Tuesday, September 6, 2016

Reading Notes: Aesop for Children (Winter) Part B

Notes. Like Part A, Part B included many interesting stories and morals. However, Part A included more stories that interested me. In Part B, the two main stories I liked were Mercury and the Woodman and The Animals and the Plague.

In Mercury and the Woodman, the moral is: Honesty is the best policy. I really like this moral. I admire how the woodman did not cave in to the gold and silver axes. He was not greedy. I wonder what the woodman said to the other people in the village. If he told them that they were supposed to deny the first few axes, they could have gotten more axes. Of course, that would defeat the whole purpose of this moral. However, if they were not too greedy and copied what the woodman did, they would be able to leave with gold and silver axes. Also, I liked how this story was not too short. It let me experience more about the story due to its length. I was not able to have a feel for the characters in the other stories because of how short it was.

(Mercury and the Woodman by Milo Winters. Web Source: Mythology and Folklore UN-Textbook.)

In The Animals and the Plague, the donkey is killed even though his confession is not as bad as the others. I feel sorry for the weak donkey, so I would change the story to make the donkey live through the means of running away or having someone help him. All he did was eat grass that did not belong to him, but others ate people and other animals. I feel like I need to give the donkey justice in a new story. 
 
Next, I want to talk about The Boy and the Nettles. This story confused me, and it was quite interesting to read. I did not know what nettles were, so I read about it. After briefly reading about it, it is hard to believe that a stinging nettle would be as soft as silk if it is held tightly. It does not make sense in my mind.

Bibliography. Aesop for Children by Milo Winter; link to reading online.

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