All Stories
Browse our complete collection of folk tales, Panchatantra stories, and moral stories from around the world.
Norse Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
Tyr and the Binding of Fenrir
The gods of Asgard fear the growing wolf Fenrir, and when he will only wear their magic ribbon if one god puts a hand in his mouth, brave Tyr steps forward.
African Folk Tales
Ages 6-8
Adzanumee and Her Mother
A childless woman’s wish turns a perfect yam into a daughter, on one condition she must keep, but a single impatient remark undoes the miracle.
African Folk Tales
Anansi and Nothing
Anansi borrows rich Nothing’s velvet cloth to win wives, loses them to Nothing’s kind bride, and turns to a deadly trap in jealous revenge.
African Folk Tales
Anansi the Blind Fisherman
Old, blind Anansi goes fishing with two kind helpers but answers every bit of help with insults, until the helpers decide to let his pride guide him.
African Folk Tales
All Ages
Farmer Mybrow and the Fairies
Forest fairies help Farmer Mybrow clear, burn and plant a secret field, but his wife answers their question at the green crop and the fairies ruin it.
African Folk Tales
Ages 6-8
Honourable Minū
A poor Akim-man in Accra hears “Minū” after every question and decides one Mr Minū owns all the town’s riches, until he meets a funeral procession.
African Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
How Beasts and Serpents First Came into the World
Polite Kweku Tsin follows lost palm-kernels into a silent town and wins a food-giving drum, but rude Anansi brings home a drum that calls wild beasts.
African Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
How Mushrooms First Grew
A debt is passed from two brothers to a bushfowl, a tree, an elephant, a hunter and a stump, until the clever ants find a way to pay it off.
African Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
How the Tortoise Got Its Shell
Tall, fast Klo the tortoise wins a fight for palm wine, drinks too much, and gets shut outside the god Mauri’s feast in a two-month rain.
African Folk Tales
How We Got the Name ‘Spider Tales’
To win the right to have every story named after him, Anansi the spider must deliver live bees, a boa-constrictor and a tiger to the sky-god.
African Folk Tales
Ages 6-8
How Wisdom Became the Property of the Human Race
Father Anansi seals all the world’s wisdom in a pot to punish people, but his young son’s simple advice at the foot of a tree spoils the plan.
African Folk Tales
Ages 6-8
King Chameleon and the Animals
The animals hold a race to choose a king, and the speedy hare is beaten to the royal stool by a chameleon who rode the whole way on his tail.