Reading, The Coffin-Lid, Part B

For part B of this last week I stuck with the Russian unit stories. My favorite story from this second part was titled The Coffin-Lid from Russian Fairy Tales by W. R. S. Ralston (1887).

In this story, I wondered why the dead man decided to come out of his grave to kill some young boys. If I were telling this story, I would at least give an explanation as to why he wanted to kill them. I think he should rise from his coffin and kill the bad people of the world. No one ever knows who is doing the killing, but people are thankful for this "hero" for protecting their community.

Graveyard
Source: Public Domain Pictures

People try to stay out of trouble and do the right thing because they know this man will come kill them if they do anything harmful in the community.

One night, when the corpse is coming out of his grave, a man from out of town will decide to follow him and he witnesses him killing two boys. He asks the corpse why he does this and the corpse says that he is making society better by killing all of the bad people. The man goes to the police to report the problem and soon the whole town knows what's going on.

Out of fear, no one does anything about it. The community just decides for each and every person to live a good and honest life or they will pay the ultimate price of death.

Reading: The Dead Mother, Part A

For this last week of reading, I chose to read the Russian story titled The Dead Mother. This story comes from Russian Fairy Tales by W. R. S. Ralston (1887).

I enjoyed this story up until the end. The baby dies, but it doesn't give an explanation why and it seems to throw the whole story off. I think it's a cool concept that the baby is soothed at night because the dead mother comes back to nurture and take care of her baby, but still I find no reason to have the baby die at the end. The husband already lost his wife, it would be even worse to lose his child.

So, I think in my version of the story I would not have the baby die. I would have the dead mother come back to take care of her baby, and when the husband finds a new wife, she will stop coming around. The husband will bring many different woman home, but the dead wife will not stop coming back until he finds the perfect woman to care for their child. As soon as he finds the perfect woman, the dead wife will say her goodbyes to her family once and for all, and wish the new mother luck.

Mother and Child
Source: Wikimedia Commons

Another concept I could use would be to make this story would be to make the dead woman kidnap her baby because her husband is trying to have bad woman be the new mother of her child. After losing his child, the husband searches everywhere for a new fitting mother to care for his child and finally finds one. I want the ending to be happy, as I do with most of my stories.

Tech Tip: Touch Typing Games

I decided to try the Ninja Cat Touch Typing Game. It was fun and definitely kept me entertained for awhile. I'm better at typing long words and I realized I don't have an exact reaction to where a letter is on the keyboard when it's just one letter. I don't type formally, like they teach you when you're younger. I was taught in a computer class where to place my fingers specifically, but I thought it was easier my way. I still believe that, and I'm pretty fast the way that I do it.

I did better on the game when it was a longer word. I also found it hard to focus with the moving targets, because I don't place my fingers correctly on the keys. My computer would not load the other typing games for some reason, so I only played the Ninja Cat one. I did play different levels though, and I enjoyed the more difficult ones the most.

Reading: The Ingrates, Part A

For extra credit reading, I wanted to read the Italian stories. I selected the story titled The Ingrates from Italian Popular Tales by Thomas Frederick Crane (1885). I enjoyed this story because it had a simple lesson to it. It states that, "For who does good is ill rewarded, and who does evil is well rewarded."

If I were to change this story and create my own version I think I would want to make it a more modern version. I would change the characters to humans. A rich man who lived and worked in a rich community would become lost and find himself in a poor community. A sketchy, mean gang member  will mug him and tell him that he may just kill him. The rich man will plead or his life and reason with the gang member. He will ask him to ask other people around if he should be able to live.

They come across many individuals who reply with, "You're rich and don't face problems we do" or "You think you're better than us because you are rich". Finally the rich man pleads with a man to agree to let him live by bribing him with money. The man agrees and tells the gang member to let him live. When the man goes to get his promised money, he grabs it and is on his way home when he is robbed and killed in a drive by shooting.

City Streets
Source: Flickr

This story doesn't have a happy ending just like the original that I derived my ideas from. It's basically a simple story of not getting involved with the wrong people because you never know how it could turn out.