. He took a rod, and he went fishing along the shore. He caught a few fish, and he brought them home to her. After a while she was sick again, and she had a longing for fish again. And this time she wanted the aku, the fine fish from the depth of the sea.

He told her then that he could not fish for aku unless he had a canoe and a fish-hook of pearl. When she heard him say that, she remembered that her father had a pearl fish-hook. So she went to the King, her father. When she came before him, he said, “What is it you want, my daughter?” She said, “A canoe for my husband, and a pearl fish-hook.” He told her that her husband might take a canoe out of his canoe-shed, and then he said to her, “I have a pearl fish-hook, and I will give it to you for him.”

So he gave a pearl fish-hook to his daughter, and she hurried home with it. Now Ai-ai, since he had grown up, had known his father and had heard how the King had taken away the hook Ka-hu-oi from him. So when he saw the pearl fish-hook in his wife’s hands he was overjoyed; he took it from her, and he got a canoe in the King’s shed, and he went out to fish in the sea.

A bird came down and watched the shining fish-hook that he held. It rested on the rail of the canoe as he paddled out to sea. It watched him lower the hook. Its eyes were half closed, but now it opened them wide and looked down after the shining hook. This was the bird Ka-manu-wai that had given the hook to his father, Ai-ai knew; now the bird was going to eat plenty of the fine aku.

But no aku came on the hook, and no aku dashed up on the canoe on seeing the shining thing in the water. The bird closed its eyes again. It gave a croak and then flew away.

Ai-ai came back to his wife without any aku for her. Again she was sick, and she begged Ai-ai again to get her the aku fish. “It may be,” he said, “that the King has another pearl hook. Go to him once more and ask him for one. Tell him that in the calabash in which he keeps the fishing utensils that he used long ago there may be another pearl fish-hook.”

So again she went before the King. “I have come for a pearl fish-hook so that my husband may go out and catch me the aku fish that I long for.” “I gave the pearl fish-hook that I had.” “In the calabash in which you keep the fishing utensils that you used long ago there may be another pearl fish-hook.”

The King ordered that this calabash be brought to him. He searched amongst all the utensils that were in it, and at last he found the pearl fish-hook that he had taken. He had left it there and had forgotten it, for he had gone fishing only once after he had taken it from Ku-ula.

And now he gave the hook Ka-hu-oi to his daughter. She hurried home, and she put the pearl hook into the hands of her husband Ai-ai. He went straight down to the beach and took out the canoe and went fishing in the place where his father used to go. As he went the bird Ka-manu-wai flew down and lighted on the rail of the canoe. It opened wide its eyes to watch him let down the shining hook.

When he came to Mamala the aku began to jump to the hook. They threw themselves up and into the canoe. They filled it up—even that ten-fathom canoe was deep with them, and Ai-ai was hardly strong enough to paddle it back. The bird Ka-manu-wai ate of the fish, and as it ate the gleam came back into its plumage, and it was a wide-eyed, strong-winged bird once more.

It took the pearl fish-hook and flew away with it. But every day it would come back with the hook when Ai-ai took out his canoe. The bird guarded the hook and would never let it go into a stranger’s hands again. Sometimes it would bring Ka-hu-oi to Ku-ula, Ai-ai’s father; for the old man took to going out in his canoe again, and he would fish for aku outside of Mamala.

********

Colum not only tells about his general sources in the book's Introduction, but concludes with Notes including this about "The Fish-Hook of Pearl"

This simple tale is given in the Fornander Collection, Vol. IV, Part III, of the Memoirs of the Bernice Pauahi Museum, with the title Kaao no Aiai, the Legend of Aiai.

Project Gutenberg has three volumes of the Fornander Collection of Hawaiian Antiquities and Folk-lore with Archive.org having volumes 4,5, and 6 for anyone wanting to fish even further into these tales.

Illustration for At the Gateways of the Day by Juliette May Fraser

 

 

 

***************** 

This is part of a series of postings of stories under the category, “Keeping the Public in Public Domain.” The idea behind Public Domain was to preserve our cultural heritage after the authors and their immediate heirs were compensated. I feel strongly current copyright law delays this intent on works of the 20^th century. My own library of folklore includes so many books within the Public Domain I decided to share stories from them. I hope you enjoy discovering them.

