Ep.1 All About Trolls & Other Hidden Folk
In the first ever episode of Fabric of Folklore, Lise Lunge-Larson, award-winning author and professional storyteller dives deep into troll mythology, Norwegian folklore and other Hidden Folk. Topics discussed include: Lise’s Website For more folklore goodness check out our blog Images from trolls in the landscape here in Minnesota mentioned in the podcast. Mentioned at […]
The post Ep.1 All About Trolls & Other Hidden Folk appeared first on Fabric of Folklore.
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00:00:01:07 – 00:00:26:18
Speaker 1
Welcome to the very first episode of Fabric of Folklore. I’m your host, Vanessa Rogers, and I am honored that you are here with us today. We will be attempting in this podcast to enter better understand the folktales, legends and myths and how they influence culture and how culture influenced those stories. So yes, in this podcast we will tell stories, but it will go beyond storytelling.
00:00:26:27 – 00:00:49:26
Speaker 1
We’re going to be asking questions that get at the heart of folklore and all of folklore. So, yes, the tales, but also the music and the art and the traditions that weave a culture together. And today, in this very first episode, we are starting off with a bang because our very first guest is absolutely stellar. And you’re absolutely going to love her.
00:00:49:27 – 00:01:16:23
Speaker 1
Her name is Lisa Lund’s Long Larsen, is that correct? LA Manga. Sorry. That’s right. Lisa Lunga Larsson. She’s an award winning author and a professional storyteller specializing in folk folklore of trolls and Norway, where she was born and raised. Today, she lives in Duluth, Minnesota. And so thank you so much for joining us today.
00:01:17:28 – 00:01:20:21
Speaker 2
I I’m very honored and happy to be here.
00:01:21:00 – 00:01:32:14
Speaker 1
Well, okay, So let’s start a little bit with your childhood in Norway and what that looked like and how it kind of influenced your future profession.
00:01:34:06 – 00:01:35:05
Speaker 3
Oh, yeah.
00:01:35:29 – 00:01:56:11
Speaker 2
I kind of grew up in a very storytelling family, so and in stories about trolls and other things that go bump in the night was a big, huge part of my my childhood. When my brother and I were fairly young, we shared a bedroom, we had bunk beds. And quite frequently after we, you know, the lights were off.
00:01:56:20 – 00:01:59:22
Speaker 2
My father, who was very tall, six foot three, he would just.
00:02:00:07 – 00:02:00:15
Speaker 3
Fill.
00:02:00:15 – 00:02:06:08
Speaker 2
Out his frame with, you know, all kinds of cushions and pillows. And then he would come charging in our bedroom with like.
00:02:06:18 – 00:02:09:04
Speaker 3
I smelled the smell of human children.
00:02:09:04 – 00:02:14:12
Speaker 2
Is there any small children I can eat up here? And then we’d have to think of.
00:02:14:23 – 00:02:15:05
Speaker 3
You know.
00:02:15:27 – 00:02:21:16
Speaker 2
Ways to trick him to get him out of there by turning on turning a flashlight on him or something that would, you know.
00:02:21:28 – 00:02:22:21
Speaker 3
As a troll.
00:02:22:29 – 00:02:25:21
Speaker 1
And he would stay in character the whole time while you were.
00:02:26:26 – 00:02:27:03
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00:02:27:16 – 00:02:29:28
Speaker 2
And then you would go, I when we.
00:02:30:04 – 00:02:31:26
Speaker 3
Turned on the light or the flashlight or.
00:02:32:06 – 00:02:44:04
Speaker 2
You know, I remember my first encounter with a troll was when I was three years old and I was walking with my mom in the woods. My dad was fishing in this lake and we were walking and it was just, you know, it.
00:02:44:04 – 00:02:44:28
Speaker 3
Was one of those.
00:02:45:07 – 00:02:51:14
Speaker 2
Dense forests with just the light just filtering through. And suddenly my mother took me by the shoulders and.
00:02:51:19 – 00:02:55:19
Speaker 3
They said, Look, there’s a troll. And I was like, Oh, no, I’m going to die.
00:02:56:14 – 00:03:01:15
Speaker 2
Until until I saw that it was it was a dead troll. And so, you know, an.
00:03:01:15 – 00:03:03:00
Speaker 3
Overturned tree.
00:03:03:00 – 00:03:14:13
Speaker 2
Route. So, you know, when trolls die of old age, they they don’t turn to stone. They, they begin to shrink and they get smaller and smaller, kind of like people doing stuff. And then the dwarf.
00:03:14:13 – 00:03:15:14
Speaker 3
Builds up all over.
00:03:15:14 – 00:03:28:19
Speaker 2
Him. And then trees and shrubs begin to grow and little creepy crawlies. And as they get stiffer and stiffer and stiffer, they stop walking more than once a day and then once a week and once a month or once a year, and then they just.
00:03:28:19 – 00:03:29:15
Speaker 3
Petrified.
00:03:30:09 – 00:03:31:00
Speaker 2
And they look.
00:03:31:00 – 00:03:31:24
Speaker 3
Like old.
00:03:31:24 – 00:03:35:28
Speaker 2
Overturned tree roots. And that’s what my mother was pointing at. There was a dead drill.
00:03:35:28 – 00:03:45:15
Speaker 1
Oh, my goodness. So but what is it that that makes those petrified? I mean, is it actually a petrified tree root that people are seeing?
00:03:47:02 – 00:03:59:19
Speaker 2
I think they’re actually seeing ancient tree roots. But I wish I could show you my collection of of the dead trolls in the Minnesota’s Boundary Water, because I have some awesome pictures of trolls that did that. Oh, you.
00:03:59:19 – 00:04:02:09
Speaker 1
Can definitely send this to us and we’ll put them up on the website.
00:04:02:09 – 00:04:13:01
Speaker 2
And you know, when my husband comes home because he’s got them all in a pile. Yeah, definitely lots and lots of of dead trolls that have turned into tree roots.
00:04:13:01 – 00:04:14:10
Speaker 3
Oh, my goodness. It looks.
00:04:14:19 – 00:04:18:26
Speaker 1
So. Do you think that that is where people started coming up with the idea of trolls?
00:04:20:03 – 00:04:21:24
Speaker 3
Well, so trolls.
00:04:21:29 – 00:04:44:19
Speaker 2
Are part of Norwegian mythology. So in Norse mythology which is, you know, that’s sort of the religion you could say, of the Vikings in the tectonics of Germans, too. And, you know, the very, very first thing in the world came into being the first thing that rose out of this huge gap called General Gap was a frost giant.
00:04:44:19 – 00:04:48:00
Speaker 2
And it was an enormous, huge creature. And then.
00:04:48:29 – 00:04:50:07
Speaker 3
Out of his.
00:04:50:07 – 00:04:52:12
Speaker 2
Armpit and from between his.
00:04:52:12 – 00:04:53:02
Speaker 3
Toes.
00:04:53:17 – 00:04:55:02
Speaker 2
Came the race of the.
00:04:55:02 – 00:04:55:24
Speaker 3
Trolls.
00:04:56:01 – 00:05:00:04
Speaker 2
And the first one was an enormous He grew to this huge size and it had.
00:05:00:04 – 00:05:00:18
Speaker 3
Six.
00:05:00:18 – 00:05:21:08
Speaker 2
Heads and it had six arms, three on each side. So it was ferocious. And ever since that time, you know, Norway has been people by trolls. The humans came much later. So the first thing you know, it’s a long story about Emmett, who then was later slain by the you know, by the gods. And then they took EMU’s body.
00:05:21:20 – 00:05:22:06
Speaker 3
And this.
00:05:22:06 – 00:05:23:08
Speaker 1
Is the first to.
00:05:24:26 – 00:05:25:06
Speaker 2
Use a.
00:05:25:18 – 00:05:26:18
Speaker 1
Cross. Right. Okay.
00:05:26:18 – 00:05:30:02
Speaker 3
So they created the world from him. So, you.
00:05:30:02 – 00:05:43:22
Speaker 2
Know, they used his skull to create the dome of the sky, and they took his blood and turned it into water and lakes and oceans. And his hair became, you know, the trees and the grass.
00:05:43:22 – 00:05:44:23
Speaker 3
And his bones.
00:05:44:23 – 00:05:50:05
Speaker 2
Became rocks and boulders and his teeth and his brains became the clouds.
00:05:50:06 – 00:05:50:15
Speaker 1
Oh, my.
00:05:50:15 – 00:05:53:06
Speaker 3
Gosh. So.
00:05:53:10 – 00:06:11:21
Speaker 2
So really, when you’re walking around in Norway, you are walking on dead trolls because, you know, when trolls, when when the sun shines on a troll, so they’re over the landscape and then they return to the landscape when they die. And so when the sun shines on the troll, he explodes or he just turns. He turns to rock.
00:06:12:00 – 00:06:14:11
Speaker 2
So if you go to Norway, which I think you should.
00:06:14:11 – 00:06:15:28
Speaker 3
Definitely you will.
00:06:15:28 – 00:06:24:07
Speaker 2
Going to places that are called things like the troll vegan. I was there the summer, the troll, all these.
00:06:24:07 – 00:06:26:05
Speaker 3
Mountains, this mountain wall is.
00:06:26:22 – 00:06:44:29
Speaker 2
A troll wall and the troll peaks and the troll camps and the troll ladder. There’s one famous one called Troll Tonga, the troll tongue, and it’s a huge mountain with this troll tongue sticking right out, you know, like a stone. And it looks like a trolls tunnel. So, you know, all over Norway.
00:06:44:29 – 00:06:45:07
Speaker 3
There’s.
00:06:45:07 – 00:06:45:22
Speaker 2
All these.
00:06:45:22 – 00:06:46:11
Speaker 3
Mountains.
00:06:46:16 – 00:06:59:02
Speaker 2
Like Golden Hayman is named the yacht and it’s a mountain range and it’s named after a certain kind of troll called the yo tunes that you see in Norse mythology. And then there’s.
00:06:59:02 – 00:06:59:15
Speaker 3
David.
00:07:00:00 – 00:07:01:20
Speaker 2
Rubin was the king of.
00:07:01:20 – 00:07:02:12
Speaker 3
The trolls.
00:07:02:24 – 00:07:05:23
Speaker 2
That’s another mountain. So you can be walking on dead.
00:07:05:23 – 00:07:08:05
Speaker 1
End, so to speak. The king of the trolls.
00:07:09:25 – 00:07:20:12
Speaker 2
Well, the king of the trolls, David Rubin, he we don’t have a lot of stories about him, but he apparently lived to be really, really ancient and are stories about him sitting on a rock wondering how old he is.
00:07:20:23 – 00:07:21:03
Speaker 3
You know.
00:07:21:25 – 00:07:24:02
Speaker 1
Because he’s so old.
00:07:24:02 – 00:07:29:15
Speaker 2
Is so old. And, you know, they might get very old, but they’re not very smart. You know, that’s the thing about.
00:07:29:15 – 00:07:30:07
Speaker 3
Yes, you.
00:07:30:07 – 00:07:31:06
Speaker 1
Can always trick them.
00:07:32:11 – 00:07:44:24
Speaker 2
You can always trick them. Their brains are super slick. They’re only about the size of a walnut. So even though they’re big and scary enough, you just don’t lose your cool. If you can just use your brain.
00:07:44:24 – 00:07:46:23
Speaker 3
Yeah, you can help the trolls.
00:07:46:23 – 00:07:47:07
Speaker 1
Oh, that’s.
00:07:47:07 – 00:07:49:11
Speaker 2
Good. Even if even if.
00:07:50:25 – 00:07:59:12
Speaker 1
That’s really good. So you said that the Vikings were the ones who were the ones who came up with these creation myths.
