Justice & Fairness
Judgments, rewards, punishments and abuses of authority shape these stories. Some endings repair a wrong; others leave losses unresolved or impose a punishment readers may question. Follow whose testimony is heard, whose choices are respected and whether the powerful are held to the same standard as everyone else.
Russian Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
Morozko
Abandoned in the freezing fields, a stepdaughter receives gifts from Morozko; her stepmother sends her own daughter after riches, with a fatal result.
Norse Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
The Death of Baldur
When everything in the world swears never to harm Baldur, jealous Loki goes hunting for the one small plant that was never asked to make that promise.
Russian Folk Tales
Koschei the Deathless
Prince Ivan frees a chained prisoner and loses his warrior wife to him, then must win a horse from Baba Yaga before he can defeat Koschei the Deathless.
Russian Folk Tales
The Three Kingdoms: Gold, Silver, and Copper
Searching for his stolen mother, Ivan climbs into Whirlwind's kingdoms of copper, silver and gold, only to be stranded there by his jealous brothers.
Arabian Nights
The Tale of the Merchant and the Genie
A genie accuses a merchant of killing his son with a thrown date-stone; three travellers’ stories gradually win the merchant’s release.
Arabian Nights
Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves
Ali Baba overhears Open, Sesame, loads his donkeys with gold—and Morgiana outwits chalk marks, oil-jar assassins, and a guest who will eat no salt.
African Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
The World’s Reward
An old dog no longer wanted by his master sets out for the land of the aged with six other old animals, and they find a house full of robbers.
African Folk Tales
Ages 6-8
The Judgment of Baboon
Itkler the tailor wants justice for his torn clothes, and every creature blames the next, so Baboon orders each to punish the one before.
Korean Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
Yun Se-pyong, the Wizard
A wizard so feared that his own family keeps away sets out to rid Seoul of a rival magician, who hides from him by turning into a beetle under a crock.
Korean Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
The Woodman and the Mountain Fairies
A woodcutter climbs the mountain to cut fuel and stops to watch two long-haired fairies playing a board game on flat stones, quite forgetting the time.
Korean Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
The Man Who Became a Pig
A man travels from the far countryside to ask a minister’s advice, because his father, nearly a hundred, shut himself in for a nap and turned into a pig.
Korean Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
The Home of the Fairies
After his servant and horse die in a mountain storm, a young scholar is guided to a marble palace where the king of the immortals has been expecting him.