The Tale of Ivan Tsarevitch, The Firebird, and the Grey Wolf

I'm taking a break from Hans Christian Andersen today and doing a Russian fairytale. So here is the tale of Ivan Tsarevitch, The Firebird, and the Grey Wolf.

So in a galaxyland far, far away, there lived a mighty Tsar. He has a great orchard, but every so often a firebird would come and steal a few apples. This makes the Tsar really mad. It also reminds me of this hilarious rant my great-aunt went on once about the little Native kids who would steal crabapples from her yard. Anyway, the Tsar enlists his three sons for help. He says that for anyone who can kill the firebird, he will get half the kingdom now and half when the Tsar dies, which just seems to be setting him up for an assassination attempt.

The first two sons do a stakeout but fall asleep, and then the third one guards the orchard. One thing I love about fairy tales is how the youngest child is the one to get shit done. They're the smartest, they're the strongest, and they are the purest of heart. That's one part of fairy tales that is true to life. Anyway, the phoenix comes and Ivan grabs it but it gets away and leaves him with a tailfeather. The phoenix never comes back; I'm not sure why. But the Tsar loves the tailfeather so much that he orders his sons to go get the bird. The two older siblings band together out of jealousy of the fabulosity of their little sibling (Also true to life. Happens to me all the time) and Ivan goes off by himself.

Ivan rode on and on until he reached a pillar standing in the middle of an open field. On the pillar were the following words: "He who goes straight will be hungry and cold. He who passes to the right will be safe, but his horse shall die. He who passes to the left will be killed, but his horse will be safe." Choosing the lesser of three evils, Ivan decided to go to the right and rode for three days.

So a wolf shows up and eats the horse and then he leaves and then comes back and is like, "Hey man, sorry I killed your horse, but it's God's will, you know." Decent excuse. Then he's like, "I'll give you a ride." This wolf sounds pretty nice. We've had coyotes around before and they are killing machines.

So the wolf takes him to a wall, tells him to jump over it and take the phoenix. But Ivan can't touch the cage he's in, or he'll be caught. Not too sure how he's supposed to get the bird then, but whatever. Then all of a sudden he has the bird but it definitely doesn't say how he opened the cage without touching it. Telekinesis, perhaps? But then he goes back for the cage to make carrying the bird easier and he gets caught by a different Tsar. This one is like, "I'll give you the bird if you go to Tsar Afron and bring back the horse with the golden mane." And every time I see "Tsar Afron" I wonder if his first name is Zac. So they go to Tsar Afron's kingdom and the wolf tells Ivan to take the horse but not touch the bridle. But of course he does. So Afron's like, "Go to the Thrice Tenth kingdom and bring back Princess Elena and I'll give you the horse." So then they go to the new kingdom and the wolf is fed up so he goes to do the job himself. So then, of course, Ivan and Elena fall in love and Ivan's blubbering like a little schoolgirl. So the wolf says he will transform into the princess and Ivan can give him to the Tsar and then later when Ivan is gone he will think of the wolf and the wolf will appear. I don't know why the wolf is being so nice. I wouldn't be. Then Ivan and the princess go off to another kingdom and forget all about the wolf. Damn. So then he thinks of the wolf, the wolf appears, and Ivan asks him to turn into the horse and trick this Tsar like they tricked the last one. So they do that and then the wolf leaves.

On the way back to their own kingdom, Ivan encounters his two brothers, who decide to kill Ivan to get his loot. Elena's all, "Dude, you just killed a sleeping and defenseless person. You are both cowards" but they don't care and they go back to their kingdom. The wolf comes back, finds the body, blackmails some crows and tell them to get "magical life and death water" from the Thrice Tenth kingdom. So Ivan comes back to life, crashes Elena's wedding to his brother, Elena tells the Tsar everything (but presumably said nothing before then, for some reason). Then Elena and Ivan get married and they lived happily ever after.

Moral of the story: Um...I got nothing.