00:08:00:12 – 00:08:29:22
Speaker 2
Well, these stories are pre Viking, you know. So they’re these are from I don’t think anybody knows exactly when they came from, but they were written down. You know, they they invented the runic script and so they were written down. And we have this we have the stories, the Norse mythology stories collected in various collections. And you see references to them in the saga literature from Iceland.
00:08:31:09 – 00:08:37:29
Speaker 2
And then you see a lot of them also in the arch when Christianity came to Norway.
00:08:38:17 – 00:08:40:15
Speaker 3
Those stories.
00:08:40:15 – 00:08:41:04
Speaker 2
Are forbidden.
00:08:41:13 – 00:08:42:09
Speaker 1
Oh, interesting.
00:08:42:09 – 00:09:06:24
Speaker 2
And so the Viking, the stories, you know about Gods, about Thor and Odin, the aliens and the trolls and all of this, that was forbidden. But the artwork that accompanied the stories was not forbidden. So you can find these early churches and they still have, you know, paintings of Odin and Thor and of dragons and and things like that.
00:09:06:24 – 00:09:24:13
Speaker 2
It’s very interesting. And then there’s a lot of scholars that think that even though, you know, even though the stories were not these myths were not allowed to be told, they just transmuted and changed shape and became the folktales.
00:09:24:14 – 00:09:26:08
Speaker 3
Okay. So there’s a.
00:09:26:08 – 00:09:36:02
Speaker 2
Character in Norwegian folklore called Ashkelon, which is the Ashkelon, and that the god Thor became this Ashkelon because, you know.
00:09:36:02 – 00:09:37:25
Speaker 3
Thor, red hair.
00:09:37:25 – 00:09:56:08
Speaker 2
Big beard, that’s not the brainiest. You know, he seems a little bumbling also, but he was the protector. He’s the one who protected the humans from the trolls. That is one of his big jobs. And so in the folktales with the ash lab, the ash lab always ends up outwitting the troll.
00:09:56:23 – 00:09:57:08
Speaker 3
So.
00:09:57:24 – 00:10:04:02
Speaker 2
You know, it’s just the way that does lives on. You can’t keep a good.
00:10:04:02 – 00:10:23:00
Speaker 1
Story that you know. And so even after it had been tried to be suppressed by the church, it still had a resurgence later on. Or did it just continue like throughout the ages and then you feel like it’s stronger today or what is your feeling that.
00:10:24:07 – 00:10:36:18
Speaker 2
It’s now stronger today? What what happened is, of course, that, you know, before literacy spread, the literature that you had was the oral tradition, right? People telling stories.
00:10:36:18 – 00:10:37:06
Speaker 3
To each other.
00:10:37:14 – 00:10:50:22
Speaker 2
And that was a very lively tradition, you know, from, you know, the so-called dark ages through the Middle Ages and into the Renaissance. But with with the Renaissance and all of these changes that came about.
00:10:51:19 – 00:10:52:03
Speaker 3
More.
00:10:52:03 – 00:10:53:25
Speaker 2
You know, more and more people became.
00:10:53:25 – 00:10:54:16
Speaker 3
Literate.
00:10:55:02 – 00:11:06:06
Speaker 2
And as people became more and more literate, the people that started listening to the stories, the old stories, folktales were the people who still couldn’t read. And.
00:11:06:14 – 00:11:08:13
Speaker 3
You know, that was often children.
00:11:08:13 – 00:11:12:27
Speaker 2
And that’s one of the reason why we think of folktales as something that is for.
00:11:12:27 – 00:11:15:01
Speaker 3
Children or for, you know.
00:11:15:25 – 00:11:21:20
Speaker 2
But then with the sort of national romantic movement that was born in the 1800s.
00:11:22:22 – 00:11:23:12
Speaker 3
Swept through.
00:11:23:12 – 00:11:50:14
Speaker 2
Europe, then the whole idea, this sort of romantic idea that the folk you know, the people who couldn’t read and write that they were the preservers of the true culture, became this long, strong sort of motivating force. And that’s when the brothers Grimm in Germany went out and collected. They didn’t write the Grimm’s Fairy tales. They collect them all from people who told them and wrote them down.
00:11:50:26 – 00:12:14:15
Speaker 2
And not very many years later to collectors in Norway named aspiration, particularly Stone aspiration and Yadkin Georgian more collected started collecting stories in Norway. And in fact, they wrote these down and published, I think it was in 1848, maybe the first volume. It became.
00:12:14:16 – 00:12:14:22
Speaker 3
A.
00:12:14:22 – 00:12:16:15
Speaker 2
Huge national hit.
00:12:17:02 – 00:12:19:12
Speaker 3
Because at that time.
00:12:19:24 – 00:12:47:14
Speaker 2
Norway had four 500 year, 400 years excuse me, Norway had been Danish territory. And then in 1814, after a war with Napoleon, Denmark and Norway was on the losing side and Sweden was on the winning side. So Norway got trade it to Sweden as a war settlement. Now we were Swedish, right? But we didn’t feel Swedish and we didn’t feel Norway, you know, Danish.
00:12:47:21 – 00:13:08:03
Speaker 2
So they questioned for Norwegians. At that time, the Swedes allowed us to set up an independent government, but we had to have a Swedish king and we had a horrible flag that was Swedish with a little bit of Norwegian in the corner they called herring salad. But when these when these stories were published, it was just like this visceral thing in the country.
00:13:08:03 – 00:13:32:08
Speaker 2
It’s like, this is who we are, this is who we are. That’s not Swedish and not Danish. These folktales with a wry sense of humor with this giant trolls, that was such a foil for the humor. You know, they’re all things evil and dark and humans are plucky. And, you know, all of this sort of felt to be the essence of the Norwegian, different from the other Scandinavian countries.
00:13:32:16 – 00:13:55:18
Speaker 2
So they became so they they became so important when they were first published that as Norway moved away from Denmark and and started to develop, then, you know, all books in Norway had to be in Danish because we were Danish, right? But then when you get to be sort of Sweden, the Swedes weren’t quite so after us to become, you know, didn’t have a Swedish written.
00:13:55:18 – 00:13:57:08
Speaker 3
Language so slowly.
00:13:57:08 – 00:14:20:01
Speaker 2
But surely they began to become more and more and more Norwegian. The three books that were printed first, every time there was an official change in the language was the Bible, the official book of hymns and the collection of Norwegian folktales. So in the end, you know, you know, you’re familiar with the music by Edward Grigg in the Hull of the Mountain.
00:14:20:02 – 00:14:20:24
Speaker 1
Okay, Yeah.
00:14:21:25 – 00:14:23:15
Speaker 3
But up, up, up, up, up.
00:14:23:15 – 00:14:26:01
Speaker 1
Up, up.
00:14:26:01 – 00:14:27:24
Speaker 2
The demolishing is a troll.
00:14:28:03 – 00:14:30:15
Speaker 1
Wow. Right? Yes, That’s what you were saying.
00:14:30:28 – 00:14:32:13
Speaker 3
Yeah, that’s.
00:14:32:16 – 00:15:02:07
Speaker 2
He wrote that for Henrik Ibsen’s play Peer Gynt. And in this period, it’s a real rascal. You won’t, you know, he. But he ends up in a in a hall of the Mountain King. And you almost married that the troll king’s daughter. And this is this is when he’s being, you know, run around by the trolls. So Ibsen I think Ibsen said that to to write is to sit in judgment of yourself, to live is to battle with trolls.
00:15:02:09 – 00:15:07:09
Speaker 1
Oh, that’s a great quote. So that song was written for a play?
00:15:08:21 – 00:15:09:00
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00:15:09:28 – 00:15:12:12
Speaker 2
It’s for independent Peer Gynt.
00:15:12:12 – 00:15:19:13
Speaker 1
And how did it become so widespread? Like, why would an American know that that tune, how did it become.
00:15:20:23 – 00:15:25:07
Speaker 3
Because it’s there, right? And that I mean.
00:15:25:19 – 00:15:30:25
Speaker 2
That the music that he wrote for that play is much more famous now than the play.
00:15:30:25 – 00:15:31:10
Speaker 1
Itself.
00:15:31:10 – 00:15:34:22
Speaker 2
Is, Although in Norway, that play is very famous.
00:15:34:27 – 00:15:35:21
Speaker 3
Interesting.
00:15:37:03 – 00:15:49:10
Speaker 2
And that was also from that period when that Norwegian nationalism was born, because we had spent 500 years being either Danish or Swedish, and now we were just finding out who we are. That’s different.
00:15:49:21 – 00:15:50:03
Speaker 3
From.
00:15:50:14 – 00:15:56:06
Speaker 2
And it’s, you know, we’re all kind of blond and blue eyed and outdoorsy. It’s hard to tell us.
00:15:56:19 – 00:16:13:15
Speaker 1
So would you say that trolls are really the the creature that differentiates you in terms of folktales from the Danish and the Swedish? Or are there other folk creatures that might also take that on?
00:16:13:15 – 00:16:19:15
Speaker 2
I think that the Norwegian troll is very much sort of like almost like a symbol of.
00:16:19:15 – 00:16:20:24
Speaker 3
Norway, you know.
00:16:21:07 – 00:16:29:25
Speaker 2
And in not in Sweden and not in Denmark. Denmark is very oriented around Hans Christian Andersen stories with The Little Mermaid.
00:16:29:25 – 00:16:30:05
Speaker 1
Right.
00:16:30:07 – 00:16:39:22
Speaker 2
You know, the Snopes, those are called Literary folktales, because they sprang from his mind, not from the collective, you know, oral tradition.
00:16:39:22 – 00:16:43:24
Speaker 1
Oh, okay. I did not realize that. And that he was also a folklorist.
00:16:44:26 – 00:17:04:28
Speaker 2
No, he was not. He was he was inspired by the stories that he heard. But they’re really you can read them. This are really different tone. It’s very, very different. You can tell they have an author that they’re not written down. Yeah. So and Sweden has a rich history of.
00:17:05:09 – 00:17:05:19
Speaker 3
Of.
00:17:05:25 – 00:17:20:09
Speaker 2
Stories, but they are not as well known. Again, it’s like people are maybe familiar with the constant, you know, the Astrid Lindgren story about that, which is about the little known.
00:17:21:02 – 00:17:21:06
Speaker 3
And.
00:17:21:13 – 00:17:22:17
Speaker 1
I don’t know the story, but.
00:17:22:22 – 00:17:24:29
Speaker 3
It’s your.
00:17:25:18 – 00:17:27:22
Speaker 2
Child in a few years will really like.
00:17:27:22 – 00:17:27:27
Speaker 3
It.
00:17:28:05 – 00:17:32:22
Speaker 1
Well, why don’t you give us a little a little taste of it? Can you give us a shortened version?
00:17:32:22 – 00:17:34:02
Speaker 3
I can’t tell you because I.
00:17:34:11 – 00:17:36:10
Speaker 2
Don’t remember that one, but I’ll tell.
00:17:36:10 – 00:17:36:20
Speaker 3
You later.
00:17:37:08 – 00:18:05:19
Speaker 2
But I was going to say, what’s funny about the Swedish folklorists. They the Norwegian folklorists, as well as the Brothers Grimm, They kept this really earthy kind of aural quality that’s very immediate. You get very drawn into the story. But the scholars that collected the Swedish stories, they just really insisted on this very pedantic, moralizing tone. They wrote them down, but they really made them inaccessible.
00:18:05:19 – 00:18:09:10
Speaker 2
So they never took off in Sweden in the same way.
00:18:09:10 – 00:18:15:00
Speaker 1
Interesting. In Norway, Norwegian folktales don’t really have the moral attach to each of them.
00:18:16:08 – 00:18:23:28
Speaker 2
No, not much. I mean, it’s implied, but not, you know, it’s an implied moral, but it’s not one of those that’s hit you over the head.
00:18:23:28 – 00:18:27:21
Speaker 1
So like, give us an example of one that has an implied moral.