At the same time, my own involvement in storytelling regularly creates projects requiring research as part of my sharing stories with an audience.  Whenever that research needs to be shown here, the publishing of Public Domain stories will not occur that week.  This is a return to my regular posting of a research project here.  (Don't worry, this isn't dry research, my research is always geared towards future storytelling to an audience.)  Response has convinced me that "Keeping the Public in Public Domain" should continue along with my other postings as often as I can manage it.

See the sidebar for other Public Domain story resources I recommend on the page “Public Domain Story Resources."

 

 

Hartwell - An Adventure with a Shark - Keeping the Public in Public Domain

Photo by Hunter Newton on Unsplash

 This second of three stories from Story Hour Readings in E.C.Hartwell's series for early 20th Century readers was published in 1921 for Fifth Year students.  It's anonymous, but filled with adventure!  

(It's also perfect for the Summer Reading theme of Oceans of Possibilities.)  I'll say a bit more about that and another shark story later.

I love that the readers are encouraged to briefly retell this story, bringing out the main incident and what leads up to it.  It's also worth noting the book was published in 1921 and the reader is asked to prove if the story took place near then or not.

I also mentioned another story about sharks.  Please look at the May of 2018 article I did about Padraic Colum's "Pu-nia and the Sharks."  It talks about a controversy when telling stories about sharks.  It's a great tale, but how you handle the ending can be tricky.

******************

This is part of a series of postings of stories under the category, "Keeping the Public in Public Domain."  The idea behind Public Domain was to preserve our cultural heritage after the authors and their immediate heirs were compensated.  I feel strongly current copyright law delays this intent on works of the 20th century.  My own library of folklore includes so many books within the Public Domain I decided to share stories from them.  I hope you enjoy discovering new stories.  

At the same time, my own involvement in storytelling regularly creates projects requiring research as part of my sharing stories with an audience.  Whenever that research needs to be shown here, the publishing of Public Domain stories will not occur that week.  This is a return to my regular posting of a research project here.  (Don't worry, this isn't dry research, my research is always geared towards future storytelling to an audience.)  Response has convinced me that "Keeping the Public in Public Domain" should continue along with my other postings as often as I can manage it.

Other Public Domain story resources I recommend-

• There are many online resources for Public Domain stories, maybe none for folklore is as ambitious as fellow storyteller, Yoel Perez's database, Yashpeh, the International Folktales Collection.  I have long recommended it and continue to do so.  He has loaded Stith Thompson's Motif Index into his server as a database so you can search the whole 6 volumes for whatever word or expression you like by pressing one key. http://folkmasa.org/motiv/motif.htm

• You may have noticed I'm no longer certain Dr. Perez has the largest database, although his offering the Motif Index certainly qualifies for those of us seeking specific types of stories.  There's another site, FairyTalez claiming to be the largest, with "over 2000 fairy tales, folktales, and fables" and they are "fully optimized for phones, tablets, and PCs", free and presented without ads.
  
  Between those two sites, there is much for story-lovers, but as they say in infomercials, "Wait, there's more!"

The email list for storytellers, Storytell, discussed Online Story Sources and came up with these additional suggestions:            

         - David K. Brown - http://people.ucalgary.ca/~dkbrown/stories.html

         - Karen Chace - http://karenchace.blogspot.com/search?q=public+domain

         - Richard Martin - http://www.tellatale.eu/tales_page.html

         - Spirit of Trees - http://spiritoftrees.org/featured-folktales

         - Story-Lovers - http://www.story-lovers.com/ is now only accessible through the Wayback Machine, described below, but the late Jackie Baldwin's wonderful site lives on there, fully searchable manually (the Google search doesn't work), at https://archive.org/ .  It's not easy, but go to Story-lovers.com snapshot for October 22 2016  and you can click on SOS: Searching Out Stories to scroll down through the many story topics and click on the story topic that interests you.

       - Tim Sheppard - http://www.timsheppard.co.uk/story/storylinks.html

       - World of Tales - http://www.worldoftales.com/ 
           - Zalka Csenge Virag - http://multicoloreddiary.blogspot.com doesn't give the actual stories, but her recommendations, working her way through each country on a continent, give excellent ideas for finding new books and stories to love and tell.

