WHAT
YOU MISSED
Zoom-zoom
– as I used to say in my childhood, in my pedal-car. But now it
brings us all together. Paul started, with the tale of Nureddin, and
the renewal of Marrakech, whose wise sultan got Nureddin his money
back, and punished a greedy magistrate in a permanent way. After we’d
clapped for the NHS, Janet took us further, with Svetlana, who had to
be turned into a broom so that she could hear what the Sun had seen,
and put everything right [and still didn’t get her name in the
title of the story!]
Nicole
had a tale of her family that she hadn’t been able to tell at our
last meeting – so she told us all about John “Whitewing”
Henderson, and his twenty-five mentions in the local paper, and what
his sobriquet signified: street-cleaner! And how he took to drinking,
but then found God, and went to Him shortly afterwards.
Maddie
took us through one of the Italian tales in Italo Calvino’s
magnificent book, with a prince who preferred reading to hunting, but
came across a mysterious woman, whom he lost, but pursued, and,
thanks to a timely hermit, found again in Peterborough, after quite a
bit of opium… [You had to be there…]
Ian
turned Child No. 32 into a splendid tale with a Haunted Hall, and all
kinds of unpleasantness, before its happy resolution, in which the
Hideous Hag became a Wonderful Woman. You can read it all here
Raph
gave us The Enchantment of Dyfed, which is essentially the Third
Branch of the Mabinogion – but as a self-contained story, with some
abridgement, and making sense on its own… [and also full of topical
references to social distancing, which wasn’t hard in the
unpopulated wasteland to which Dyfed had been magically converted.
Here is a translation of the full version…
http://www.mabinogi.net/manawydan.htm
]
As
a very quick closer, Mike referred back to Paul’s tale of the
magistrate who refused to admit that he had ever received the
treasure that had been entrusted to him for safekeeping, and told
this story: A merchant, going on a dangerous journey, put his wealth
into olives – quite literally, pitting them and slipping gold coins
inside each one, then sealing them in a jar which he gave to a friend
for safekeeping, not telling him of its true contents. When the
sealed jar was returned to him, 7 years later, he was shocked to find
only olives in it, and went to Harun-al-Rashid for justice. The
mighty caliph, confronted with the contradictory statements of two
apparently honest men, was stumped, and, walking the streets by night
in disguise, as was his wont, asked one of his friends among the
beggars for advice. “Have you ever eaten seven-year-old olives?”
asked the beggar. “Of course not!” replied the caliph. “They
taste foul,” said the beggar. “Tomorrow, in court, taste one of
the olives from the jar.” Harun did. It tasted fine. “You opened
the jar,” he said to the man who had kept it for his friend, “took
out the gold, put in fresh olives and re-sealed it. Return to your
friend twice the money you stole from him, or I will have you
executed and confiscate all your wealth.”
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