Dear Diary,
The walk was pleasant to begin with: we talked about the changing of the seasons and how she was getting her home ready for the winter. She told me that as she was cleaning, she found a sixpence and decided to go to the market and rescue a pig - me. That was considerate of her. She seemed unassuming enough, if not a bit too talkative.
About this time, though, we got to a very large fenced off area. I struggled and struggled, but it was too high for me to jump over. After a while, the woman got really frustrated at me, climbed over, and continued walking. I thought she was just going to abandon me there.
I stood there in confusion for several minutes, and after that, I began to panic. So much for being rescued; now I was stuck in the middle of nowhere all by myself. My thoughts began to race and I suddenly became paranoid of my surroundings. I began to wander around the fence, but the area seemed to stretch on forever. Finally, I just gave up and went back to my original spot.
I don't know how much longer I stood there, but eventually I heard the old woman's voice. Overjoyed and relieved, I started squealing in delight. As she drew closer, I saw that she had come back with an entourage of animals. I was surprised to see so many new friends, but I was so glad to be saved that I didn't pay much attention to this fact.
I watched from a distance as the old woman gave a cow some hay. After this, as they walked closer, I realized that this started a chain reaction in a flurry of activity. No, that was an understatement--it was mass chaos. The cow gave a cat some milk, and the cat drank the milk and pounced on a mouse, who was chewing on a rope, which started to hang a man who looked like a butcher. The butcher began to do his job and killed an ox, and as he was doing this, the ox drank some water, which began to put out a fire, but not before its flames engulfed a stick. This stick began to hit the leader of this pack, a dog, who then came charging at me and bit me!
So after that odd and terrifying series of events, before my mind could even comprehend what was happening, I finally launched myself over the fence in fear, and the woman and I walked home in silence. Now I'm in her home, living in terror of her after seeing what lengths she would go to just to get me to do a simple task.
The pig caught behind the fence. Source: Wikimedia Commons.
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Author's note: This week, I retold the story of The Old Woman and Her Pig from the English Fairy Tales (1) unit. This is a cumulative story, where a series of events happens, and with each new event, the story escalates. In this case, a woman brings a pig home from a market and they reach a stile over which the pig cannot jump. In order to get the pig over the fence, she walks further and encounters a dog, stick, fire, water, ox, butcher, rope, rat, and cat, telling each of them to do something, but they refuse unless something else affects them first. Finally, she meets a cow and gives it hay, and the cow gives the cat milk and sets off a chain reaction ending in the dog biting the pig and ultimately getting him over the stile. This reminded me of a very extreme Rube Goldberg machine, in which a lot of energy is expended to perform a simple task (and certainly, a lot of deaths had to occur in this situation just to get the pig over the fence).
Although this one was somewhat morbid, I usually like cumulative stories because of their ridiculousness. I chose to retell this story because it had the setup of a nursery rhyme, which gave me ample opportunity to elaborate on details and provide background. I wanted to show it from the pig's perspective, because I imagine the entire situation would have been quite terrifying for him. This gave me some trouble because the pig would not have been able to see all that happened when the woman ventured on because he was trapped behind the fence, but I decided to remedy this by bringing all of the creatures back to him so he could see the chain reaction.
Bibliography:
"The Old Woman and Her Pig."
Joseph Jacobs, 1890.
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This was hilarious (if a bit morbid when the butcher tried to kill the ox)! I thought that the woman was going to leave the pig there, even though she had just bought him. I did not expect the strange chain reaction that forced the pig to jump over the fence. As the pig reflected, it really does say something about the woman, who went to such lengths just to get the pig over the fence. That’s a clever, if convoluted and ridiculous, plan thought up by the woman. The pig has every right to be scared, ha ha. Anyways, I really enjoyed this. Keep it up!
ReplyDeleteYou mentioned that this story reminded you of an extreme Rube Goldberg machine, and that's exactly what I was thinking before I read your author's note! It makes me wonder why the author of the original story would go to such 'plot lengths' to get the pig over the stile. I also see what you mean when it comes to how morbid the original story was! I would be terrified as well!
ReplyDeleteThis was a fun and different story! I liked that there was a build up to the exciting ending. I thought it was a good idea to rewrite this story in the diary style because you really got to read all of the pigs feelings and see everything from his perspective. I was not expecting that ending for sure which was nice. I love when stories are surprising in stories! Great job!
ReplyDeleteHi, Chelsea! I read this story earlier this week when I was going back through the portfolios to make my nominations. What a creative way to tell this story from the perspective of the pig (I did this reading unit too!) The whole succession of events sounds even more ludicrous when it is being described by an observer. The poor pig was probably super confused! Great job!
ReplyDeleteChelsea, I have yet to visit your portfolio but it was voted favorite portfolio on the ballot so I thought I would check it out! I chose to read your portfolio post for your week 12 story, “The Pig and the Fence.” The introduction of the story was very good. I was immediately interested because the pig said it was a terrifying day but that he was bought by a sweet old lady. These two descriptions just did not go together at all and I could not wait to continue reading to see what the story unfolded. At first, I also thought that the old lady was going to leave the pig alone in the middle of nowhere. Little did we all know, what the old lady had planned. I got lost in your story when you began to explain the events that occurred. It did not make sense to me that a butcher who had been hung by a robe began to do his job and kill an ox? How did the dead butcher do anything? Reading the author’s note did help clarify a little. I understood that a series of events were to occur in order to get the pig across the fence but was not sure how they exactly worked.
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