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- Herausgeber: Abela Publishing
- Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
- Sprache: Englisch
ISSN: 2397-9607 Issue 158In this 158th story in the Baba Indaba’s Children's Stories series, Baba Indaba narrates the perennial fairy tale of Little Thumb also known as Tom Thumb. A poor woodcutter and his wife give birth to a seventh child and christen him Tom. He small in stature and is not as able to carry out tasks like his brothers. However, he does have brains....……. Download and read this story to find out how Tom uses his brains to improve his family’s fortunes.Baba Indaba is a fictitious Zulu storyteller who narrates children's stories from around the world. Baba Indaba translates as "Father of Stories".Each issue also has a "WHERE IN THE WORLD - LOOK IT UP" section, where young readers are challenged to look up a place on a map somewhere in the world. The place, town or city is relevant to the story, on map. HINT - use Google maps.33% of the profit from the sale of this book will be donated to charities.INCLUDES LINKS TO DOWNLOAD 8 FREE STORIES
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Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2017
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LITTLE THUMB
A Fairy Tale
Baba Indaba Children’s Stories
Published By
Abela Publishing, London
2016
LITTLE THUMB
Typographical arrangement of this edition
©Abela Publishing 2016
This book may not be reproduced in its current format
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except as permitted by law
without the prior written permission
of the publisher.
Abela Publishing,
London, United Kingdom
2016
Baba Indaba Children’s Stories
ISSN 2397-9607
Issue 158
Email:
Website:
www.AbelaPublishing.com
Introduction
Baba Indaba, pronounced Baaba Indaaba, lived in Africa a long-long time ago. Indeed, this story was first told by Baba Indaba to the British settlers over 250 years ago in a place on the South East Coast of Africa called Zululand, which is now in a country now called South Africa.
In turn the British settlers wrote these stories down and they were brought back to England on sailing ships. From England they were in turn spread to all corners of the old British Empire, and then to the world.
In olden times the Zulu’s did not have computers, or iPhones, or paper, or even pens and pencils. So, someone was assigned to be the Wenxoxi Indaba (Wensosi Indaaba) – the Storyteller. It was his, or her, job to memorise all the tribe’s history, stories and folklore, which had been passed down from generation to generation for thousands of years. So, from the time he was a young boy, Baba Indaba had been apprenticed to the tribe’s Wenxoxi Indaba to learn the stories. Every day the Wenxoxi Indaba would narrate the stories and Baba Indaba would have to recite the story back to the Wenxoxi Indaba, word for word. In this manner he learned the stories of the Zulu nation.
In time the Wenxoxi Indaba grew old and when he could no longer see or hear, Baba Indaba became the next in a long line of Wenxoxi Indabas. So fond were the children of him that they continued to call him Baba Indaba – the Father of Stories.
When the British arrived in South Africa, he made it his job to also learn their stories. He did this by going to work at the docks at the Point in Port Natal at a place the Zulu people call Ethekwene (Eh-tek-weh-nee). Here he spoke to many sailors and ships captains. Captains of ships that sailed to the far reaches of the British Empire – Canada, Australia, India, Mauritius, the Caribbean and beyond.
He became so well known that ship’s crew would bring him a story every time they visited Port Natal. If they couldn’t, they would arrange to have someone bring it to him. This way his library of stories grew and grew until he was known far and wide as the keeper of stories – a true Wenxoxi Indaba of the world.
Baba Indaba believes the tale he is about to tell in this little book, and all the others he has learned, are the common property of Umntwana (Children) of every nation in the world - and so they are and have been ever since men and women began telling stories, thousands and thousands of years ago.
Where in the World – Look it Up!
This next story was told to him by a traveller who hailed from the small town of Breisach. Can you find Breisach on a map? What country is it in?
LITTLE THUMB
A Fairy Tale
A story, a story
Let it come, let it go
A story, a story
From long, long ago!
Umntwana Izwa! Children Listen!
ONCE upon a time long, long ago, in a far, far away land, Once upon a time there was a fagot-maker and his wife, who had seven children, all boys. The eldest was but ten years old, and the youngest only seven.
They were very poor, and their seven children were a great source of trouble to them because not one of them was able to earn his bread. What gave them yet more uneasiness was that the youngest was very delicate, and scarce ever spoke a word, which made people take for stupidity that which was a sign of good sense. He was very little, and when born he was no bigger than one's thumb; hence he was called Little Thumb.
The poor child was the drudge of the household, and was always in the wrong. He was, however, the most bright and discreet of all the brothers; and if he spoke little, he heard and thought the more.
There came a very bad year, and the famine was so great that these poor people resolved to rid themselves of their children. One evening, when they were in bed, and the fagot-maker was sitting with his wife at the fire, he said to her, with his heart ready to burst with grief:—
"You see plainly that we no longer can give our children food, and I cannot bear to see them die of hunger before my eyes; I am resolved to lose them in the wood to-morrow, which may very easily be done, for, while they amuse themselves in tying up fagots, we have only to run away and leave them without their seeing us."
"Ah!" cried out his wife, "could you really take the children and lose them?"
In vain did her husband represent to her their great poverty; she would not consent to it. She was poor, but she was their mother.
However, having considered what a grief it would be to her to see them die of hunger, she consented, and went weeping to bed.
Little Thumb heard all they had said; for, hearing that they were talking business, he got up softly and slipped under his father's seat, so as to hear without being seen. He went to bed again, but did not sleep a wink all the rest of the night, thinking of what he had to do. He got up early in the morning, and went to the brookside, where he filled his pockets full of small white pebbles, and then returned home. They all went out, but