     
You're going to find many of the links on these sites have gone down, BUT go to the Internet Archive Wayback Machine to find some of these old links.  Tim's site, for example, is so huge probably updating it would be a full-time job.  In the case of Story-Lovers, it's great that Jackie Baldwin set it up to stay online as long as it did after she could no longer maintain it.  Possibly searches maintained it.  Unfortunately Storytell list member, Papa Joe is on both Tim Sheppard's site and Story-Lovers, but he no longer maintains his old Papa Joe's Traveling Storytelling Show website and his Library (something you want to see!) is now only on the Wayback Machine.  It took some patience working back through claims of snapshots but finally in December of 2006 it appears!

Somebody as of this writing whose stories can still be found by his website is the late Chuck Larkin - http://chucklarkin.com/stories.html.  I prefer to list these sites by their complete address so they can be found by the Wayback Machine, a.k.a. Archive.org, when that becomes the only way to find them.

You can see why I recommend these to you. Have fun discovering even more stories!

Colum - The King of the Birds - Keeping the Public in Public Domain

I'm torn between wanting to feature Irish material before next week's St. Patrick's Day and remain with resources related to the current Ukrainian invasion by Russia.  Today's story is an Irish story told by Padriac Colum in The Boy Who Knew What the Birds Said .  I hope it's prophetic of the Ukrainian people managing to use their wits and limited resources to fight back against what would seem the obvious ruler over them and other countries.

(There's a bit of a "frame" before the story begins.  It starts after the dividing line.)

The King of the Birds

The thirteen little wrens sat on the Apple-yard wall in the King's Garden and their mother was there to teach them to fly. One called them the little wrens, but really each one was as big as their mother. She had a tail, however, that was most cunningly cocked and they had no tails, and the consequence was that when they made their little flights they always went sideways. Moreover, their beaks were still yellow and wide and open and this is always a sign of the young bird.

"All I ask of you," said the mother, "is that when you go into the World you remember that you are the Children of the King of the Birds."

"Now why does our Mother call us the Children of the King of the Birds?" said one little wren to the other. "I think we're really very small. And I think our Mother is very small. And there's our Father behind that ivy-leaf and he's very small too."

"And wherever you go, be sure to conduct yourselves like the Children of the King of the Birds," said the Mother.

"It's because we were reared in such a fine nest," said another little wren. "No other birds in the world had ever a finer nest than we have had. That's the reason we're called the Children of the King of the Birds."

"Men call the Wren the King of the Birds," said the Father Wren, as he flew up on a tree, "and surely men ought to know who is the King of the Birds."

"Why do men call the Wren the King of the Birds?" said the little wrens.

"I will tell you," said the Mother. "As we fly from the wall to the tree, and from the tree back to the wall, I will tell you why men honor the wren as the King of the Birds."

She spent a whole day telling the little wrens the story and the Boy Who Knew What the Birds Said was there, and he heard the whole of it.—

---

The King of the Hither-side of the Mountain conquered the two villages of Half-a-Loaf and Windy-Gap, and the very day he conquered he ordered the two Headmen to come before him.

"You two Headmen are to see that your villages, Half-a-Loaf and Windy-Gap, send me my rightful tribute," said the King to them.

"There isn't much we can send...." said the Headman of Half-a-Loaf.

"A string of salmon," said the Headman of Windy-Gap.

"A basket of plover's eggs," said the Headman of Half-a-Loaf.

"No," said the King, "the tribute that each of your villages must send me is the King of the Birds."

The two Headmen went back to their villages, and that very day each told at the council what tribute the King had ordered them to send. "The King of the Birds," said the people of Half-a-Loaf, "that's the Eagle surely." "The King of the Birds," said the people of Windy-Gap. "What Bird might that be? We'll have to give thought to this."

The people of Windy-Gap thought about it and thought about it, but the people of Half-a-Loaf declared there was no doubt at all about it—the Eagle was the King of the Birds. And while the people of Windy-Gap were thinking and pondering the people of Half-a-Loaf were sending their young men off to catch an eagle.