00:18:29:08 – 00:18:44:21
Speaker 2
Well, I think almost all of the stories do in that the let’s say we get go back to the troll stories. Right. Or any one of the stories is always about it. Say an adolescent hero.
00:18:45:03 – 00:18:46:04
Speaker 3
That encounters.
00:18:46:04 – 00:19:04:07
Speaker 2
A difficulty. Let’s say it’s the boy who had an eating competition with a troll. In this story, it’s the youngest of three brothers, right? And the father’s busted his back and they have to go up and they go to start chopping down the wood and help out the family because they’re running out of money And they’re like.
00:19:04:12 – 00:19:04:24
Speaker 3
No.
00:19:04:24 – 00:19:06:06
Speaker 2
No, no, Dad, you do it, you do.
00:19:06:06 – 00:19:12:03
Speaker 3
It. We don’t want to go there, troll in the woods. And he’s like, I’m trolls all the time.
00:19:12:03 – 00:19:22:19
Speaker 2
When I was your age, you can do it. So finally, you know, the first one about and, you know, it gets these acts, it goes off into the woods and he starts to chop down. And no sooner has he struck the first.
00:19:22:19 – 00:19:23:21
Speaker 3
Blow, then out of the woods.
00:19:23:21 – 00:19:24:04
Speaker 2
Comes this.
00:19:24:04 – 00:19:28:22
Speaker 3
Troll and I have to go and age you up. He gets all scary runs so and.
00:19:28:22 – 00:19:46:23
Speaker 2
Cries to his mom and dad and his dad. You’re such a chicken. I know anyone could have tricked that troll when I was your age. I did it all the time. So he’s very ashamed. And then the second brother has to go on and he has the same fate. Runs right back them. So the third one, the Ashland, it’s his turn.
00:19:46:23 – 00:19:47:26
Speaker 2
And they tease him.
00:19:47:26 – 00:19:50:10
Speaker 3
They’re like, Oh, are you the only.
00:19:50:10 – 00:19:52:25
Speaker 2
Thing you’re good for sitting around puking in the ashes?
00:19:52:25 – 00:19:55:01
Speaker 3
You think you’re going to be able to deal with a drill?
00:19:56:10 – 00:20:04:11
Speaker 2
He doesn’t pay attention. You just ask his mom for some food. So she gives him this big juicy cheese card which he put in his backpack, puts on.
00:20:05:01 – 00:20:05:20
Speaker 3
Sees acts.
00:20:05:20 – 00:20:18:00
Speaker 2
Off. He goes to the forest, puts the sack down and gets his ax ready and it starts to chop. What he has no sooner struck that first bell and again, out of the woods comes a great big, huge stroke, screaming and roaring.
00:20:18:05 – 00:20:21:01
Speaker 3
If you I know my trees are going to kill you and eat you up.
00:20:21:11 – 00:20:27:02
Speaker 2
But this boy’s not so slow. He goes over to his backpack, he gets out this tea skirt.
00:20:27:11 – 00:20:28:04
Speaker 3
And he holds.
00:20:28:04 – 00:20:32:11
Speaker 2
It up, squeezing it, saying, If you don’t like it, I’m going to squeeze you the way and.
00:20:32:11 – 00:20:47:21
Speaker 3
Squeezing the water out of this white rock. I am here. Oh, as it goes forward. I didn’t know you were so strong. Oh, my goodness. Oh, listen, if you will not squeeze me like that, I’ll help you tell them the truth. So. Hey.
00:20:48:00 – 00:20:56:03
Speaker 2
So that’s what they do. You know, they chop down the trees and then that kind of end of the day and there’s no food at home. And the troll looks at this juicy boy and.
00:20:56:04 – 00:21:02:14
Speaker 3
Says, Oh, bloated. Oh, but you come to my house, people have a bite to eat together. So he said, Sure.
00:21:02:27 – 00:21:05:04
Speaker 2
So they go there and the troll.
00:21:05:04 – 00:21:11:21
Speaker 3
Says, Well, I’m going to make up a fire. You go out to the well and get the bucket and fill it with water and we’ll make porridge. Okay.
00:21:12:00 – 00:21:20:08
Speaker 2
So he goes outside, But you know, it’s not a normal bucket. It’s a huge cast iron thing. He can’t even lift it and hear the troll thinking he’s.
00:21:20:24 – 00:21:23:10
Speaker 3
She like, okay.
00:21:23:28 – 00:21:24:18
Speaker 2
He says to the.
00:21:24:18 – 00:21:28:15
Speaker 3
Troll, okay, you know what? I’m going to bring the whole.
00:21:28:15 – 00:21:33:18
Speaker 2
Well inside this thimble. It’s so tiny, this little bucket you have. Let’s, let’s get the whole.
00:21:33:18 – 00:21:34:20
Speaker 3
Well knows.
00:21:34:20 – 00:21:35:24
Speaker 2
As a troll you can’t do that.
00:21:35:24 – 00:21:36:05
Speaker 3
You know.
00:21:36:19 – 00:21:41:05
Speaker 2
Just you go inside and make the fire all go and get the water. So they do that.
00:21:42:09 – 00:21:42:20
Speaker 3
And then he.
00:21:42:20 – 00:21:50:11
Speaker 2
Makes the porridge. And before he sits down to eat, the boy looks at the troll and says, How boring? What if you and I have an eating competition?
00:21:50:15 – 00:21:52:01
Speaker 3
Hey, that’s the draw.
00:21:52:13 – 00:22:06:13
Speaker 2
So he agrees because he’s like ten times bigger. But before the Ash letter sits down, he takes his backpack and he ties it around his stomach and then he sits down to eat. And then after a while, instead of putting the food in his mouth.
00:22:06:19 – 00:22:09:21
Speaker 3
He puts it in his backpack the back.
00:22:10:08 – 00:22:22:24
Speaker 2
He got his knife out and you slice his hole in the sack and the food runs out and he can keep pulling it but troll. He can’t figure out what’s going on at all because it’s not very smoke. And finally it’s really full. And he says.
00:22:22:24 – 00:22:27:00
Speaker 3
Oh, you’ll get it all can way to my jaw so little bit. It was very.
00:22:27:00 – 00:22:32:12
Speaker 2
Easy. I just, you know that my knife out and I put a hole in my stomach and this way I could eat as much.
00:22:32:12 – 00:22:36:23
Speaker 3
As I want. Oh, that’s a really good idea. You did not hurt at all.
00:22:36:23 – 00:22:39:03
Speaker 2
Not to speak of. Not for a big guy like you.
00:22:39:14 – 00:22:39:27
Speaker 3
For that.
00:22:39:27 – 00:22:42:11
Speaker 2
Frog. Get this knife up and he puts it to his stomach.
00:22:42:20 – 00:22:47:17
Speaker 3
Any rib. So it. And of course he couldn’t survive that. He falls.
00:22:47:17 – 00:22:52:14
Speaker 2
Over onto the ground, den of the doornail, and the ash lad is safe and he runs inside.
00:22:52:18 – 00:22:53:22
Speaker 3
He gets all the gold.
00:22:53:22 – 00:23:03:20
Speaker 2
And silver. He can carry that. You know that the troll has been hoarding and brings it home to his mom and dad. And with that they live in the greatest of happiness and wealth through the end.
00:23:03:20 – 00:23:06:15
Speaker 3
Of their days as if it.
00:23:07:01 – 00:23:19:03
Speaker 2
Happened to you. So there doesn’t appear to be a moral there. But, you know, it’s clearly if you start to think about it, it’s like, don’t give up. You know, don’t listen to people who put you down.
00:23:19:03 – 00:23:19:18
Speaker 3
You should.
00:23:19:28 – 00:23:45:06
Speaker 2
Be frightened. Use your smarts and you’ll do okay. I mean, the stories are always like that. It’s always over and over again. You learn just all these implied lessons about many. This one doesn’t have, you know, but in many stories it’s like there might be the boy who goes out to do the thing, but it’s very often a princess who uses her brain and helps him solve.
00:23:45:08 – 00:23:51:08
Speaker 1
Oh, that’s interesting. I don’t know. I don’t feel like we have that in our culture very much at all.
00:23:52:15 – 00:23:53:04
Speaker 2
Did you get this?
00:23:53:04 – 00:23:54:24
Speaker 1
No. What is that one called.
00:23:56:08 – 00:23:58:26
Speaker 2
The troll with no heart in his body and other tales.
00:23:59:09 – 00:24:01:24
Speaker 1
I think that one might be the one on hold at the library.
00:24:02:04 – 00:24:02:12
Speaker 3
Oh.
00:24:03:09 – 00:24:08:14
Speaker 2
That’s got some great, great troll stories. It’s got that story in there. That was a little lost.
00:24:08:14 – 00:24:10:16
Speaker 3
Sorry. No, I mean, I loved it.
00:24:10:22 – 00:24:12:27
Speaker 1
I was definitely enthralled.
00:24:14:14 – 00:24:17:22
Speaker 2
You know, it’s got all these implied things about.
00:24:19:06 – 00:24:19:18
Speaker 3
You know.
00:24:20:12 – 00:24:22:09
Speaker 2
Be persistent, you know, don’t give.
00:24:22:09 – 00:24:23:19
Speaker 3
Up work.
00:24:23:19 – 00:24:29:17
Speaker 2
With your friends, be kind, you know, be it’s just it has a lot of implied.
00:24:31:03 – 00:24:32:03
Speaker 3
Values.
00:24:32:03 – 00:24:39:02
Speaker 2
That are not as you you know, you doesn’t hammer you over the head. What it is. It’s just always a great story to list.
00:24:39:02 – 00:24:52:24
Speaker 1
Exactly. And, you know, it reminded me of the billy goat gruff story a little bit. I mean, it kind of a longer version of that one, but three brothers in that one as well. And they’re they’re all tricking, tricking a troll at the same time.
00:24:53:27 – 00:24:54:18
Speaker 3
That’s right.
00:24:54:18 – 00:24:57:03
Speaker 2
That’s right. That’s like one of my favorite stories of all time.
00:24:57:03 – 00:24:57:22
Speaker 1
Oh, is it?
00:24:58:00 – 00:24:58:12
Speaker 2
And that.
00:24:58:24 – 00:24:59:00
Speaker 3
I.
00:24:59:20 – 00:25:19:25
Speaker 1
I did not realize it was from Norway. I didn’t I because I grew up with that one. And my kids and I will play. We have a little bridge that is near one of our walks and I’ll go under the bridge and play the troll and the kids will walk over the bridge and pretend to be the goats.
00:25:19:25 – 00:25:21:10
Speaker 1
And they they just love that.
00:25:22:19 – 00:25:23:03
Speaker 3
Yes.
00:25:23:26 – 00:25:30:07
Speaker 2
That’s exactly how I grew up. You were asking me and I was going to say, whenever you went hiking, which is like what you had to do on.
00:25:30:07 – 00:25:32:06
Speaker 3
Some.
00:25:32:06 – 00:25:41:21
Speaker 2
If there was a bridge and there were some, it wouldn’t even be your family. Could be some total strangers who see that their family with kids are coming and they would hide underneath the bridge. And when you came there was.
00:25:41:21 – 00:25:49:00
Speaker 3
A who stepping over my head. And you you told me. Yes.
00:25:49:14 – 00:25:56:02
Speaker 1
That’s wonderful. Well, okay, so let’s see. Let me take a sip of water real quick.
00:25:57:18 – 00:25:58:05
Speaker 3
A little.
00:25:58:23 – 00:26:03:13
Speaker 2
Same.
00:26:03:13 – 00:26:18:15
Speaker 1
Okay. So when I was looking at your website, I saw that you had a lot of different quotes that were listed on there. And one of them was you had several from G.K. Chesterton.
00:26:19:06 – 00:26:20:20
Speaker 3
See, of you.
00:26:21:18 – 00:26:30:20
Speaker 1
And I’ll just read it real quick. And fairy tales are more than true, not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.
