The Fairytale Logs: The Nail

After a successful day of business at the fair, a merchant longs to return home. He rides his horse hard, hoping to get home before nightfall. He stops at a town to rest where a stable-boy informs him a nail is missing from his horse’s shoe, and that he should spend some time to get [...]

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The Fairytale Logs: Sharing Joy and Sorrow

This fairytale portrays gruesome domestic violence. A quarrelsome tailor who beats his wife is called before the authorities to account for his misbehavior. They lock him up in jail, and only agree to let him out if he promises to live with his wife in peace, sharing his joys and sorrows with her like a good husband and wife should do.
For awhile, he behaves, [...]

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The Fairytale Logs: The Golden Key

During winter, a poor boy goes out to chop some wood. He finds a golden key buried in the snow, then searches for a chest assuming that if the key was found here so too must be the lock that it opens. He finds an iron chest, but the key won’t fit. Then he finds a a second smaller chest, which is barely [...]

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The Fairytale Logs: The little Farmer

The little farmer lives in a town of rich farmers. He has always wanted a cow so he decides to create a fake wooden one. He leaves his cow with cowherd who abandons him in the fields when he will not return with the rest of the cows; it cannot move of course because it [...]

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The Fairy Tale Logs: The Giant and the Tailor

This is the counterpart fairy tale to “The Gallant Tailor.” Whereas “The Gallant Tailor” had the little guy boasting and outsmarting giants and kings, the reverse happens in this story; all the tailor’s boasting gets him into trouble when he cannot back up his words.
The story opens with the following lines:
“A certain tailor who was [...]

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Fairy tale Logs: The Gallant Tailor

A mild-mannered tailor purchases a jar of jam one day that will forever change the course of his life. The jar of jam attracts some flies to his workshop, which the tailor disposes of by reaching for a rag and killing them in one blow. Amazed at his own gallantry, the tailor designs a belt to [...]

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The Fairy tale Logs: The Frog Prince

The fairy tale details the life of a princess who enjoys playing in the woods with her golden ball. One day while playing in the woods she accidentally drops her golden ball in a deep well. A talking frog says he will rescue her golden ball, but only if the princess agrees to love him, [...]

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