Reading Notes: Chinese Fairy Tales, Part B

Part B of this unit was just as awesome as part A! This might be my favorite unit so far, in fact. For today, the two stories I wanted to focus on the most are "How the River God's Wedding Was Broken Off" and "Retribution."

How the River God's Wedding Was Broken Off

I liked this story because it was similar to a trickster story, only the one doing the tricking was not meant to be a "bad" character. Instead, it was a good character who was actively helping another character. The bad people, who were sacrificing girls to the River god were punished and the one's that weren't learned their lesson. I think this would be a fun story to retell, but with a different setting. Perhaps they all work together and the "girl" is someone who they give all of the hard tasks to. Then the person in charge sees what they are doing and makes them do it instead? Haha, maybe. I like that there was a sense of justice with the end, but it also felt a little like a parent punishing you for your own good, in my opinion.

Retribution

I really liked this story because of its parallel structures. The first man accidentally killed the water-carrier, who was then reborn wealthy. Then, the reborn water-carrier accidentally killed the old man next door. Both of them hid from what they did and let it seem like the other fell on their own. It implies maybe the older man will be reborn, possibly in higher standing, and may go on to accidentally kill someone who will be reborn and so on. I am a sucker for parallel story telling!

Edit: After re-reading the story a bit more carefully, I realized it was actually the older man, old Wang, who accidentally killed the water-carrier. Then, the water-carrier reborn accidentally killed old Wang. The younger man, Ma, was actually just witnessing everything from his house. This makes the story even more interesting to me, since the same two people were accidentally killing each other.

Chrysanthemum Blossom Bloom Flower Plant Macro

Public Domain

(Blossom Plant Bloom Chrysanthemum Macro Flower on maxpixel)

Bibliography: "Retribution" and "Hot the River God's Wedding Was Broken Off" from The Chinese Fairy Book, ed. by R. Wilhelm and translated by Frederick H. Martens (1921). (Web Source)