00:26:32:05 – 00:26:32:12
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00:26:32:28 – 00:26:40:00
Speaker 1
Can you tell us a little bit more about why you love this quote or why you’ve listed it all yet?
00:26:40:00 – 00:27:09:09
Speaker 2
You know, dragons, trolls, things, You know, that’s what I think. One reason I think children really love the stories is because they don’t try to tell you that there will be no difficulty. Every story is about difficulty and it’s about meeting something that’s really big and scary. And children, the things that seem maybe like nothing to you are like dragons or trolls.
00:27:09:09 – 00:27:29:05
Speaker 2
To them it’s things like. I remember my youngest son when he was at the end of first grade. He was the only one who hadn’t lost a tooth yet. And like the end of the world, am I never am I going to be the only one that will never lose the truth, you know? Will I be able to handle a sleepover at my friend’s house?
00:27:29:05 – 00:27:45:05
Speaker 2
Is that scary? I know. And so all of these things are really scary to children. And when you read them folktales, what the tales tell them is that, yeah, you will encounter dragons there.
00:27:45:07 – 00:27:47:18
Speaker 3
You know, I had a couple of dragon.
00:27:47:18 – 00:27:49:03
Speaker 2
Teachers, let me tell you.
00:27:49:16 – 00:27:52:16
Speaker 3
Growing up that was terrifying.
00:27:52:27 – 00:28:10:13
Speaker 2
And and the stories tell them that you can and they also give you almost like a blueprint for how to overcome that kind of challenge, that kind of quality. And that’s what that code is about. It could be about dragons, it could be about trolls.
00:28:10:23 – 00:28:15:00
Speaker 1
But it’s about Dragon daggers, Big Dragon teachers.
00:28:16:17 – 00:28:21:29
Speaker 3
Your will? Yes. Is it today?
00:28:22:03 – 00:28:24:29
Speaker 2
I’m getting the light in here. Are you getting seeing New York.
00:28:25:07 – 00:28:25:12
Speaker 3
And.
00:28:25:17 – 00:28:29:11
Speaker 1
New York? Yeah. Yeah. It’s okay.
00:28:29:12 – 00:28:30:04
Speaker 2
I’m just seeing.
00:28:30:09 – 00:28:31:08
Speaker 1
Oh, there you can.
00:28:31:08 – 00:28:31:22
Speaker 3
Do better.
00:28:32:07 – 00:28:45:16
Speaker 1
This suddenly It’s going right in. Yeah, it’s beautiful. So can you. You had several quotes from this gentleman. G.K. Chesterton was here, folklorist or somebody who wrote folk stories.
00:28:46:25 – 00:28:55:14
Speaker 2
I can’t even remember anymore. I hate to admit to tell you I want to Google him and look him up. And he was famous, though. My favorite quotes are the one from Einstein. Okay.
00:28:55:29 – 00:28:58:22
Speaker 1
You do have one if you.
00:28:58:22 – 00:28:59:07
Speaker 3
Well, you.
00:28:59:07 – 00:29:06:10
Speaker 2
Know, because Einstein. Yeah. What he said was if you want smart children, read them fairy tales.
00:29:06:21 – 00:29:07:01
Speaker 1
Yeah.
00:29:07:15 – 00:29:11:22
Speaker 2
If you want to even smarter children, read them even more fairy tales.
00:29:12:05 – 00:29:13:06
Speaker 3
And it’s because.
00:29:13:14 – 00:29:16:06
Speaker 2
You know, the fairy tales describe the.
00:29:16:06 – 00:29:16:23
Speaker 3
World.
00:29:17:04 – 00:29:44:09
Speaker 2
Using the imagined version. I mean, there are many, many ways to describe the world, right? You could describe it, you know, historically with events that have happened throughout history or you could describe it mathematic radically or through science and using folktales. That’s another way of describing the world. But you’re using the imagination and you describe as a world that mirrors the world the way children experience it, because small children.
00:29:44:18 – 00:29:47:05
Speaker 3
You know, rocks can talk, you know.
00:29:47:24 – 00:29:50:02
Speaker 2
Things are alive. So it mirrors.
00:29:50:04 – 00:29:51:00
Speaker 3
Their world.
00:29:51:08 – 00:30:04:21
Speaker 2
And it functions in a way that makes sense to them. It’s also a world where it thinks it has a set formula, right? Once upon a time, a long, long time ago. And then it has this rising action.
00:30:05:06 – 00:30:05:16
Speaker 3
Right?
00:30:06:10 – 00:30:08:17
Speaker 2
Your problem. And then there’s going they.
00:30:08:17 – 00:30:09:02
Speaker 3
Know.
00:30:09:09 – 00:30:12:14
Speaker 2
When they’re listening to that story that there’s going to be a solution.
00:30:12:26 – 00:30:13:23
Speaker 3
To them.
00:30:14:01 – 00:30:15:18
Speaker 2
And things are going to end.
00:30:15:19 – 00:30:16:14
Speaker 3
Okay.
00:30:17:22 – 00:30:50:17
Speaker 2
As they grow up and they are living in the world where they’re beginning to realize that things don’t always work out okay, They they they can they can relax for a spell. You know, in that listening to that story, knowing that things are going to be okay. And at the same time as you’re listening to their story, it opens up that world of imagination, especially if you tell a story rather than watch it, because, you know, it just uses kind of smoke and mirrors.
00:30:50:25 – 00:30:55:03
Speaker 2
It doesn’t tell you what the princess looks like. It just says she’s beautiful.
00:30:55:13 – 00:30:55:22
Speaker 3
What?
00:30:55:29 – 00:31:09:24
Speaker 2
The prince might be handsome, but, you know, I tell stories to kids from every kind of culture and they’re all imagining the prince and the princess or the heroic hero as themselves. Nobody gives any color or race.
00:31:10:04 – 00:31:10:21
Speaker 3
You know, or.
00:31:10:21 – 00:31:21:24
Speaker 2
Size or shape. If you have beautiful clothes. They are all imagining it when they’re you know, So when you’re describing things, they they feel it in themselves.
00:31:22:02 – 00:31:23:12
Speaker 3
In the.
00:31:23:15 – 00:31:36:27
Speaker 2
Movie, you know, it’s all been done for them. Everything has been, you know, So as great as, you know, these movies are, you know, you can Elsa in any other way than you have seen her in Frozen.
00:31:36:27 – 00:31:37:05
Speaker 1
Right.
00:31:37:24 – 00:31:42:15
Speaker 2
But if you heard a story, every child would have had a different version of Elsa inside.
00:31:42:15 – 00:31:42:29
Speaker 3
There had.
00:31:44:08 – 00:31:48:00
Speaker 2
Been one that was more like themselves, you know, And.
00:31:48:00 – 00:31:48:10
Speaker 3
That’s.
00:31:48:21 – 00:31:51:01
Speaker 2
The reasons why they’re so satisfying.
00:31:51:01 – 00:31:51:08
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00:31:52:21 – 00:32:00:12
Speaker 2
That that they can they can put themselves into those stories and also a lot of people are like, Oh, that’s such a scary story. How can you tell it?
00:32:00:28 – 00:32:01:23
Speaker 3
It’s worse.
00:32:01:23 – 00:32:12:03
Speaker 2
I do well, I do it differently for different ages, but but they also when you if you are too graphic, they will just let their own minds will.
00:32:12:03 – 00:32:15:07
Speaker 3
Stop where it stops and.
00:32:15:20 – 00:32:17:00
Speaker 2
Happen when you see it in.
00:32:17:00 – 00:32:18:21
Speaker 1
Video. Exactly. Yeah.
00:32:19:16 – 00:32:25:15
Speaker 2
So decided for them how far it should go. And it’s often too much for small children.
00:32:25:15 – 00:32:25:26
Speaker 1
Yeah.
00:32:26:17 – 00:32:36:24
Speaker 2
So those are those are some of the many, many reasons why kids kids are. So I’ll give you a really great example and it’s about the billy goat.
00:32:36:24 – 00:32:38:26
Speaker 3
Graph of how how they.
00:32:38:26 – 00:32:52:29
Speaker 2
Live in this story. It was one school and I was there. It was a whole auditorium. It was kindergarten first and second graders. It was probably about 150 kids. And I started out with the three Billy Goats Gruff. I’m very sort of like.
00:32:53:19 – 00:32:53:28
Speaker 3
You’re.
00:32:54:07 – 00:32:57:20
Speaker 2
You know, when I’m on an auditorium, it’s like when the troll comes.
00:32:58:00 – 00:33:13:26
Speaker 3
Who’s stepping over my burger? And you just don’t you see the kids? I’m on my way to your mouth to. Wow, you know, Need your help. What did you do? Oh, I.
00:33:13:27 – 00:33:14:11
Speaker 2
Let you make.
00:33:14:12 – 00:33:18:15
Speaker 3
This up. Protocol. He’s really a lot bigger and fatter. When are you.
00:33:19:00 – 00:33:19:29
Speaker 2
Mar? Right then.
00:33:19:29 – 00:33:23:06
Speaker 3
Or the draw so often? Little goat. Well, I was.
00:33:23:06 – 00:33:38:23
Speaker 2
Telling this story when I got to the second billy goat coming across in the troll roaring. This little kindergartner leapt up from the floor, ran across the gym, jumped up onto the auditorium, grabbed my leg and shouted.
00:33:38:23 – 00:33:48:14
Speaker 3
I got him, I got him. That’s amazing. How brave of that little kid you believe it?
00:33:48:14 – 00:33:51:00
Speaker 2
I mean, we had to get the principal to pull him off my.
00:33:51:00 – 00:33:55:27
Speaker 3
Height because he was going to protect that billy goat on it. You know, he was offended.
00:33:56:02 – 00:33:58:04
Speaker 1
So sweet.
00:33:58:04 – 00:34:00:04
Speaker 3
You access this amazing.
00:34:00:04 – 00:34:01:24
Speaker 2
Amount of courage inside of him.
00:34:01:24 – 00:34:06:07
Speaker 3
Some, you know, it’s just you can’t you.
00:34:06:07 – 00:34:10:11
Speaker 2
Just can’t beat that. It was another time it was telling stories and these were fifth graders.
00:34:10:25 – 00:34:11:25
Speaker 3
And end of a.
00:34:11:25 – 00:34:22:00
Speaker 2
Rough bunch. And the teacher just said, you know, these kids are kind of this is a tough crowd. This is the last session of the day. If they’re bad, just leave. So, you know, I pulled up the best of the trolls.
00:34:22:00 – 00:34:22:11
Speaker 3
Stories.
00:34:22:12 – 00:34:34:02
Speaker 2
And I did. And they were just like riveted. It was just like you threw a spell on them. They didn’t move. And after I had finished and I’d done this one story called The Troll with no heart in his body, it’s.
00:34:34:05 – 00:34:35:01
Speaker 3
Like really.
00:34:35:01 – 00:34:35:05
Speaker 1
A great.
00:34:35:12 – 00:34:37:04
Speaker 3
Story and appropriate.
00:34:37:08 – 00:34:48:17
Speaker 2
Fifth and sixth graders who think they’re to write four stories. At the end, there was just dead silence. And then this one little boy stood up and he was so concerned, he said.
00:34:48:23 – 00:34:49:28
Speaker 3
So do.
00:34:49:28 – 00:34:58:06
Speaker 2
You think that in the future, like when we might have better weapons and stuff, that we would do a better, better job getting rid of trolls?
00:34:59:04 – 00:35:02:10
Speaker 3
And I said, I don’t think so, because trolls are evil.
00:35:02:10 – 00:35:03:16
Speaker 2
And evil is a really.
00:35:03:16 – 00:35:04:00
Speaker 3
Old.
00:35:04:00 – 00:35:04:28
Speaker 2
Thing in the world.
00:35:05:07 – 00:35:05:26
Speaker 3
And you can.