But an eagle is a hard fowl to catch, and the people of Half-a-Loaf found they had to send all of their young men out and to send them out every day. And the young men climbed high hills and stony ditches, and they searched the east and they hunted the west; they went out at sunrise and they came back at sunset, but never an eagle did they bring with them.

"It may be that the Eagle is the King of the Birds," said the people of Windy-Gap, "but we had better consider it."

They thought about it from sunrise to sunset; they thought about it while they plowed their fields and sowed them, while they spun their cloth and made their coats, while they mended their nets and mended their shoes, while they thatched their roofs and planted their apple-trees.

And in Half-a-Loaf there was few left to plow the fields and sow them, to spin cloth and to make coats, to mend nets and to mend shoes, to thatch roofs and to plant apple-trees—there was few left to do these things for all the young men were out on the mountain hunting for an eagle.

"The people of Windy-Gap will be ruined," said the people of Half-a-Loaf, "they have done nothing yet to catch the Eagle. When the King gets no tribute from them he'll come down and sell them and their village. Call the young men back that have gone into the fields to work and send them up the mountain again."

At last the people of Half-a-Loaf caught their Eagle—a great golden Eagle he was. They built for him a shed and they fed him on what lambs they had that year.

"We're safe anyway," said the people of Half-a-Loaf, "but the unfortunate folk in Windy-Gap have lost their chance. They'll not have time to catch an eagle now."

The time was coming near when the two villages would have to send their tribute to the King.

"We have our Eagle," said the people of Half-a-Loaf, "But O, Bad Fortune! we have hardly a crop growing. This will be a hard year for us—we haven't lambs to grow into sheep even."

"We have our crops," said the people of Windy-Gap, "but, Bad Cess to it! What are we to do about paying our tribute to the King?"

And still they couldn't decide whether it was the Eagle or the Cuckoo or the Woodpecker that was King of the Birds. They were still considering it when the King's Messenger came to bid them come with their tribute to the King's Castle.

What were the people of Windy-Gap to do? They searched round and about but no bird at all could they find. And then as he was being marched off the Headman put his hand under the thatch of his house and took out a Wren that was sheltering there. He put the Wren under his hat and went off with the King's Messenger.

And there, before him on the way to the King's Castle was the Headman of Half-a-Loaf. The riders of the village were with him and they bore their golden Eagle most triumphantly.

"Give to my Falconer the King of the Birds," said the King.

The Headman of Half-a-Loaf presented the Eagle.

"It is well," said the King, "and where have you," said he to the Headman of Windy-Gap, "bestowed the King of the Birds?"

The Headman put his hand under his hat and handed over the Wren to the King's Falconer.

"Tush," said the King, "Why do you call this the King of the Birds?"

The Headman of Windy-Gap was going to say "Because his family is great," but he said instead "Because he flies the highest, my lord."

"If it be truth it's unknown to me," said the King, "but it shall be tried out."

Then said he to the Royal Falconer, "Let the Eagle and the Wren soar together. And when the Eagle outsoars the Wren it shall be proved that the Headman of Windy-Gap is a catiff, and his village and everyone in it will be sold to the Saracens. But if it so happens that the Wren outsoars the Eagle, the tribute sent from the village of Windy-Gap must be accepted."

The Eagle and the Wren rose from the same perch and soared up together. Up and up the Eagle went. "So far my father went, but I shall go farther," said the Eagle. Higher and higher he rose. "So far my grandfather went but I shall go farther." Farther and farther he soared. "So far went my great-grandfather, and no eagle again will fly so high." His wings were stiff and tired. "No bird will ever out-soar this flight of mine," said the Eagle.

He went to close his wings so that he might rest them as he went down. But as he did the Wren came from under his wings.

Up went the Wren, down went the Eagle. Up and up went the Wren. He had been resting while the Eagle had been flying, and now he was able to soar past the point the Eagle had reached at his dead-best.

"No bird will ever out-soar this flight of mine," said the Eagle.

 

 

The Eagle flew down and lighted on the Falconer's perch. "Has he flown high, Falconer?" asked the King. "No bird has flown so high," said the Falconer. "By the rime on his wings he has gone into the line of frost."

"The Eagle is King of the Birds and no one can deny it," said the King. "The village of Windy-Gap has not sent me my tribute."

