Week 6 Reading A: Japanese Fairy Tales

For my first reading this week, I went straight for the Japanese fairy tales (by Lang). I've never really had the chance to read fairy tales from Japan, so I was really interested to see what of their culture spilled over into their writings. I have to say, they were certainly entertaining and definitely carried that 'fairy tale' vibe.

Schippeitaro: 

A young man comes of age and goes off looking for adventure! He vows to not come back until he’s made a name of himself doing some heroic deed.
Alright, so men get to choose what they want to do, but what about the women? Are they just stuck at home tending to the chickens or weaving (or whatever someone would do during that time period in Japan)? I wonder if there are any stories about girls coming of age, dressing up as men, and going to have their own adventures in Japan.
Anyway, the young man goes into this dense forest and finds a chapel to stay the night in. He’s woken up late in the night by the clamor of a bunch of cats dancing in the full moon. They keep yelling, “Don’t tell Schippeitaro!” He watches them and tries to get back to sleep. Anyone who has ever heard a cat yowling knows that this is a difficult feat.
Waking up in the morning, he finds a town nearby and sees a woman weeping. Curious, he asks what’s going on. Apparently, an annual sacrifice is made where a maiden is chosen to be offered up to the Spirit of the Mountain, who will eat her in return for keeping the town safe. The maiden will be offered to the Spirit in a casket. He then learns that Schippeitaro is a dog owned by the prince of the land.
The young man convinces the prince to let him borrow his dog for the night and tricks the Spirit of the Mountain into thinking he’s about to eat the maiden in the casket when, lo and behold, Schippeitaro is there instead! Both the young man and Schippeitaro kill many of the evil cat creatures and have a celebratory feast from the town in their name.
So here’s what I don’t understand - did the cat demon-creatures have a run-in with Schippeitaro before and that’s why they fear him, or do they just know the prince has this big dog named Schippeitaro that will most likely eat them? Either way, it wasn’t highlighted very well in the story. I was confused about just that, mostly. Other than that bit of confusion, this was a fun, light-hearted story to read.

Schippeitaro, by Frederick Richardson

Uraschimataro and the Turtle:

This story was a classic fairy tale. A young man who is very good with navigating his little ship through turbulent waves catches a little turtle one day among his full net of fish. The little turtle implores him to let her go, and, having a kind heart, the young man obliges.
One day, many years later, his ship is caught up in whirlwind and crashes. He struggles to get out of the wreckage, succeeds, and starts to swim for shore. But the turtle he saved all those years ago is huge now, and tells him to get onto her back and she’ll take him to shore.
That doesn’t happen. She instead takes him to see all the beautiful wonders of the ocean and finally, to the palace of the Princess of the Sea, Otohime. Uraschimataro falls in love with the beautiful princess and ends up spending an unknown amount of time with her.
Of course, as is the case with all fairy tales, he wants to go back to his loving parents and see them, but the princess begs him not to. Finally, after lots of convincing and promising he’ll come back, the princess concedes and gives him a golden box. As with all fairy tales, there’s just one condition. If Uraschimataro opens the box, he can never return to her.
So he goes back to his hometown and discovers three hundred years have passed in all his time with the princess. And as with most tragic fairy tales, he opens the golden box and is engulfed by a violet mist, withering him and turning him into an old man. He is soon taken by death, but not before telling his story to the village children.
So my thought the entire time during this story was, “Is this guy even human?” A sea turtle takes him down into the depths of the ocean for THREE DAYS and he doesn’t even have to come up for air. Maybe this guy was a fairy to begin with and he didn’t even realize it. Regardless, this was a good, classic example of a tragic fairytale.

Urashima Taro by Edmund Dulac

Bibliography

Title: "Schippeitaro" and "Uraschimataro and the Sea Turtle"

Book: "The Violet Fairy Book" and "The Pink Fairy Book"

Author: Andrew Lang

Year: 1897

Read the stories here!