00:35:06:00 – 00:35:10:11
Speaker 2
Use modern weapons to get rid of something that ancient. And we.
00:35:10:11 – 00:35:11:14
Speaker 3
Had the best.
00:35:11:14 – 00:35:23:04
Speaker 2
Discussion. The fifth graders, they were so insightful talking about what did you really need to combat evil? And, you know, we concluded that you had to be the opposite of the troll.
00:35:23:15 – 00:35:25:09
Speaker 3
You had you can’t you can’t.
00:35:25:09 – 00:35:26:29
Speaker 2
Be like a troll and fight.
00:35:26:29 – 00:35:27:28
Speaker 3
A troll have to.
00:35:27:28 – 00:35:30:00
Speaker 2
Be its opposite. And that.
00:35:30:10 – 00:35:31:00
Speaker 3
Those kids.
00:35:31:00 – 00:35:34:09
Speaker 2
Figured that out. Do you have to draw on the best of what you are?
00:35:34:09 – 00:35:35:17
Speaker 3
Well, you know, you have.
00:35:36:02 – 00:35:37:29
Speaker 2
I ended persistent and.
00:35:38:10 – 00:35:39:29
Speaker 3
You know just yeah.
00:35:40:08 – 00:35:48:08
Speaker 2
It’s it’s quite amazing you know going around telling stories because people people think kids, you know, they they just really get it.
00:35:48:18 – 00:35:52:12
Speaker 1
Yeah. So what are some other great questions that you’ve gotten from kids?
00:35:53:16 – 00:35:53:24
Speaker 3
Oh.
00:35:54:04 – 00:36:10:04
Speaker 2
Well, you know, you’ve read the story about the River Sprite because I remember. So the River Sprite for an audience is a little being that lives in the rivers and often behind waterfalls and is very, very good at playing the violin.
00:36:10:04 – 00:36:16:22
Speaker 1
That’s one of my kids families, by the way. That’s one of their favorite stories.
00:36:16:22 – 00:36:41:10
Speaker 2
So it’s you know, you don’t usually see these creatures. They they are hidden creatures. But if you it’s said that all the best violinists in the world have learned their art from the River Sprite and that you could find a river where a river Sprite lived, you would know by hearing the music. If you come on a Thursday and you bring him a leg of mutton.
00:36:41:15 – 00:36:45:25
Speaker 2
What’s mutton? It’s a leg of lamb. Okay, then.
00:36:46:27 – 00:36:47:09
Speaker 3
You know.
00:36:47:14 – 00:36:58:04
Speaker 2
It must be a lot of meat on it, because otherwise he will just teach you to pluck. But if it’s a good size, he’ll. He’ll teach you to play his instrument. And one little.
00:36:58:04 – 00:36:58:16
Speaker 3
Girl.
00:36:59:12 – 00:37:09:21
Speaker 2
She goes and she raised her hand. And you said she said, I know, I know where there’s a river like that. And you said, But does he want the meat cooked?
00:37:09:21 – 00:37:14:28
Speaker 1
Is She went in to learn how to play the fiddle.
00:37:16:06 – 00:37:19:04
Speaker 3
Yeah. Oh. Oh, yeah. You know, just like.
00:37:19:04 – 00:37:29:19
Speaker 2
Are there descendants of trolls alive today? I mean, they were very astute. There was a long time ago, but I remember one kid saying, So is Saddam Hussein a troll?
00:37:29:19 – 00:37:30:08
Speaker 3
Interesting.
00:37:30:08 – 00:37:50:02
Speaker 2
And we decided he was a troll. He was real because that’s kind of what Ibsen was hinting at. When you say you say it’s to live is to battle with trolls that that when you let the dark side, when you let the evil when you start turning towards doing things that are wrong, you’re becoming a troll.
00:37:50:12 – 00:37:51:07
Speaker 1
Interesting.
00:37:51:07 – 00:37:52:04
Speaker 3
Yeah. You know. Yeah.
00:37:52:19 – 00:37:56:04
Speaker 2
When when I was a bad kid, my mother called me in terror long.
00:37:56:14 – 00:38:01:03
Speaker 3
A troll kid. You how? You know.
00:38:01:06 – 00:38:02:18
Speaker 2
So this is.
00:38:02:20 – 00:38:26:10
Speaker 1
One of the stories in Hidden Folk was about schoolkids. And I had heard about schoolkids through that movie Song of the Sea, I believe is the movie. Yeah, but I. I had thought that original it originated Scotland. But I know that there are a lot of those like, you know, stories that kind of are in different regions as well.
00:38:27:24 – 00:38:31:10
Speaker 1
Do you know if it originated in Norway or where it.
00:38:32:05 – 00:38:58:23
Speaker 2
No, I do. I do think those are so, you know, the whole Atlantic seaboard kind of shares is a shared culture and uses different names. So, you know, we all have mermen and mermaids and there are a lot of but the selfish stories are more traditionally told, like in Scotland and Ireland, the Shetland Islands and Faroe Islands, which used to belong to Norway.
00:38:58:23 – 00:39:21:14
Speaker 2
Yeah. And all of these stories, you know, they are, they, they’re about that liminal space, that in-between, you know, they, they come out in the in-between times at dusk and at dawn. You know, when you’re in between, when you’re not, you know, one thing and not another. Like maybe you’re pregnant, you’re not a mother, but you’re not not a mother either.
00:39:22:02 – 00:39:26:03
Speaker 2
Or you’re engaged to be married. You’re not married, but you’re not unmarried either.
00:39:26:03 – 00:39:26:20
Speaker 1
Exactly.
00:39:27:05 – 00:39:29:28
Speaker 2
T Yeah. And so that’s that’s their time.
00:39:29:29 – 00:39:34:20
Speaker 1
Can you tell our listeners who are familiar with it the stories of Kelpies a little bit about them?
00:39:36:09 – 00:39:36:20
Speaker 3
Well.
00:39:37:06 – 00:40:05:29
Speaker 2
The story in the book is very long, so I’ll just beat the South. These are the selfies are come. They look like seals, but they actually can take their seal skin off. And when they do, you know, they look exactly like humans, except ever just incredibly beautiful. And you know, this particular story you’re referring to in almost all of the stories I like that it’s about a man who sees a Celtic woman.
00:40:06:15 – 00:40:07:14
Speaker 3
And just.
00:40:07:14 – 00:40:13:08
Speaker 2
Falls madly in love, decides he just has to marry her. So he hides her skin.
00:40:13:17 – 00:40:15:08
Speaker 3
And basically keeps her captive.
00:40:16:22 – 00:40:19:23
Speaker 1
But materialistically keeps her captive on earth.
00:40:21:13 – 00:40:31:06
Speaker 2
Keeps her captive on earth. So it’s it’s you know, and they have children and even though, you know, she loves her children, she’s a very, very good mother. She always longs.
00:40:31:06 – 00:40:32:29
Speaker 3
For the sea. And a.
00:40:33:00 – 00:40:38:21
Speaker 2
Day when he goes off, one of her children finds the key to the box where he has hidden her seal.
00:40:38:21 – 00:40:39:04
Speaker 3
Skin.
00:40:39:19 – 00:41:02:01
Speaker 2
And so she’s able to get her sealskin back. And so she sits down with her children and tell them that she has to return to her first. Family can always come down to the rocks along the seashore, and whenever they need any help, just call for her and she’ll come back. And so he puts her seal skin on and she dives back into the sea.
00:41:03:01 – 00:41:06:09
Speaker 2
But it’s lovely because every midsummer night, you know, she comes.
00:41:06:09 – 00:41:07:13
Speaker 3
Back and.
00:41:07:19 – 00:41:35:28
Speaker 2
Visits them, and whenever they need anything, she will come back and they get to know their seal brothers and sisters and there’s there is that send the Cindy stories, you know, that we are frozen. We are. We are. We are not. We are more than we think we are. Oops, we lost Vanessa. There.
00:41:35:28 – 00:41:42:09
Speaker 3
Yes. You just added. Hmm. Yeah.
00:41:42:09 – 00:41:58:07
Speaker 2
Yeah. Maybe she hears me. Or maybe I’m frozen. No, I’m okay. This is what’s good about the fact that it’s not a live audience right now.
00:41:58:07 – 00:42:15:22
Speaker 3
Yeah. Oh. Oh, good.
00:42:15:22 – 00:42:16:04
Speaker 2
I’m glad.
00:42:16:04 – 00:42:17:01
Speaker 3
Yeah, well.
00:42:17:03 – 00:42:35:00
Speaker 2
It’s just, you know, folklore is so rich and so deep.
00:42:35:00 – 00:42:52:21
Speaker 3
Oh, create. Yeah, yeah, it is true.
00:42:52:21 – 00:42:53:08
Speaker 2
That’s really.
00:42:53:08 – 00:43:03:11
Speaker 3
True. Oh, gay. Was it me? Oh, my goodness.
00:43:03:18 – 00:43:25:14
Speaker 1
Sorry. You know what happened? My Internet, it just went out. You know, it’s possible that it was the almost two year old who found the router and turned it off. That’s very possible. Hip. This one of his favorite games is to turn the router off. So hopefully, hopefully that was. We got that sorted. All right. So sorry about that.
00:43:26:09 – 00:43:26:21
Speaker 1
Okay.
00:43:27:01 – 00:43:37:00
Speaker 2
So you say was that you know that they they kind of all of those kinds of stories it’s about how there’s sort of like our hidden cell, like they’re part of their appeal, right? You know?
00:43:37:05 – 00:43:37:22
Speaker 1
Yeah.
00:43:38:12 – 00:43:38:28
Speaker 2
So.
00:43:39:06 – 00:43:39:25
Speaker 1
So like.
00:43:40:07 – 00:43:45:08
Speaker 2
Did you did you read that little story about the origin of the hidden people in the introduction to them?
00:43:45:08 – 00:44:05:28
Speaker 1
But the part where you were talking about how they were almost like rumors that your aunt and your mother’s would would tell and they weren’t written down, but they were whispers actual true. They were told as if they were actually true. Is that what you were talking about?
00:44:06:02 – 00:44:06:16
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00:44:07:22 – 00:44:26:28
Speaker 2
Yeah. I was thinking about the story. The story about Adam and Eve and how it’s a story about the origin of the hidden Soul, which said that when Adam and you were kicked out of the Garden of Eden, they. They had a rough time setting up shop, and they did a lot of teasing. It was just very good, right?
00:44:26:29 – 00:44:29:20
Speaker 1
Yes, I. I really relate to that story.
00:44:31:07 – 00:44:33:00
Speaker 3
You do it and you do.
00:44:33:15 – 00:44:56:12
Speaker 2
You still met those annoyed. So what happens is one day God comes wandering into the garden and he says, Well, let me let me see your children. And he was so embarrassed because, you know, she hasn’t clean them up. And they most of them look like just a bunch of ragamuffin. So she hides the messy children and she takes the two that she’s managed to dress and clean and she brings them up and says, here, God, these are my children.
00:44:56:12 – 00:45:14:27
Speaker 2
But of course God knows and sees everything and says, Oh, Eve, what have you done From now on? You know, those children that you have shown me shall remain seen in this world and the ones that you have hidden shall remain hidden. And so it has been to this very day. We are the descendants of those two clean and.
00:45:14:27 – 00:45:18:04
Speaker 3
Yes, children. And they all the hidden.
00:45:18:04 – 00:45:24:25
Speaker 2
Folk are descendants of the messy children. So they really are our siblings. They are our hidden selves.
00:45:25:03 – 00:45:27:01
Speaker 3
Which I think is very you know.
00:45:27:13 – 00:45:33:11
Speaker 2
I just it’s one of those medieval legends that I think hints at a deeper. A deeper.
00:45:33:11 – 00:45:34:26
Speaker 3
Yeah, absolutely.