Moral I learned: Always listen to grey wolves. They know all.

The Child in the Grave by Hans Christian Andersen

Today's story sounds really grim (ha ha ha, no pun intended) and kind of like a bad horror movie.

So we start off with a four year old kid dead. Not a very promising start. Hans randomly mentions that one of the other kids is getting confirmed. Like, that doesn't have to be SHOEHORNED IN AT EVERY OPPORTUNITY.

Two daughters, the elder of whom was going to be confirmed, still remained: they were both good, charming girls; but the lost child always seems the dearest; and when it is youngest, and a son, it makes the trial still more heavy.
Yes, those sons are definitely more valuable.

So the mother is so completely grief stricken that all she does is cry and neglects her two daughters. One night she goes out to the grave, where she meets Death, who's like, "Dude, I'll take you to him." So she sees her kid and then he's like, "I have to go. You will follow soon" and the mother hears her husband calling her.

So I'm confused here. It said she headed UP, towards the light. She was also taken to her child by the grim reaper, who's more demonic. If she was going to Heaven, wouldn't an angel take her? Does that mean her kid went to hell?

Then she's all happy. This was a strange story.

Moral of the story: Trust in God? Not too sure.

Moral I learned: Grim reapers hang around earth and will gladly let you visit the afterlife.

Ib and Little Christina

This is a fairy tale I have never heard of before. Ib is an interesting name. Also, here are the morals for Little Claus and Big Claus.

Moral of the story: I honestly have no idea what we're supposed to learn. Be resourceful? I guess.

Moral I learned: You can get lots of stuff if you exploit your grandmother's dead body.

Okay, Ib and Little Christina.

There's a little house surrounded by really bad soil. Here lives a shoemaker named Jeppe Jans and his assistant, Ib. They make shoes and, randomly, spoons. One day Ib made miniature shoes out of two little sticks and decided to give them to Little Christina. I'm not sure why the modifier is here, really. I'm just going to call her Christina.

Then it says, "And who was Little Christina?" and it's in quotes, so it's like someone's speaking, but really they aren't. The quotation marks are unnecessary. Come on, Hans. Anyhoo, Christina is a boatman's daughter. Ib and Christina are partners in everything and divide their food and stuff. She's six, Ib is seven. I'm just throwing that out there now, in case this story turns squicky.

Christina's father buys a bunch of eels and a pig (?) and Christina and Ib are stupid and let the pig fall into the stream where it floats away. Good going, guys.

What? Wtf just happened? It says like, "This is a big disaster!" and Ib and Christina are so distraught that they RUN AWAY. Instead of, you know, GOING AFTER THE PIG.

Presently they heard the frightful scream again, and Christina said, “We shall get into trouble about that pig.”
Or, you know, for running away.

Then they decide to go to Ib's house but they both get lost and start crying. Then an old lady comes out of the woods and gives them three "wishing nuts". I've heard wishing lamp, but not nuts ever.

“Is there in this nut a carriage, with a pair of horses?” asked Ib.

“Yes, there is a golden carriage, with two golden horses,” replied the woman.

“Then give me that nut,” said Christina; so Ib gave it to her, and the strange woman tied up the nut for her in her handkerchief.

Ib held up another nut. “Is there, in this nut, a pretty little neckerchief like the one Christina has on her neck?” asked Ib.

“There are ten neckerchiefs in it,” she replied, “as well as beautiful dresses, stockings, and a hat and veil.”

“Then I will have that one also,” said Christina; “and it is a pretty one too.” And then Ib gave her the second nut.

The third was a little black thing. “You may keep that one,” said Christina; “it is quite as pretty.”

You are too kind, Christina. She's a selfish little brat, isn't she? Then again, what would Ib want with dresses and stockings?

Then the old woman tells them how to get home and they don't get in trouble. Ib opens his nut which is supposed to hold "the best of all things". Instead it holds dirt. Well, maybe you should try WISHING on the WISHING NUT. DUH.