"Mercy," said the Headman of Windy-Gap.

"The village and all in it shall be sold to the Saracens," said the King.

Just then the Wren came down and lighted on the perch beside the Eagle. "Where did the Wren fly to?" said the King. "By my glove," said the Falconer "he soared past the line of frost, and went into the line of snow, for what's on his feathers is a drop of snow."

"The Wren is King of the Birds," said the Headman of Windy-Gap.

"Yes, King of the Birds," said the King, "and, therefore, my lawful tribute."

And so, for ever after the villages sent to the King, not an Eagle, but a Wren as tribute. And in no village ever after were the lands unplowed and the fields unsown, the cloth unspun and the coats not made, the roofs unthatched and the apple-trees unplanted. And in every village in the hollow and on the height the people shouted for the Wren—"The Wren, the Wren, the King of all Birds."

*************************

May the present situation change so once again the lands are being plowed (Ukraine has long been the bread basket of Europe and beyond), the fields sown, the cloth spun and coats made, the roofs thatched (and the incredible amount of reconstruction needed), and apple trees and other trees replanted.

For those seeking a picture book version, Jane Goodall created a fable based on her remembrance of a story she and her sister heard nightly.  She doesn't name the book where it was found and probably no longer recalls it.  The incident of the wren hiding in the eagle's wing occurs, but it occurs because there's a contest among the birds.  She uses the fable format to illustrate the idea of teamwork and need for everyone to have a little help now and then.  

Was it the same story?  Did her memory shape her view of it?

Similarly I could swear there's a Native American version, but couldn't find it.

Among storytellers the question of "should we state the moral at the end of a fable or not" is often discussed.  Goodall clearly believes it should, although the Horn Book review faults her for the book being "heavy on message."  The explanation storytellers often give for NOT stating a conclusion to a story is it can and should mean many different things to the many different members of your audience.  Teachers can check this, if they wish, by offering a story and then asking students what the story might be trying to teach.  In a discussion it might become obvious we all hear what we need or want to hear.

Similarly there are many views of the current invasion.  I pray it ends well and actually has an ending since it's stirring up events dating back to times many believed were settled.

*********************

This is part of a series of postings of stories under the category, "Keeping the Public in Public Domain."  The idea behind Public Domain was to preserve our cultural heritage after the authors and their immediate heirs were compensated.  I feel strongly current copyright law delays this intent on works of the 20th century.  My own library of folklore includes so many books within the Public Domain I decided to share stories from them.  I hope you enjoy discovering new stories.  

At the same time, my own involvement in storytelling regularly creates projects requiring research as part of my sharing stories with an audience.  Whenever that research needs to be shown here, the publishing of Public Domain stories will not occur that week.  This is a return to my regular posting of a research project here.  (Don't worry, this isn't dry research, my research is always geared towards future storytelling to an audience.)  Response has convinced me that "Keeping the Public in Public Domain" should continue along with my other postings as often as I can manage it.

Other Public Domain story resources I recommend-

• There are many online resources for Public Domain stories, maybe none for folklore is as ambitious as fellow storyteller, Yoel Perez's database, Yashpeh, the International Folktales Collection.  I have long recommended it and continue to do so.  He has loaded Stith Thompson's Motif Index into his server as a database so you can search the whole 6 volumes for whatever word or expression you like by pressing one key. http://folkmasa.org/motiv/motif.htm

• You may have noticed I'm no longer certain Dr. Perez has the largest database, although his offering the Motif Index certainly qualifies for those of us seeking specific types of stories.  There's another site, FairyTalez claiming to be the largest, with "over 2000 fairy tales, folktales, and fables" and they are "fully optimized for phones, tablets, and PCs", free and presented without ads.
  
  Between those two sites, there is much for story-lovers, but as they say in infomercials, "Wait, there's more!"

