Kindness & Compassion
Stories that make care, mercy or refusal to help central to the plot. A meal, shelter, patient attention or a rescued animal can change the course of events. Consider the recipient’s needs as well as the helper’s intentions, and distinguish freely offered care from pressure to accept harm or forgive abuse.
Russian Folk Tales
Sadko
A poor Novgorod dulcimer player is paid in jewels by the Tzar of the Sea, grows rich, and twelve years later must leap overboard to keep his promise.
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.
Russian Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
The Snow Maiden (Snegurochka)
A childless old couple build a snow girl who comes to life, but when they cheat the fox who saved her, she hears that a hen matters more and melts away.
Russian Folk Tales
Vasilisa the Beautiful
Sent to Baba Yaga's hut for a light, Vasilisa survives the witch's chores with help from her mother's magic doll and carries home a glowing skull.
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.
Korean Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
The Vision of the Holy Man
On a calm night in a fishing village, a wandering holy man stares out to sea and warns the merchant To-jong that a giant wave will strike within hours.
Korean Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
The Geomancer
A hungry geomancer repays a mourner’s bowl of porridge with a perfect grave site, warning him that in ten years he must send for him in Seoul.
Korean Folk Tales
Ages 9-12
East Light and the Bridge of Fishes
A boy saved as a baby by pigs and mares grows into a great archer, and when a jealous king hunts him, the fish of a river form a bridge for him.
Celtic Folk Tales
The Story of Deirdre
Hidden from birth because of a dark prophecy, Deirdre falls in love with Naois, son of Uisnech, and flees with him from the king who means to marry her.
Grimm's Fairy Tales
The Salad
A huntsman loses a wishing-cloak and a magical bird heart, then uses two kinds of salad to transform those who took them.
Grimm's Fairy Tales
The Goose-Girl
A waiting-maid steals a princess's place and has Falada killed; the true bride keeps geese until a horse's head and an old king expose the fraud.