Then Hans randomly shoehorns in a bit about Ib's confirmation. Yes, HCA, we get it, you are religious. But since his confirmation has absolutely no bearing on the story, it's not really necessary.

After Ib’s confirmation, he remained at home with his mother, for he had become a clever shoemaker...

I thought that said he had become a clever SMOKER.

So the years pass and Christina goes to become a housekeeper and then she comes back to visit Ib and she's all rich and Ib's like, "Do you want to get married?" and she's like, "Meh, we can wait a bit." Harsh.

They're like engaged but they only exchange two letters in a year. Then Ib finds out that this other rich guy wants to marry Christina but she refused because she knows Ib loves her but Ib's like, "No, she shouldn't refuse this good fortune."

Then Ib writes her this really sweet letter about how he loves her but can't offer her much so she should think of herself. He seems like one of those super nice guys who never gets the girl. Like the character that James Marsden plays in Superman Returns and X-Men.

Then it's kind of confusing because it doesn't actually SAY it, but Christina gets married to this other guy like, immediately after getting the letter. Also harsh. She sounds like kind of a bitch. But unfortunately, she and her husband didn't know how to save money and I think she's getting poor.

And for him the nut had contained only black earth. The gypsy woman had said it was the best for him. Perhaps it was, and this also would be fulfilled. He understood the gypsy woman’s meaning now. The black earth—the dark grave—was the best thing for him now.

Whoa, HCA. That's...dark.

Then Ib finds treasure in the soil. OH, HCA, I SEE WHAT YOU DID THAR. So Ib goes to the city to sell this stuff and gets "a large sum" 600 LARGE, ZOMG. Then he finds a kid who randomly starts crying, then he really sees her and it's Christina's kid! Then the kid leads him to Christina, who is poor and sick. Her husband's wealth went to his head and he spent it all. The husband died and Christina's youngest kid died. Then Christina dies, and Ib takes her daughter and raises her. Check out this last line:

Ib had money now—money which had come to him out of the black earth; and he had Christina for his own, after all.

Shades of pedophilia.

Moral of the story: Don't become overwhelmed by wealth? Not too sure.

Moral I learned: If you don't handle money well your husband will die, your kid will die, then you will die.

The Red Shoes By Hans Christian Andersen

I'm not feeling up to more Allecto today, so it's another fairy tale. Today I bring you a tale called The Red Shoes, and if I remember correctly, it's pretty sadistic and freaked me out even when I was little, and not even Bluebeard did that.

So there's a little girl named Karen who's really poor. We know she's poor because she has to go barefoot in the summer and in the winter she has to wear these ginormous wooden clogs which hurts her instep. One day a shoemaker's wife makes her some shoes. Karen wears them for the first time at her mother's funeral. Then this random old lady is like, "I'll adopt her" and takes Karen home. So the old lady gives her clothes and the mirror tells Karen she's beautiful (apparently he is on loan from the witch in Snow White). Then a queen and her daughter come to town and the princess is wearing beautiful red shoes.

I think it's hilarious how in practically every Hans Christian Andersen tale, there is a strange fixation on SOMETHING. Back in Little Claus and Big Claus there was the weird thing about the sexton, and now red shoes. Doesn't matter what kind. Just that they're red.

So Karen is now getting confirmed and has to get new shoes. Karen wants this pair of red shoes and the old lady buys them for her, but she can't see so she doesn't know they're red. The old lady would never let Karen get confirmed in red shoes. I can tell this isn't going to turn out very well.

And EVERYONE is staring at her red shoes. Karen thinks that even the mountains are fixated with her shoes. She can think of nothing but these shoes. SERIOUSLY. I like my low tops with little aliens on them, but I don't think about them every single minute of every single day.

Then a bunch of bitches at the church tell the old lady that Karen was wearing red shoes and she freaks out and makes Karen wear black shoes to church from then on. I'm just going to throw this out here: I'm not sure God cares.