The email list for storytellers, Storytell, discussed Online Story Sources and came up with these additional suggestions:            

         - David K. Brown - http://people.ucalgary.ca/~dkbrown/stories.html

         - Karen Chace - http://karenchace.blogspot.com/search?q=public+domain

         - Richard Martin - http://www.tellatale.eu/tales_page.html

         - Spirit of Trees - http://spiritoftrees.org/featured-folktales

         - Story-Lovers - http://www.story-lovers.com/ is now only accessible through the Wayback Machine, described below, but the late Jackie Baldwin's wonderful site lives on there, fully searchable manually (the Google search doesn't work), at https://archive.org/ .  It's not easy, but go to Story-lovers.com snapshot for October 22 2016  and you can click on SOS: Searching Out Stories to scroll down through the many story topics and click on the story topic that interests you.

       - Tim Sheppard - http://www.timsheppard.co.uk/story/storylinks.html

       - World of Tales - http://www.worldoftales.com/ 
           - Zalka Csenge Virag - http://multicoloreddiary.blogspot.com doesn't give the actual stories, but her recommendations, working her way through each country on a continent, give excellent ideas for finding new books and stories to love and tell.

     
You're going to find many of the links on these sites have gone down, BUT go to the Internet Archive Wayback Machine to find some of these old links.  Tim's site, for example, is so huge probably updating it would be a full-time job.  In the case of Story-Lovers, it's great that Jackie Baldwin set it up to stay online as long as it did after she could no longer maintain it.  Possibly searches maintained it.  Unfortunately Storytell list member, Papa Joe is on both Tim Sheppard's site and Story-Lovers, but he no longer maintains his old Papa Joe's Traveling Storytelling Show website and his Library (something you want to see!) is now only on the Wayback Machine.  It took some patience working back through claims of snapshots but finally in December of 2006 it appears!

Somebody as of this writing whose stories can still be found by his website is the late Chuck Larkin - http://chucklarkin.com/stories.html.  I prefer to list these sites by their complete address so they can be found by the Wayback Machine, a.k.a. Archive.org, when that becomes the only way to find them.

You can see why I recommend these to you. Have fun discovering even more stories!

 

 

 

Colum - Pu-nia and the Sharks - Keeping the Public in Public Domain

Hawaii's volcano has all the world watching with what some say could be a once in a century eruption.  For the official information, the U.S. Geological Survey has information straight from the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory or as the USGS site calls themself, "science for a changing world."  Changes have closed Volcanoes National Park indefinitely.

As a storyteller it makes me think of today's story, which I love to tell.  No, there's no volcano in it, but it certainly could be a good time to talk about them.  What there is, however, is sharks and a bit of a problem its ending caused.  After I give the story here, I want to discuss that controversy.  I will also say more about its collector and a bit related to the topic of Public Domain...the very heart beating behind my posting "Keeping the Public in Public Domain" stories here.

But first the story.

 

 

I first discovered that story through
Margaret Read MacDonald's excellent, audience participation storytelling book, Twenty Tellable Tales.  As you might expect from her folklore background, she also explained its background.  She, too, goes back to Padraic Colum, but only to his Legends of Hawaii.  That 1937 book includes this story from his earlier two volume work, Tales & Legends of Hawaii.  It's the opening story in Volume I, At the Gateways of the Day. 
I mentioned on an earlier story by Colum "There are some stories by Colum put into a form of copyright limbo" -- this is because of the need for renewal 28 years after original copyright under the old law.  There is now an online database to find book renewals for 1923-1963 at Stanford and those original two volumes  were not renewed, letting them fall into public domain in the fifties.  Probably Colum's later work was simply his and his publisher, Yale University Press, repackaging nineteen of the most popular stories.  All three of those books were the result of a four month stay for the Hawaiian Legislature's Commission on Myth and Folklore and mainly was based upon the Fornander Collection of Hawaiian Antiquities and Folk-lore.  In his Introduction he notes the traditional storytellers use of gesture "makes the telling of a story a dramatic entertainment."  He also said there was no longer a school for gesture and it was being lost.

Whether gesture was lost might be debatable in watching hula dancers, but MacDonald also notices Martha Beckworth's longer version of the tale in Hawaiian Mythology with Punia in the shark ten days and eating the shark from the inside until it heads to shore (Motif F912, Victim kills swallower from within and Motif F811.4 Jonah, Fish or water monster swallows a man).  Since the story probably pre-dates the arrival of missionaries in 1820, it's interesting to read more from MacDonald on the variants on the motif through out the world.

