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Reading Notes: Japanese Fairy Tales Part A

The Maiden with the Wooden Helmet
(Wooden Bowls from Wikipedia Commons)
Plot: A man and a wife lived in a village with their beautiful daughter. The family was once rich but lost its fortune over time. This makes the man very sad and he dies. The mother and her daughter made their way together. The mother noticed her daughter was getting more and more beautiful. This worried her as she knew the dangers beautiful girls have to worry about. She caught a cold and on her death bed asked her daughter to wear a wooden helmet which obscured her face. The girl agreed and the mother died. The girl gets a job working in the fields for a rich landowner. The other workers taunt her for wearing the helmet. One day the landowner's son comes home and sees the girl washing her face in a stream and falls desperately in love. He asks her to marry him every day. The girl refuses every day even though she likes him because she doesn't want to cause tensions. Her mother comes to her in a dream and tells her to marry him. She accepts him the next day and they have a beautiful ceremony. At the reception, her helmet falls off and cracks on the ground revealing precious stones. They live a prosperous life.

Lesson: This story is about listening to your elders. It's also about not judging someone on something as simple as a helmet one chooses to wear.

Ideas: I like the idea of a basic retelling of this story. I would probably keep the setting the same but change from a helmet to something else.

Story Source: From The Violet Fairy Book by Andrew Lang.
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  1. Bianca MFebruary 19, 2019 at 9:45 AM

    Hello, Meghan!

    I would like to begin by saying thank you for your reading notes on Japanese Fairy Tales. I am seriously curious to know if the wooden bowls that the maiden with the wooden helmet used really look similar to the actual wooden helmet! Once again, I really appreciate the fact that you include a little lesson at the end of your notes!

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