So at church Karen wears her red shoes again. Because that in no way will get back to the old woman. Some crippled beggar says some shit like, "Pretty dancing shoes! Dance!" and slaps the soles of Karen's feet. And everyone once again stares at her shoes, and once again they are ALL that Karen can think of. Then they leave the church, the beggar once again goes, "What pretty dancing shoes!" and then Karen can't help herself: she starts to dance and she can't stop. And they won't even dance in the direction she wants to go; these shoes dance the opposite. You'd think she could use reverse psychology, but no. So she keeps dancing and dancing and she can't take the shoes off and she's dancing and can't stop.

And as she danced past the open church door she saw an angel there in long white robes, with wings reaching from his shoulders down to the earth; his face was stern and grave, and in his hand he held a broad shining sword.

“Dance you shall,” said he, “dance in your red shoes till you are pale and cold, till your skin shrivels up and you are a skeleton! Dance you shall, from door to door, and where proud and wicked children live you shall knock, so that they may hear you and fear you! Dance you shall, dance—!”

Whoa, that's a pretty harsh punishment for wearing red shoes to church. It also seems to me that there are better things to do than punish a little girl for wearing red shoes instead of black. Like, I don't know...achieving world peace? Also, I love how this angel came down from heaven seemingly to tell her that she has to dance, which she kind of knew already.

So Karen dances to this executioner's house and he threatens to cut off her head but she's like, "No, cut off my shoes!" and he cuts off her feet. She finally feels clean and keeps wanting to go to church but the red shoes are there dancing and she gets scared. This happens a few times until she begs God for mercy and the scary angel comes back and transports her to the church. I'd be like, "Thanks, angel, but uh, do you think byou could give me my feet back?" But apparently her sin was too horrible: The sin of wearing coloured shoes.

Then she randomly goes to Heaven.

I'm going to begin implementing a new conclusion for these stories. The moral that we are supposed to learn, and the moral that we actually learn.

Moral of the story: Vanity is a sin and will keep you from God.

Moral I learned: Do not, under pain of eternal damnation, wear red shoes to church. You will be forced to dance and then get your feet cut off.

A few more things before I end the post:

My weird, weird dream. It's in the sidebar but I want to tell it in detail. First thing you should know is that I just finished writing a short story using Kate and Asher, two characters who have starred in almost forty of their own stories now, and that one took place mostly at their graduation. So anyway, I dreamed that I was at graduation and Asher was there and also Fred Durst. Now, I don't know why I dreamed about Fred Durst. He's kind of a douche and I don't listen to Limp Bizkit. Like at all. But anyway, Fred Durst had this huge crush on me and he kept wanting to dance with me but I made Asher dance with me so I didn't have to dance with Fred. Then I decided to tell Fred that Asher and I were dating. So we did and he was sad, and he told me that he was going to propose to me in a hot air balloon the next day. Instead, he gavce me his class ring and I was like, "Don't you want to keep this? We're not even dating" and he's like, "oh right..." and he looked around and finally decided to give it to this other girl and then he handed me a belt buckle and Asher was like, "Because that's what we need....the smell of Fred Durst's crotch." Then there was a secondary little dream where I was in a hot air balloon with my brother and then it got blown away and Jonas wasn't there anymore and I landed in some trees and I had to climb down and Fred Durst was there AGAIN, except his head was put on the body of a mouse. It was weird.

Also, I'm working on a novel right now and I've had really bad writer's block for like the past two or three weeks. My philosophy is, writer's block? Add a fight scene! So I added the most random fight scene ever, and it kind of fucks up my continuity a little bit, and the person they're fighting isn't even supposed to be bad. I kind of hand waved it away. But yeah, I put in a random fight scene. I love novel writing, because every day is an adventure.

I also just remembered that I wore shiny red shoes to church...on Christmas EVE, no less. They were high heeled too, so I guess that makes me even more of a harlot. Shit, my soul is damned now.