But Controversy?

I once told this story at a school where all classes had studied various aspects of oceanography.  I remember walking the halls and seeing the class displays of student work, including one class which obviously enjoyed sharks.  My telling of the story went along to the traditional ending.

Silence.

I could tell the school was polite, but I had just killed off the King of the Sharks.  (Appropriately Colum in his final notes tells us: The shark's name, Kai-ale-ale, means "Sea in great commotion.")  The program went on and was well enough received, but the ending now troubled me.  It continued to trouble me until 1997 when Lee Wardlaw produced a picture book version.  In her book's adaptation the ending has Punia not only outsmart the shark, but let him go free with the warning that, if the shark returns, Punia will let all the ocean creatures know how he was outsmarted!

I asked my fellow storytellers what they thought of my stopping the story at the end and giving my audience the choice of endings.  They felt I needed to tell the story with my ending chosen.

I don't.  I don't ask the audience to vote, merely in their own mind decide if King Kai-ale-ale is killed, as is traditionally told, or if Punia outsmarted him once again and the shark leaves in disgrace.  I don't ask the audience to tell anyone else, but explain their ending is their version of how story ends for them.  Wardlaw is a teacher as well as award-winning author of over 20 books (yes, this book, has a few awards) and, as a result, I'm sure she understands the problem with the traditional ending.  Like any good educator she offers a teacher's guide.  I like that, among Language Arts activities, it suggests: As a class, write your own adventure where you outsmart another animal.  How would you outsmart a bear, snake or lion?  What would you use to trick them like Punia did?

On Amazon I see yet another version by Beverly Moffett Mohan and a different Study Guide for Wardlaw's book.

Now what's your version?  (As I tell my audiences: Only you need to know.)

********************

This is part of a series of postings of stories under the category, "Keeping the Public in Public Domain."  The idea behind Public Domain was to preserve our cultural heritage after the authors and their immediate heirs were compensated.  I feel strongly current copyright law delays this intent on works of the 20th century.  My own library of folklore includes so many books within the Public Domain I decided to share stories from them.  I hope you enjoy discovering new stories.  

At the same time, my own involvement in storytelling regularly creates projects requiring research as part of my sharing stories with an audience.  Whenever that research needs to be shown here, the publishing of Public Domain stories will not occur that week.  This is a return to my regular posting of a research project here.  (Don't worry, this isn't dry research, my research is always geared towards future storytelling to an audience.)  Response has convinced me that "Keeping the Public in Public Domain" should continue along with my other postings as often as I can manage it.

Other Public Domain story resources I recommend-

• There are many online resources for Public Domain stories, maybe none for folklore is as ambitious as fellow storyteller, Yoel Perez's database, Yashpeh, the International Folktales Collection.  I have long recommended it and continue to do so.  He has loaded Stith Thompson's Motif Index into his server as a database so you can search the whole 6 volumes for whatever word or expression you like by pressing one key. http://folkmasa.org/motiv/motif.htm

• You may have noticed I'm no longer certain Dr. Perez has the largest database, although his offering the Motif Index certainly qualifies for those of us seeking specific types of stories.  There's another site, FairyTalez claiming to be the largest, with "over 2000 fairy tales, folktales, and fables" and they are "fully optimized for phones, tablets, and PCs", free and presented without ads.
  
  Between those two sites, there is much for story-lovers, but as they say in infomercials, "Wait, there's more!"

The email list for storytellers, Storytell, discussed Online Story Sources and came up with these additional suggestions:            

         - David K. Brown - http://people.ucalgary.ca/~dkbrown/stories.html

         - Karen Chace - http://karenchace.blogspot.com/search?q=public+domain

         - Richard Martin - http://www.tellatale.eu/tales_page.html

         - Spirit of Trees - http://spiritoftrees.org/featured-folktales

         - Story-Lovers - http://www.story-lovers.com/ is now only accessible through the Wayback Machine, described below, but Jackie Baldwin's wonderful site lives on there, fully searchable manually (the Google search doesn't work), at https://archive.org/ .  It's not easy, but go to Story-lovers.com snapshot for October 22 2016  and you can click on SOS: Searching Out Stories to scroll down through the many story topics and click on the story topic that interests you.

