Elizabeth DiSalvatore - Myth-Folklore

Author's Note: This story comes from a Bengali folktale. Ghost are so prevalent in Bengali culture, that there are several types of ghosts that are responsible for different actions. It is believed that the spirits of people who could not find peace in the afterlife or died of unnatural deaths such as murder, suicide, or accident, remained on Earth.  In  The Story of the Brahmadaitya   by Rev. Lal Behari, a ghost is indeed a main character.  In this particular story, the "Brahmadaitya" is a ghost of a Brahman who dies unmarried. From my research, I discovered that a Braymadaitya is one of the most popular kind of ghost in Bengal and are believed to be benevolent. In this story, a poor Brahman befriends a Brahmadaitya who helps the Brahman become prosperous and in the end the Brahmadaitya's duties are accomplished and he ascends into the heavens, and everyone lives happily ever after. This story ends the same way many of the Bengali Folktales do, with the ...

I love animal tales and fairy tales! My Story book is about Italian fairy tales, so I thought it would be good to have other regional fairy tales to compare them to. These will also give me examples of how to write my own. These stories come from "Persian Tales" which was translated by D.L.R. Lorimer and E.O. Lorimer. The Wolf and the Goat was a fun ready! Especially because it is a parallel to a Brothers Grimm story. Most of Brothers Grimm's stories come from the Pentamerone, a collection of Italian fairy tales. This story reminded me a little bit of the wolf and the three little piggies. Goat Source: Flickr The WolfAunt is an exciting story about a werewolf! This story is based in Iran. I noticed that this story started out the same way as The Wolf and the Goat  with the phrase "Once upon a time there was a time where there was no one but God". This story also ended with the same phrase "And now my story has come to an end, but the sparrow neve...

I continued to read stories from Folklore of the Santal Parganas by Cecil Henry Bompas. The Tiger and the Cat   is a story or maybe you could call it a legend about why tigers and leopards now eat raw food and dogs. It was a very interesting story that was all over the place. This story was helpful for gaining information on how to write about tigers, for they are going to be the main characters in my story this week. The Elephants and the Ants was a funny, short story. The story tells what the lesson is at the end. I found it very peculiar. However, I am learning a lot about the culture of the Santal by reading all these short stories. A common theme is that the stories either teach a lesson or explain why something is the way that it is in current day. The Elephant and the Ant Source: Holtz Images 

I chose reading from the Santal region, for they were known to have stories filled with animals and tricksters. The first story I read was Ledha and the Leopard which came from Folklore of the Santal Parganas by Cecil Henry Bompas. This story was all over the place, and I could not predict where it was going. One minute Ledha was being hunted by a leopard and the next by a woman who found his hairs in the river and decided she wanted to marry him. I enjoyed reading it, but I think coming up with a story this complicated would be very challenging for me. The Oilman's Bullock was another interesting story. The bullock asked to fight the king's elephant to win his master some money so that his master would set him free. The animals fought, but it was a very short descriptive fight. I wonder how the story would be different if the fight was longer and more specific? The bullock won, but then the story ended abruptly saying he died a month later. Just when I thought these s...