And Now For Something Completely Different

I can't do it, guys. I can't finish Ghost. This morning I was all, "I can force myself through it. I DON'T GIVE UP, DAMMIT." But I have to give up. I can take the misogyny, the BDSM, and Mike's batshit ways, but not the boring military stuff.

Anyway, I've decided to recap fairy tales. They're in the public domain so you can get them on the internet, plus at home I have two big books of fairy tales so I can get them next time I go home. And most fairy tales are completely batshit, so there should be some good jokes to be made.

So anyway, today's offering is called "Little Claus and Big Claus" by Hans Christian Andersen.

There are two men who live in the same town. One has four horses, so he is called Big Claus. The other has one, so he is Little Claus. Well, in my town there were three Nolans and we differentiated them by their last initial. But maybe we should have differentiated them by the number of livestock they owned. Anyway, the two Clauses have this slightly confusing arrangement where they share their horses and Little Claus (LC, from now on. Not to be confused with LC Conrad) ploughs for Big Claus (BC.) I'm getting confused already.

Whenever LC ploughs for BC, he always says, "Gee up, my five horses" and BC gets all mad because only one of them is his. But LC always forgets (he sounds like kind of a tool) and BC is like, "If you say that one more time I'm going to hit your horse so he dies." Wow. Harsh.

So LC forgets again and BC kills his one horse. No one can say he's not true to his word. I also think that's kind of a shitty thing to do. After all, LC only has one horse. And now their arrangement is fucked. LC doesn't have to plough for BC anymore. I have a feeling that BC didn't think this through very well.

LC is sad for awhile, then he's like, "whatever" and he skins the horse and goes to sell its hide. Why? I don't know. He has to walk a long way and he gets tired so he invites himself over to this random farmer's house. Because that's safe. Anyway, the farmer's wife is like, "Hell no, you can't stay here" so he decides to go sleep on the roof of a shed. Not IN the shed, for some reason.

Oh also, the farmer's wife is having sex supper with a sexton. LC sees the farmer come up the road. For some reason, this farmer fucking HATES sextons. Like he will FREAK THE FUCK OUT if he sees a sexton. Why? Again, I have no idea. A sexton, apparently, is someone in charge of upkeep of a church. I don't know why anyone would have such a bias against them. So anyway, the wife tells the sexton to hide in a big chest in the corner and she puts the food and wine and stuff in the oven. This can't turn out well.

The farmer sees LC and he's like, "WTF are you doing on the roof? Come inside." Apparently he is more copacetic with strangers than his wife is. He's surprisingly okay with a strange guy sleeping on the roof of his shed.

The farmer feeds LC porridge but he's kind of a prick and he really wants the fish and stuff that the sexton was eating so he's all, "I have a conjurer in this sack! He just conjured good food in the stove!" I want to live in a world where someone can be like, "The wizard in my bag conjured food in the oven!" and other people are like, "Oh, okay, whatever. Cool."

“Oh, I am not afraid. What will he be like?”

“Well, he is very much like a sexton.”

“Ha!” said the farmer, “then he must be ugly. Do you know I cannot endure the sight of a sexton."
Ouch. That's harsh.

So basically, LC said the wizard in his sack looks like the sexton.

“Oh,” cried he, springing backwards, “I saw him, and he is exactly like our sexton. How dreadful it is!” So after that he was obliged to drink again, and they sat and drank till far into the night.
Ha ha ha ha! I love how even the sight of the sexton (well, actually, to the farmer he's not ACTUALLY the sexton) drives him to drink. I don't even hate TWILIGHT that much.

So LC tricks the farmer into buying the horse hide because the farmer thinks it's magical. But he tells LC to take the chest because he's so scared that the sexton may still be there. I think it's hilarious how he hates this guy SO MUCH for no apparent reason.

Dude. LC takes the chest and the sexton is STILL THERE. The sexton has been in there like the whole night.