00:45:35:07 – 00:45:49:20
Speaker 1
Yeah, I can see that. Okay. So let’s go back a little bit to how you got into this line of work and how it you felt like it and you know it. It called to you.
00:45:49:20 – 00:45:50:04
Speaker 3
Well.
00:45:51:20 – 00:46:11:05
Speaker 2
So I was in Norway and I got something called the Crown Prince Harald Scholarship to go to college in the United States. And that was great. But it was only for a year and I’d fallen in love and I wanted to stay more than a year. So my parents were like, You stay. You pay because it’s.
00:46:11:05 – 00:46:13:20
Speaker 3
Free in Norway. And so I.
00:46:13:20 – 00:46:30:09
Speaker 2
Got a job at the library, at the college where I was in the children’s library. And there was a great job because students only came in twice a week and I needed to read as many children’s books as I could to familiarize myself with the collection so I could help the students.
00:46:30:21 – 00:46:32:01
Speaker 3
And I was like, Wow.
00:46:32:01 – 00:46:53:10
Speaker 2
That’s I mean, I’d never read any Dr. Seuss or any of the American children’s books. I was in heaven. It was great. And but they didn’t have many of the Norwegian stories. And then, you know, after about a while, I a kind of occurred to me that these kids were getting college credit for reading all these books. And I was like, I’m going to do this.
00:46:53:11 – 00:47:13:22
Speaker 2
So I decided to take the class called Children’s Literature. And when we got to the part, there’s always a part that’s called folklore and storytelling. The professor who knew me a little by then said, Lisa, I bet you know a story. Could you tell us a story? And I was like, Sure can. And I got up and I told him the three Billy Goats gruff.
00:47:14:20 – 00:47:16:10
Speaker 3
It was a big success.
00:47:16:10 – 00:47:37:14
Speaker 2
And so she told about me to her friend, the professor at the Maine University of Minnesota. And then I started telling stories in her classroom. So these two professors kind of took care of me a bit. They really sort of look out for me and there was going to be a big dinner. And this famous Swedish author was coming to be a keynote speech.
00:47:37:14 – 00:47:50:22
Speaker 2
And people from all over the Twin Cities, like 300 people, librarians, teachers, people interested in children’s literature, were coming in. I was invited to be the guest of these two professors so that I could share this. So we had this.
00:47:51:00 – 00:47:51:14
Speaker 3
Year.
00:47:51:27 – 00:48:13:05
Speaker 2
And that was very nice. And then somebody came in, whispered to one of them and the two professors started talking together and suddenly one of them said, Lisa, have a glass of sherry. So they poured mead, glass of sherry. And I was, you know, okay, I didn’t really drink sherry, but I had some sherry.
00:48:13:15 – 00:48:15:27
Speaker 3
Have another glass to sherry strong.
00:48:15:27 – 00:48:18:24
Speaker 1
It’s a lot stronger than wine is, isn’t that right?
00:48:18:24 – 00:48:22:23
Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah. Yes. It’s often new spirit. So I was like, super.
00:48:23:06 – 00:48:40:07
Speaker 2
I was pretty lively to begin with, and it after that second glass, maybe the third, I don’t know. They said, you know, Maria Grape is stuck in a snowstorm in Chicago and she can’t come. But we have all these people here and they’re expecting some entertainment. Why don’t you tell them stories in.
00:48:40:10 – 00:48:43:05
Speaker 3
And that’s amazing.
00:48:44:17 – 00:48:56:27
Speaker 2
So my storyteller career was born. I had all these people who all had libraries, you know, with story hours or teachers. And I was a student, so I couldn’t receive money. I just worked for dinner.
00:48:57:29 – 00:49:08:12
Speaker 1
That’s amazing. So did you did you see a big difference in the folklore of and were you going to school in Minnesota where you are now? Okay.
00:49:08:23 – 00:49:11:28
Speaker 2
Yeah, that’s why I ended up here. I had the scholarship to go.
00:49:11:28 – 00:49:20:20
Speaker 1
To college now. So did you see a lot of difference in the folklore here in America as opposed to Norway?
00:49:20:20 – 00:49:29:01
Speaker 2
Well, yeah, because what I was introduced to as American folklore when I came was, you know, the tall tales, you know, with Prague, with.
00:49:29:01 – 00:49:31:14
Speaker 3
Paul Bunyan, all Poles.
00:49:32:05 – 00:49:39:24
Speaker 2
Only later did I sort of learn well, I learned a lot more about, you know, African American folklore, which is quite amazing, you know, with all the.
00:49:40:10 – 00:49:40:15
Speaker 3
Red.
00:49:40:19 – 00:49:51:18
Speaker 2
Rabbit and the tar baby stories and all of these. And so but yeah, and at at that time in the there began to be quite a lot.
00:49:51:18 – 00:49:51:27
Speaker 3
Of.
00:49:53:22 – 00:50:17:09
Speaker 2
Folktales published with people like Tammy DePaula doing a lot of Italian folktales. But yeah, clearly nobody had done trolls properly. I mean you, but it’s like they just didn’t understand truth. But I did storytelling for almost 20 years before I began to write the stories down.
00:50:17:10 – 00:50:22:16
Speaker 1
Interesting. And how did you go about doing that research?
00:50:22:16 – 00:50:36:05
Speaker 2
You know, my father was an antiquarian, an old and rare book dealer. I grew up in a house that was a bookstore where every book with at least a hundred years old, my elder. And so.
00:50:37:16 – 00:50:38:00
Speaker 3
I.
00:50:38:00 – 00:50:43:12
Speaker 2
Have collected and I found in, you know, at home many.
00:50:43:12 – 00:50:46:16
Speaker 3
Beautiful, old, really, really old.
00:50:46:16 – 00:51:10:14
Speaker 2
Collections of folktales. And I also had you know, I had my I actually got a collection of the Norwegian folktales in English. No, they were the English one. I got them as a wedding gift from some neighbors who said, So you won’t ever forget Norwegian Cruise Line. And and so I, I, I did a lot of reading, you.
00:51:10:14 – 00:51:34:01
Speaker 2
I knew tons of stories from having heard them growing up. But then I started reading a lot of those really old collections with more sort of more of the hidden folk stories, which are not so much in that actual Norwegian collections of folktales. They don’t have so many, you know, of the Hidden Folk, the said the the fairies and elves and norms and dwarves.
00:51:34:01 – 00:51:38:17
Speaker 2
They are in other kinds of collections that didn’t really become as popular.
00:51:39:10 – 00:51:40:20
Speaker 3
For reason and of.
00:51:40:28 – 00:52:00:09
Speaker 2
They weren’t they were more they you know, they were more anecdotal in nature. So they were often I guess one of the differences is that the the folk tales that sort of begin once upon a time, a long, long time ago, they have a certain literary quality to it and they were always.
00:52:00:09 – 00:52:01:03
Speaker 3
Told.
00:52:01:03 – 00:52:04:02
Speaker 2
As entertainment and not not as a.
00:52:04:02 – 00:52:05:07
Speaker 3
Literal truth.
00:52:05:15 – 00:52:10:18
Speaker 2
But as a metaphorical truth. And these stories about the fairies, elves.
00:52:10:18 – 00:52:11:27
Speaker 3
Gnomes, dwarves.
00:52:12:01 – 00:52:13:24
Speaker 2
Silks, they were always.
00:52:13:24 – 00:52:14:27
Speaker 3
Cannot hold.
00:52:15:12 – 00:52:28:15
Speaker 2
More. Like as an aside, this really happened is true. This is this is not a make believe. This is this really happened. And so it’s a very different quality to them.
00:52:28:15 – 00:52:32:16
Speaker 1
Do are they still told today to to kids in that in that fashion.
00:52:34:05 – 00:52:54:05
Speaker 2
Yeah yeah and that’s I mean that my like I remember one time my grandmother was supposed to have met one of the the the, the, the white horse Mnookin He’s called in the Norwegian. And there was a big cautionary story. And then once a creature that’s not in this book is called Hulda, and she is this unearthly.
00:52:54:05 – 00:52:55:04
Speaker 3
Beautiful.
00:52:55:04 – 00:53:16:25
Speaker 2
Woman that lives in the mountains. And she’s just the witching. And the only way that you can tell that she’s not a normal human is that she has a cows tail, but she hides that underneath her skirt. So it was very dangerous for a man, you know, to walk, you know, over the mountains. The only only power that you would have if you had had to have a steel knife and you have to throw it over her.
00:53:17:19 – 00:53:31:10
Speaker 2
If you saw that she had a cow tail, otherwise, you know, you would go home with her. But it said that they did occasionally marry human men. And if she agreed to marry in a church, her cow, his tail would fall.
00:53:31:10 – 00:53:31:23
Speaker 3
Off.
00:53:32:07 – 00:53:41:10
Speaker 2
And she would lose some of her unearthly beauty. But she’s said to be, you know, they were very good mothers and very, very good storytellers. And my kids were little.
00:53:41:15 – 00:53:42:10
Speaker 3
I used to think.
00:53:42:25 – 00:53:47:16
Speaker 2
And when I married your dad, I buried my coast tale on my father.
00:53:51:27 – 00:53:55:28
Speaker 1
Did you ever go and show them where it was buried?
00:53:55:28 – 00:53:56:05
Speaker 3
Oh.
00:53:58:11 – 00:54:01:10
Speaker 1
That’s too funny.
00:54:01:10 – 00:54:02:28
Speaker 3
Oh, my goodness. Well, you know.
00:54:04:07 – 00:54:06:06
Speaker 2
It’s a very different kind of a type of.
00:54:06:06 – 00:54:06:17
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00:54:07:15 – 00:54:28:15
Speaker 1
Yeah. You know, when I was growing up, I and I believed that there was a leprechaun in the attic in our in our house. And all of the neighborhood kids believed that as well. And I don’t know where that even came from, but mean, you know, kids latch on to those things and they it’s, you know, it really sparks the imagination.
00:54:28:15 – 00:54:43:16
Speaker 2
It really does. I was just telling that story about that little rascally Nissen to my grandson’s class on Thursday and they were all like, I got one of those. You know, I have I have one that lives in mine.
00:54:43:16 – 00:54:48:10
Speaker 1
Why don’t you tell the audience a little bit about that? The the niece, how do you say it?
00:54:48:16 – 00:54:50:10
Speaker 3
NISSEN It’s pronounced.
00:54:51:04 – 00:54:56:22
Speaker 2
In Norwegian and in Swedish they called the exact same creature Tonto.
00:54:57:08 – 00:54:59:19
Speaker 3
Och t0c.
00:55:00:10 – 00:55:20:17
Speaker 2
And sometimes in Danish they’re actually called trolls. And that’s why you often have that confusion when people think trolls are spoke. This is only if little is only about the size of one or two year old. So just a small child, even though he lives to be hundreds and hundreds of years old. And in the old days, of course, he lived.
00:55:20:21 – 00:55:40:23
Speaker 2
Every farmer, the farmers who had a nice a living were very lucky because they took care of all the animals they loved the birds, the horses and the sheep and the goat and the cows and feed them and everything. And so that the farmers called them the good folks, you know, the good. But now there’s not so many farms, so their habitat has diminished.
00:55:40:23 – 00:55:48:03
Speaker 2
So there’s not so many, but some of them have moved into houses in their attics, especially if you have a furry pet.
00:55:48:25 – 00:55:49:27
Speaker 3
So, you know.
00:55:51:06 – 00:56:06:00
Speaker 2
You can tell if you have nieces are not extinct, the trolls are extinct. You can find evidence of trolls and you can find evidence, living evidence of the Nisei. So they love to dance and they are nocturnal. So if you hear a lot of creaking from, you.
00:56:06:00 – 00:56:06:29
Speaker 1
Know, I definitely.
00:56:08:22 – 00:56:09:26
Speaker 3
Yell at.
