Week 9 Story
Mighty Mouse, Champion of Beasts
Story source: Tibetan Folk Tales by A.L. Shelton with illustrations by Mildred Bryant (1925).
A LONG time ago, when all beasts spoke a common tongue and all land was uniform, there was a single ruler of the beasts. The mighty lion reigned supreme above all creatures. The lion knew this and demanded all creatures serve him. The lion spent his days lazily relaxing. Every whim catered for and every meal provided. Since birth, this champion of beasts would never want for anything. It is because of this that the lion grew to an enormous size. Such a lion had never been seen before nor would it ever be seen again.
One day a gazelle came to the lion. The gazelle pleaded the lion to intervene on behalf of the gazelle. For the gazelle had lost its home. Its family displaced by the hand of a pack of buffalo. The gazelle begged for justice by the hand of the mighty king. Yet, the king declared it was not his place to intervene.
Upon this declaration a servant began to think. Make no mistake, this was an ordinary servant. A small mouse who had served the lion all his life as his parents before him and their parents before them. All this mouse had ever known was servitude. Yet as the lion declared he would not act this mouse wondered. The more he thought the more he realized he had never seen the king intervene in any affairs. As long as the lion had lived, he had only ever been served.
The Mouse grew enraged at this and challenged the lion. “you are unfit to rule glutton! You are no servant of the people, rather, you demand the people serve you! I challenge you to a duel for the kingdom!” Declared the mouse. As the lion heard this, he became enraged. He stood to destroy the mouse. Yet as he stood the lion began to struggle. In his gluttony, his body had become too massive for his heart support. It was in that moment, as the lion stood that he collapsed right back down, dead.
It was with the lion’s downfall that a lowly mouse became the champion of beasts.
Authors Note:
I loved how the original story displayed the impact of simple character traits. The rabbit was slothful which would have cost him his life, if the lion hadn’t fallen to pride. Both characters had flaws and neither of them overcame them. This is where I wanted to change the story. The lion in my tale was obviously a glutton. This eventually killed him. However, the mouse was a mindless servant. However, in my story we sort of saw a changing moment for this mouse. It was when he decided to stand up for himself that he ended up becoming champion of beasts!
A LONG time ago, when all beasts spoke a common tongue and all land was uniform, there was a single ruler of the beasts. The mighty lion reigned supreme above all creatures. The lion knew this and demanded all creatures serve him. The lion spent his days lazily relaxing. Every whim catered for and every meal provided. Since birth, this champion of beasts would never want for anything. It is because of this that the lion grew to an enormous size. Such a lion had never been seen before nor would it ever be seen again.
One day a gazelle came to the lion. The gazelle pleaded the lion to intervene on behalf of the gazelle. For the gazelle had lost its home. Its family displaced by the hand of a pack of buffalo. The gazelle begged for justice by the hand of the mighty king. Yet, the king declared it was not his place to intervene.
Upon this declaration a servant began to think. Make no mistake, this was an ordinary servant. A small mouse who had served the lion all his life as his parents before him and their parents before them. All this mouse had ever known was servitude. Yet as the lion declared he would not act this mouse wondered. The more he thought the more he realized he had never seen the king intervene in any affairs. As long as the lion had lived, he had only ever been served.
The Mouse grew enraged at this and challenged the lion. “you are unfit to rule glutton! You are no servant of the people, rather, you demand the people serve you! I challenge you to a duel for the kingdom!” Declared the mouse. As the lion heard this, he became enraged. He stood to destroy the mouse. Yet as he stood the lion began to struggle. In his gluttony, his body had become too massive for his heart support. It was in that moment, as the lion stood that he collapsed right back down, dead.
It was with the lion’s downfall that a lowly mouse became the champion of beasts.
Authors Note:
I loved how the original story displayed the impact of simple character traits. The rabbit was slothful which would have cost him his life, if the lion hadn’t fallen to pride. Both characters had flaws and neither of them overcame them. This is where I wanted to change the story. The lion in my tale was obviously a glutton. This eventually killed him. However, the mouse was a mindless servant. However, in my story we sort of saw a changing moment for this mouse. It was when he decided to stand up for himself that he ended up becoming champion of beasts!
I am so glad you picked this Tibetan unit, Kev: it is one of my all-time favorites. Tibetan folklore is FULL of wonderful animal stories like these, along with many stories that come from the Buddhist jataka tales, originally from India, that came to Tibet with Buddhism. I really like here how you played up the size contrast with the huge lion and the tiny mouse, which then makes the contest between them even more striking! And then it turns out to have a moral dimension too: all that royal catering literally brought the lion DOWN to defeat. At the start of the semester, I'm always thinking of Storybook projects, and reading your lion-and-mouse made me think about how cool it would be to do a lion-and-mouse anthology because I bet there are variations on lion-and-mouse in every country that has lions (and every country has mice!). This story about the rabbit and the lion happens to be one of the stories that came to Tibet from India; here's the Indian version: The Lion and the Rabbit
ReplyDeleteHi Kev,
ReplyDeleteYour story was very well-written! It was very easy and enjoyable to read. I really like this story because it kind of reminds me of David and Goliath, the Bible story.
I think your story is very entertaining, yet straight to the point. The moral is very obvious, which is good, especially to tell to younger kids.
Good job! I look forward to reading more of your writing.
-Libby
Hi Kev,
ReplyDeleteWhat a great read! It was easy to follow and well written. I thought that you had a very nice author's note that established parts of the original story and made the changes that you added very apparent. I think that it would be interesting if you were to expand on this story in the future. Would the mouse fall into the same trap as the lion or will the hero remain the hero?