Thursday, February 21, 2019

Reading Notes: The Monkey and the Girl, Extra Credit


·      All the children in a village watched the crops growing by a nearby river
·      A Hanuman monkey wanted to eat the crops, so he devised a plan to be able to do so
o   The children often drove him off, which is why he needed a plan
·      The monkey’s plan was to make a garland of flowers and leave it behind after the children ran him off
o   The children fell for his plan and were happy with the flowers he left behind
o   The two parties eventually became friends
·      One of the young girls was interested by the monkey and made a one-sided promise to marry him
o   We have no idea how the monkey responded
·      Of course, the other children gossiped, and word spread
·      Eventually, the girl’s parents heard, and the father, with the help of some villagers, shot the monkey
o   They burned his corpse, which was commonly done with human corpses
·      The girl showed up as they were burning the body and simply stated that she just really wanted to see if they really did burn him
·      The girl distracts them by saying “what’s happening in the sky?”
o   Everyone looks up, and while they are looking up, she grabs sand and throws it up to blind them
·      As everyone is rubbing sand out of their eyes, the girl jumps into the fire and burns with the monkey
·      Everyone is sad, but they explain that she must have had a monkey’s soul, which would explain her fascination with him

Hanuman Langur Monkey. Source: Wikimedia.


Bibliography: This story is called "The Monkey and the Girl" and can be found here. Story source: Folklore of the Santal Parganas by Cecil Henry Bompas (1909).

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