00:56:10:05 – 00:56:30:10
Speaker 2
Mr. Up and about at night and you might be practicing his dance moves because he’s a really good dancer. Or if you have a pet that’s really happy and has a very shiny coat, it might be that you have a nurse who helps take care of him. But for those of us in the north, they’re one of the best ways to know if you have a nissa is if you lose a lot of socks or mittens.
00:56:31:06 – 00:56:37:17
Speaker 2
And that’s because Dennis kindness steals them in order to use it as a sleeping bag for his children.
00:56:38:00 – 00:56:40:01
Speaker 3
It is just a perfect size. So.
00:56:41:05 – 00:56:51:12
Speaker 2
So the story is about a Nissan that lived on a farm and he was practicing dancing. One day and he was going at it so hard that when you did it, a big, huge somersault. When he.
00:56:51:12 – 00:56:52:27
Speaker 3
Landed crack, he.
00:56:52:27 – 00:56:55:06
Speaker 2
Landed with such force that his little.
00:56:55:06 – 00:56:56:20
Speaker 3
Leg cut through.
00:56:56:20 – 00:57:19:29
Speaker 2
The floorboard and dangled down into the room below. Well, right then there was a farmhand named Jack who was busy pitching hay for it when he saw that little leg, you thought, Hey, so our niche is up there, that rascal, I’m going to give him a surprise. And so he grabbed his pitchfork and he ran up and he poked the knife in the leg with a Pittsburg.
00:57:19:29 – 00:57:20:18
Speaker 2
And then this is when.
00:57:20:19 – 00:57:22:21
Speaker 3
You how in a Yankees.
00:57:22:21 – 00:57:24:09
Speaker 2
Leg up and he hopped around.
00:57:24:26 – 00:57:25:05
Speaker 3
And.
00:57:25:10 – 00:57:46:24
Speaker 2
That jack the farmhand, he just thought this was the funniest thing had ever seen. The way that little leg disappeared. He was laughing and laughing. He was still laughing when it was suppertime. So the farmer said, Well, Jack shared the joke. Oh, you said our Nissa was dancing so hard today that his leg cut through the floorboard and dangled in to the into the barn.
00:57:47:04 – 00:57:49:24
Speaker 2
And boy, did I give him a surprise. I gave him.
00:57:49:24 – 00:57:50:29
Speaker 3
One big jab.
00:57:50:29 – 00:57:51:06
Speaker 2
With a.
00:57:51:06 – 00:58:00:05
Speaker 3
Pitchfork. You didn’t just give me one jab. You gave me three jabs because there were three prongs on of pitchbook. And I’m going to before.
00:58:00:05 – 00:58:02:27
Speaker 2
It came, an angry little voice from outside.
00:58:03:13 – 00:58:05:21
Speaker 3
But Jack just laughed. I mean.
00:58:05:27 – 00:58:09:07
Speaker 2
He was a strapping big 16 year old. He wasn’t going to be.
00:58:09:07 – 00:58:10:10
Speaker 3
Afraid of a tiny.
00:58:10:10 – 00:58:11:10
Speaker 2
Little creature like.
00:58:11:10 – 00:58:11:19
Speaker 3
That.
00:58:12:09 – 00:58:16:15
Speaker 2
He went to bed without a care in the world. But in the middle.
00:58:16:15 – 00:58:17:02
Speaker 3
Of the night.
00:58:17:11 – 00:58:22:22
Speaker 2
That Nissa snuck into the house down the hall into Jack’s bedroom, and there he grabbed.
00:58:22:22 – 00:58:22:25
Speaker 3
Him.
00:58:23:01 – 00:58:30:24
Speaker 2
Lifted him up and carried him outside And out there he grabbed Jack by the legs and he started to swing him around and around and around. And then he.
00:58:30:24 – 00:58:33:02
Speaker 3
Flung him up over the barn.
00:58:33:09 – 00:58:46:21
Speaker 2
And then he ran so fast to the other side that he caught him before he hit the ground. Then he following him around and around and over a second time. And Jack, normally a very sound sleeper. Boy, did he wake up his dad.
00:58:46:27 – 00:58:51:18
Speaker 3
I’m so sorry for what I did. Please let me down. I’ll be really good. I’ll never do it again. Just please put me down.
00:58:51:26 – 00:58:57:14
Speaker 2
But, you know, the Nissa was really mad. He just grabbed Zach’s leg and you flung him over a third time.
00:58:57:19 – 00:59:01:06
Speaker 3
Four, five, six, seven, eight.
00:59:01:14 – 00:59:04:21
Speaker 2
Finally, on the ninth time, he had the jack have his wake.
00:59:04:26 – 00:59:08:14
Speaker 3
He fought him and nearby so.
00:59:08:14 – 00:59:13:14
Speaker 2
Hard that he landed in the middle of a field in a great big brown.
00:59:13:14 – 00:59:15:09
Speaker 3
Smelly mud puddle.
00:59:16:15 – 00:59:41:13
Speaker 2
Then he saw when he saw Jack sitting there, he laughed so hard that he woke up the whole household. Down came the farmer and his wife and the kids and the dairy maid and all the other people who worked on the farm. And when they saw Jack sitting out there covered in brown muck, they started laughing too. So poor Jack, he learned his lesson the hard way, but learning he did from that day on, he was really good to the nest.
00:59:41:25 – 00:59:45:00
Speaker 2
And if you have a knife at your house, I suggest you be good.
00:59:46:20 – 00:59:50:24
Speaker 1
That is such a great story.
00:59:50:24 – 01:00:00:05
Speaker 2
You have to end Norwegian stories with snip snip snip to add at 78 means snip snip snout. This tale is told.
01:00:00:18 – 01:00:03:09
Speaker 1
Oh that’s so cute. I love that.
01:00:03:09 – 01:00:05:17
Speaker 3
Ending.
01:00:05:17 – 01:00:17:16
Speaker 1
Yeah. So do you think that people would try and go and steal other farmers? And he says if they this, if they didn’t have one.
01:00:17:16 – 01:00:33:03
Speaker 2
You can’t do that. They can’t do the thing it didn’t mentioned about the nicer but you maybe could deduce is that even though he is very tiny he’s insanely strong he is so strong he can lift up an entire horse so you can not forcibly move anything.
01:00:33:19 – 01:00:34:00
Speaker 3
But.
01:00:34:15 – 01:00:59:06
Speaker 2
You if you don’t take your nieces seriously. You know, you he can he can leave you and your farm will suffer as a consequence. There’s loads of stories about that and there’s loads of other stories where there was like at Christmas you’re supposed to put out porridge for them. Well, every Thursday you should put that porridge. But on Christmas he expects to have a big lump of butter and some some sugar on top.
01:00:59:21 – 01:01:15:22
Speaker 2
And so one dairy made, you know, she put the lump of butter and the sugar in the bottom. So when the Nissa saw his porridge didn’t have it, he was really mad. So when she came in, you know, he grabbed her and you dance and danced and danced, you know, until she wore her shoes out and she almost fell down dead.
01:01:16:08 – 01:01:33:11
Speaker 2
And then he sat down. He said, well, you just, you know, eat it after all. And then when it came to the the bottom and found the butter, he felt really bad because he had worn her out. So you restored her to all her, you know, good senses again and, you know, did extra. It’s kind.
01:01:33:11 – 01:01:34:25
Speaker 3
Of like just don’t.
01:01:34:29 – 01:01:43:21
Speaker 2
Don’t mess with him. So there’s there’s this sort of, you know, live live in harmony with the things around you.
01:01:44:01 – 01:01:44:14
Speaker 3
Yeah.
01:01:44:27 – 01:01:46:06
Speaker 1
Do people still put up porridge?
01:01:48:03 – 01:01:48:26
Speaker 3
No.
01:01:49:09 – 01:02:01:04
Speaker 2
Well, maybe Icelanders, but not Norwegians in Minister firmly belongs with Christmas in Norway. We don’t have Santa’s elves. We have Nissa and the Santa Claus is called.
01:02:01:13 – 01:02:01:28
Speaker 3
You.
01:02:02:00 – 01:02:05:00
Speaker 2
Ula Nissa. So he’s the Christmas Nissa.
01:02:05:01 – 01:02:07:01
Speaker 1
Oh, how interesting.
01:02:08:08 – 01:02:09:18
Speaker 2
His helpers are nice.
01:02:09:23 – 01:02:10:14
Speaker 3
Not elves.
01:02:10:15 – 01:02:27:09
Speaker 1
Oh, wow. So that’s. That’s very interesting. Well, okay. I think. I think we’ve covered quite a bit, haven’t we?
01:02:27:09 – 01:02:27:23
Speaker 3
Yeah.
01:02:28:06 – 01:02:29:11
Speaker 2
You didn’t get acquired?
01:02:29:11 – 01:02:39:10
Speaker 1
No, no, but I’m very grateful for you. What do you think? Is there anything else you want to add?
01:02:39:10 – 01:02:57:20
Speaker 2
There’s so much you can say, you know, about the stories, about why? You know, I think it’s I’m so glad you’re doing this podcast because I think the children just don’t get these stories anymore. They just are, you know, they get them maybe as a movie, but they.
01:02:57:20 – 01:02:58:26
Speaker 3
Don’t they.
01:02:58:26 – 01:03:00:18
Speaker 2
Don’t get the breadth and the.
01:03:00:18 – 01:03:03:10
Speaker 3
Depth of the folk tales.
01:03:03:23 – 01:03:34:21
Speaker 2
And I think it’s a real shame because I think it sparks that creativity. It opens up the world, it gives them a respite. It’s just it does so many things for children, even something simple. I have teachers tell me, you know, that kids don’t understand the references, like, well, if the shoe fits, you know, like with Cinderella, you know, or all all of those kinds of references that you often do and they don’t it’s like they don’t they don’t tell these stories.
01:03:34:21 – 01:03:58:09
Speaker 2
I hope that we’ve had a chance to touch on, you know, why these stories are so important and why parents need to keep sharing these stories and I think it’s, you know, do it with books or just tell it, because also it just the really old books, they’re quite gruesome. You read The Brothers Grimm and you go, well, you know, you need to you need you need to adapt.
01:03:58:09 – 01:04:19:19
Speaker 2
And I was going to say that I do think it’s a good thing. You know, you don’t what happened when these stories were written down, You know, in the 1800s, they became frozen in print the way people thought and spoke and did things in those days. Until then, it had been a living oral tradition that changed and adapted with the times, with different.
01:04:19:19 – 01:04:20:07
Speaker 3
People, with.
01:04:20:07 – 01:04:20:17
Speaker 2
Different.
01:04:20:17 – 01:04:23:04
Speaker 3
Cultures. So, you know.
01:04:23:04 – 01:04:48:00
Speaker 2
One of the things that’s really fun to do is to take the universal element, but then imagine, you know, adapt the stories so that they’re appropriate for children today. And, you know, we are different than, you know, we think differently than people did 200 years ago. So it’s it’s appropriate to be inspired by the really old versions, but bring them up into the modern age.
01:04:48:00 – 01:04:48:24
Speaker 1
Yeah. And I.
01:04:49:06 – 01:04:49:18
Speaker 2
If.
01:04:49:19 – 01:05:13:11
Speaker 1
You want, there’s still much value to the folk. The folk tales, which is why I wanted to start this this podcast for me. I remember folk tales more than any other stories that were told to me. And so they just stick in my mind and I just kind of want to explore why that was, why they’re so memorable and why they spark so much imagination.
01:05:13:11 – 01:05:14:17
Speaker 3
And I have.
01:05:14:17 – 01:05:32:20
Speaker 2
A psychology psychologist friend who says he thinks that when they hear the stories, they just bypass the entire frontal cortex, the modern brain, and it goes right back down to the ancient part of the brain where they reside right next to fire.
01:05:32:20 – 01:05:33:25
Speaker 1
Right next to fire.
