Unter dem Odongbaum: Koreanische Sagen, Märchen und Fabeln

Abstract

One of four sections of this book from the old DDR is devoted to fables: Kwon Kerang: Der Dorfschulmeister: Koreanische Fabeln (100-132). There is a narrative frame-story here of the poor rural schoolmaster telling his pupils stories. They are a mixture of well-known traditional Western stories and others which I read here for the first time. Thus the first, Fox and Bear, substitutes a bear where we usually have a goat. The fox lures the bear into his pit and then uses him to get out. Hund und Fuchs bei Gericht has the ape weighing the supposedly unequal portions of what he is dividing for the two claimants. Das Urteil des Hasen (105), Der Dumme Bär (110), Wie der Storch den Prozess Entscheidet (112), and Der Kranke Tiger (130) are further traditional stories well known -- though often with different characters -- among Western fables. Perhaps as an interlude among the stories there are several songs (113-15). The other stories in this section seem to get into more complicated plots than are usual in fables.