LC muses aloud that he may as well just throw the chest in the river (way to be a litterbug) and the sexton is like, "NO! I'LL BE DROWNED!" and LC pretends he didn't know the sexton was in there and he's like, "Oh, is there someone in there? Meh, I'll throw him in anyway." And the sexton offers to pay LC not to kill him which was LC'S PLAN ALL ALONG. He's kind of a prick.

So LC goes back home and sends someone to BC's house to ask to borrow a bushel measure. Eighteen years on a farm, and I have no idea what that is. BC gets suspicious because after all, LC doesn't have a horse. So BC goes to talk to LC and LC's like, "I got a bushel of money for my horse's skin" so BC, who is also kind of a moron, kills all four of his horses and tries to sell the skins. You'd think he could start off with ONE and see if he gets that much, but no.

What would you use a horse's skin for? Clothes? Blankets?

“Ah,” said he, as he came to his house; “Little Claus shall pay me for this; I will beat him to death.”
Well, Big Claus, he wasn't the one that killed all four of your fucking horses, was he, you douchebag?

Now, in non-sequitur land:
Meanwhile the old grandmother of Little Claus died. She had been cross, unkind, and really spiteful to him; but he was very sorry, and took the dead woman and laid her in his warm bed to see if he could bring her to life again.
Because that generally works.

Then BC comes to LC's house with a hatchet, thinks that LC's in the bed, and stabs the grandma with a hatchet. LC seems extraordinarily lucky.

So LC goes off to an inn with his grandma in the backseat of his cart. He asks the landlord to bring her a glass of mead, which he does, and he gets really angry when she doesn't respond and throws the glass at her face. Whoa. Apparently everyone in Andersenland has extreme anger issues. First Big Claus and his horses, then the farmer and the sexton, and now the landlord. LC comes out and he's like, "YOU KILLED MY GRANDMA!" and the landlord offers to pay him if he won't say anything AND he'll bury LC's grandma. Man, he sure is getting a lot of mileage out of a dead grandma. If only I KEPT my dead fish, maybe I could have gotten a bunch of money.

LC then goes home and sends someone to BC to ask for his bushel measure and, understandably, he's a little confused. So he goes to LC's house and LC's like, "You killed my grandma instead of me and then I sold her." So what does BC do? HE GOES AND KILLS HIS GRANDMA AND ATTEMPTS TO SELL HER TO AN APOTHECARY. He also readily admits this to said apothecary. Now everyone thinks he's crazy. Which he is.

So BC gets mad at LC (I think he has some kind of psychological disorder, but I'm not sure what the name is) and kidnaps him. In the middle of his kidnap/murder attempt, he decides to go to church. I don't get his motivations for action here.

So a suicidal cattle driver goes by (No seriously. He's actually suicidal) and Claus is like, "You'll be in heaven if you climb into this sack" and the cattle driver doesn't think this is sketchy AT ALL and climbs into the sack. So BC comes back and kills this guy and then he sees LC with the guy's cattle. LC weaves this crazy ass story about how he sank to the bottom of the lake and he saw mermaids and stuff who randomly gave him sea-cattle. BC believes every word of this because he's BATSHIT INSANE. He's probably also the hugest moron I have ever seen in a fairy tale, ever. He wants his own herd of sea cattle so he decides to go to the bottom of the lake and LC kindly offers to tie BC up into a sack and throw him into the river.

“I’m afraid he will not find any cattle,” said Little Claus, and then he drove his own beasts homewards.
That's cold.

So, my conclusions. Little Claus is a sociopath with absolutely no regard for anyone other than himself. Ostensibly, he is the protagonist and the person we're supposed to be rooting for, but he's so despicable I can't support him at all. Big Claus is a big, bruiser moron who deserves everything that happens to him because he's so fucking stupid and gullible. I'm still not sure what was with the farmer's extreme hatred of sextons, but it was pretty hilarious.