01:05:35:22 – 01:05:50:17
Speaker 2
Right? Yeah. Because, you know, the things that sort of make humans really humans is, you know, I mean, no other animal makes fire that I know of and sits by the fire and uses fire the way we do. So it’s one of those early things. And stories like these.
01:05:50:17 – 01:05:51:07
Speaker 3
Belong.
01:05:51:21 – 01:05:58:10
Speaker 2
With, you know, our ancient heritage. It connects you on a very, very deep level with something fundamentally.
01:05:59:03 – 01:06:14:08
Speaker 1
Yeah, absolutely. And there’s so many crossovers with so many different cultures. And I know that that in Japan they have a very similar Little Mermaid story. And you were saying that it came from Denmark. Is that what you said? It originated from.
01:06:16:04 – 01:06:16:17
Speaker 3
The Little.
01:06:16:17 – 01:06:21:23
Speaker 2
Mermaid, but that’s it. Yes. An original tale by Hans Christian Andersen. But there are.
01:06:22:13 – 01:06:22:27
Speaker 3
Tales.
01:06:22:27 – 01:06:34:17
Speaker 2
That are folktales that came out of the oral rather than Hans Christian Andersen. But I know the Japanese have some amazing underwater dams and things.
01:06:34:26 – 01:06:43:17
Speaker 1
Yeah, I just love how there is even from people from so, so far away.
01:06:43:17 – 01:06:48:25
Speaker 2
Yeah, there are. There are more than 500 variants of Cinderella found in Europe alone.
01:06:48:27 – 01:06:54:07
Speaker 1
Interesting. Can you tell us a little bit about just the various.
01:06:54:07 – 01:07:10:24
Speaker 2
Oh, there’s so many different variants, my daughter said. I think we had 13 different ones, didn’t we, growing up? And There’s a really cool African-American and I can’t remember it. I’ll have to pull it out. But can you guess where they think that story originated?
01:07:11:03 – 01:07:12:07
Speaker 1
No.
01:07:12:07 – 01:07:12:21
Speaker 2
So what’s.
01:07:12:21 – 01:07:13:06
Speaker 3
The you.
01:07:13:06 – 01:07:42:18
Speaker 2
Know, because the pivotal element is does the shoe fit right to have the tiny foot? So the culture that emphasized the importance of the tiny China women with China, so they think it might have started in China and traveled with peddlers and merchants through the silk route and landing, you know, in Europe and well along the way, because there are variants there, I have Egyptian variants, I have a Korean variant, you know, their variants.
01:07:42:28 – 01:08:07:10
Speaker 2
It’s such a, you know, such a compelling story. And so people before you know, it, literacy was widespread. You stories with you. They traveled with people when the English settled Australia and America, you know, they brought their stories with them right? Or when people were taken prisoner of war or when they were enslaved and brought, they brought their stories with them at the end.
01:08:07:23 – 01:08:12:02
Speaker 2
And you know, when you have a really good story, everybody goes, I heard a great story.
01:08:12:14 – 01:08:13:06
Speaker 3
But, you.
01:08:13:06 – 01:08:23:11
Speaker 2
Know, you change it. So I think the Chinese story has a fish in it rather than, you know, no, there’s not in or anything like that. I, I have a whole bunch of.
01:08:23:11 – 01:08:38:03
Speaker 1
They still I know that the the Grimm’s tale when they actually cut their toes off in their heels off right. And it’s very, very gross. But I mean there’s kind of the tradition in China. They don’t cut off, but they break bones and bend.
01:08:38:10 – 01:08:40:28
Speaker 3
Yeah, break. It’s pretty brutal, right?
01:08:40:28 – 01:08:41:26
Speaker 1
I mean, people die.
01:08:42:00 – 01:08:42:16
Speaker 3
But there’s.
01:08:43:14 – 01:09:02:19
Speaker 2
Yeah, it’s so, you know, that’s how stories because they are of the oral tradition they travel with people as they move and you know people have always been on the go but stories go with you but if you grew up in a say on the ocean and then you end up in a mountainous place with that’s very dry.
01:09:02:25 – 01:09:09:07
Speaker 2
You know the landscape in the story will change the clothing, the food. But the basic elements of the stories.
01:09:09:07 – 01:09:10:10
Speaker 3
Stays the same.
01:09:10:21 – 01:09:16:26
Speaker 2
So it is really fun to study, you know, the different versions of stories from different cultures.
01:09:16:26 – 01:09:21:29
Speaker 1
Definitely. I’m very much looking forward to hearing all the different variants from different places.
01:09:23:17 – 01:09:24:08
Speaker 3
Yeah.
01:09:24:08 – 01:09:26:03
Speaker 2
Oh, you’re going to have a great time.
01:09:26:25 – 01:09:28:09
Speaker 3
You’re going to learn. Yes.
01:09:28:18 – 01:09:30:01
Speaker 1
It’ll Be exciting journey.
01:09:31:00 – 01:09:32:17
Speaker 3
So yeah, how are you going to.
01:09:32:28 – 01:09:33:24
Speaker 2
Know these people?
01:09:33:24 – 01:09:50:23
Speaker 1
And we’re hoping for suggestions from people who come on to the show. So if you have people that you want to suggest to us, we would absolutely love any, any direction that you you want to give. Yes.
01:09:51:15 – 01:10:00:11
Speaker 2
Because there’s you know, there’s very there’s like famous scholars who deal with it. But then you’ll get a very scholarly approach. Well, then there’s storyteller.
01:10:00:14 – 01:10:11:25
Speaker 1
And I think we want a balance. We want we want both, you know, scholars and also storytellers and so we want a mixture.
01:10:11:25 – 01:10:41:26
Speaker 2
I’ll think about it because then I can email you because like right now my brain is like, I can’t think of any right now that I know are still telling stories because the scholars and there’s one name, Maria I think is Tatiana. She’s been at Harvard and then there, but I think she might have retired. She’s written some really interesting things, but if you if you contact the American Folklore Society.
01:10:41:26 – 01:10:43:19
Speaker 1
Yeah, we have that.
01:10:44:13 – 01:10:48:00
Speaker 3
Yeah. I mean.
01:10:48:00 – 01:11:00:26
Speaker 2
You know, because and then because there’s like this big storytelling festival. I wonder if it’s still going on in Jonesboro, in Tennessee every year. And hundreds of storytellers come there.
01:11:01:23 – 01:11:05:19
Speaker 1
There’s one in Texas that’s happening in March as well. I don’t know if it’s.
01:11:06:08 – 01:11:06:24
Speaker 3
Also.
01:11:07:27 – 01:11:09:00
Speaker 2
You should go to that.
01:11:09:07 – 01:11:09:16
Speaker 1
It.
01:11:10:04 – 01:11:10:17
Speaker 3
Begins.
01:11:10:26 – 01:11:13:24
Speaker 1
Which I think is outside of Fort Worth or Dallas or somewhere.
01:11:15:21 – 01:11:39:00
Speaker 2
Yeah, yeah. There’s there’s there was for a long time there was, you know, like really active and now maybe it’s because I have kind of retired even though I don’t seem to be able to quite retire, I haven’t that I haven’t been sort of paying attention like I used to, you know, because I used to very sort of in that world.
01:11:39:00 – 01:11:45:28
Speaker 2
But between between grandchildren and going to Norway so much and all the skiing, I’m like.
01:11:46:10 – 01:11:50:10
Speaker 1
They ask you to tell stories about your grandchildren.
01:11:50:10 – 01:11:51:19
Speaker 3
Yeah, yeah.
01:11:51:27 – 01:11:57:18
Speaker 2
My, my, my one grandson always says moonwalk. That’s what they call me. It’s like Norwegian for mother’s mother.
01:11:58:08 – 01:11:58:27
Speaker 3
Don’t, don’t.
01:11:59:13 – 01:12:06:03
Speaker 2
Don’t read the books. Tell me stories from out of your mind that we.
01:12:06:03 – 01:12:12:19
Speaker 1
I wonder if you tell it differently, if you’re reading or if you’re just acting them out.
01:12:12:19 – 01:12:20:27
Speaker 2
You know, I have a hard time just reading. I end up just, you know, telling you, just, Oh, forget the book.
01:12:21:02 – 01:12:26:25
Speaker 1
I can definitely see why you’re a storyteller. You’re very dynamic.
01:12:26:25 – 01:12:28:07
Speaker 3
Yeah. So you ask your father.
01:12:28:17 – 01:12:43:25
Speaker 2
I think you’ve found me rather than the other way around. I just fell into it, and I kept trying to become an academic. So I did a master’s in linguistics, but I wrote my thesis on using storytelling to teach English as a second language.
01:12:44:26 – 01:12:47:28
Speaker 3
Oh, wow yeah. It’s what I. Yeah.
01:12:48:00 – 01:12:52:27
Speaker 1
And you said at one point you wanted to be a folklorist, but you don’t consider yourself a folklorist now.
01:12:54:07 – 01:12:55:12
Speaker 3
Well, I mean, I don’t.
01:12:55:12 – 01:13:16:19
Speaker 2
Have a Ph.D. or like a degree, but I have studied it. I’ve studied at the University of Minnesota. I studied for a year and a half folklore in the folklore program, and then I was going to start a Ph.D. at the University of Minnesota Folklore, and I’d done all my prerequisites. And then I got pregnant with my third child, and it have been a two hour commute each way.
01:13:16:19 – 01:13:22:26
Speaker 2
And I was like, I can’t have I can’t have three kids and commute three days a week to, you know.
01:13:23:07 – 01:13:24:19
Speaker 3
It’s just not going to work.
01:13:24:19 – 01:13:28:26
Speaker 2
So that’s when I decided to start writing instead. Yes.
01:13:29:22 – 01:13:31:00
Speaker 1
So this is probably.
01:13:31:00 – 01:13:32:02
Speaker 3
A good I don’t have the.
01:13:33:09 – 01:13:35:12
Speaker 2
Yeah, I don’t have the official degree, but.
01:13:35:22 – 01:13:36:06
Speaker 3
You know.
01:13:37:18 – 01:13:39:19
Speaker 2
Well, I have studied and I.
01:13:39:19 – 01:13:40:05
Speaker 3
Have I would.
01:13:40:05 – 01:13:42:16
Speaker 1
Consider you a folklorist in my.
01:13:42:26 – 01:13:43:24
Speaker 3
IT and.
01:13:44:06 – 01:13:48:00
Speaker 1
Although I’m not in college but I will I will grant you that that title.
01:13:49:18 – 01:13:51:01
Speaker 3
Okay. Thank you.
01:13:51:12 – 01:13:54:02
Speaker 1
Well, thank you so much for coming on. It was such a pleasure.
01:13:54:02 – 01:13:54:21
Speaker 3
Thank you.
01:13:55:05 – 01:13:56:18
Speaker 1
And what fun.
01:13:56:18 – 01:13:58:00
Speaker 3
Yes, this is fun.
01:13:58:02 – 01:14:05:12
Speaker 1
And maybe we’ll even have you on until you have you tell us more stories because you were just such a great storyteller.
01:14:05:12 – 01:14:08:12
Speaker 2
And thank you. You got a.
01:14:08:15 – 01:14:30:24
Speaker 1
Great so I’ll go ahead and do that now. Outro So thank you listeners for joining us today on Fabric of Folklore. I’m really glad you were here and if you enjoyed it, don’t forget to tell a friend and please make sure to subscribe so you don’t miss our next episode. Also, all the links and information we covered in this podcast will be on our website.
01:14:31:03 – 01:14:52:20
Speaker 1
Fabric of Folklore icon. I may be the host of this podcast, but ultimately this is your so we want to hear from you. So we’ve created a Facebook group so you can tell us your thoughts, give us your suggestions for future guests or topics and we can see if we can get them on the show and if we can and we can even give you out a shout out so we can’t wait.
01:14:52:20 – 01:14:59:23
Speaker 1
See you next week and then we need to do actually press end.