       - Tim Sheppard - http://www.timsheppard.co.uk/story/storylinks.html

       - World of Tales - http://www.worldoftales.com/ 

     
You're going to find many of the links on these sites have gone down, BUT go to the Internet Archive Wayback Machine to find some of these old links.  Tim's site, for example, is so huge probably updating it would be a full-time job.  In the case of Story-Lovers, it's great that Jackie Baldwin set it up to stay online as long as it did after she could no longer maintain it.  Possibly searches maintained it.  Unfortunately Storytell list member, Papa Joe is on both Tim Sheppard's site and Story-Lovers, but he no longer maintains his old Papa Joe's Traveling Storytelling Show website and his Library (something you want to see!) is now only on the Wayback Machine.  It took some patience working back through claims of snapshots but finally in December of 2006 it appears!

Somebody as of this writing whose stories can still be found by his website is the late Chuck Larkin - http://chucklarkin.com/stories.html.  I prefer to list these sites by their complete address so they can be found by the Wayback Machine, a.k.a. Archive.org, when that becomes the only way to find them.

You can see why I recommend these to you. Have fun discovering even more stories!

Colum - The Building of the Wall - Keeping the Public in Public Domain

Storytellers who make mythology accessible are living treasures.  Back when I headed Children's Services at Mount Clemens Public Library, middle schoolers annually had a Greek mythology unit.  I loved overhearing how their teacher made it as alive as a "soap opera" and without modernizing it.  I teach storytelling, including a method called Word Weaving, developed by Kate Farrell, who discovered the power of storytelling while teaching Greek myths to bored high school students.  She became angry and shouted out, "I WISH I WERE LIKE MEDUSA AND COULD TURN YOU ALL TO STONE!"  Whoa! Her students thought she had flipped out, but they paid attention!  For a modernized version, I enjoy school librarian and storyteller, Barbara MacBride-Smith's storytelling and also her book, Greek Myths, Western Style: Toga Tales With An Attitude, retelling those gods as a bunch of Texas "good ol' boys. . . and gals."

Have you noticed how Greek, to a lesser extent Roman, and even Egyptian mythology because of Egyptian history seem to get more attention than Norse or Celtic mythology?

Padraic Colum, handled Norse mythology in great depth in The Children of Odin -- the source of today's tale.  He also wrote a children's version of the Iliad and the Odyssey and many Celtic legends to retain his knowledge of Irish Gaelic.  He's so well covered online, you may take your choice of his autobiographical sketch posted on The Baldwin Project and some of his writing there or the Wikipedia article about him and the various versions of some of his work at Project Gutenberg.

Taking stories exactly as they are in his book would require filling in background information.  That's more easily done in a live re-telling.  For that reason today's story is from almost the start of the book.  For example I'd love to include more about the trickster, Loki, who is in this story and throughout Norse mythology.

That leaves things hanging, doesn't it?  Just like a "soap", the stories always seem to leave you wanting more.  The next story takes place inside that wall in a garden where the goddess Iduna tended an apple tree whose apples kept the dwellers of Asgard from aging.  Odin and Loki went into the world of men, including the bleak realm of the Giants.  Revenge by the Giants, a barbecue, an iceberg, a volcano, and more trickery involving Loki, will that story slake the thirst for more? 

There are some stories by Colum put into a form of copyright limbo, but fortunately not the stories in The Children of Odin.  In my opinion stories are even more inclined to fit the slogan of Nobody Can Have Just One...nor should they, especially when they are part of our cultural heritage in the world of Public Domain.
****************************
This is part of a series of bi-weekly posting of stories under the category, "Keeping the Public in Public Domain."  The idea behind Public Domain was to preserve our cultural heritage after the authors and their immediate heirs were compensated.  I feel strongly current copyright law delays this intent on works of the 20th century.  I hope you enjoy discovering new stories. 

Currently I'm involved in projects taking me out of my usual work of sharing stories with an audience.  My own library of folklore includes so many books within the Public Domain I decided to share stories from them.  This fall I expect to return to my normal monthly posting of a research project here.  Depending on response, I will decide at that time if "Keeping the Public in Public Domain" should continue along with my monthly postings.