BY LOUIS GINZBERG - "THE LEGENDS OF THE JEWS VOLUME III BIBLE TIMES AND CHARACTERS"

Standish O'Grady - "Early Bardic Literature, Ireland. "

A. M. Barnard - "The Abbot's Ghost, Or Maurice Treherne's Temptation"

Robert Green Ingersoll - "The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Volume VIII."

Editorial
This paper argues that discourses of love in Ghanaian market literature for youth offer a view into complex negotiations of agency and empowerment. Drawing on Deborah Durham's notion of youth as "social `shifters'" and Francis Nyamnjoh's conception of the "interconnectedness" of agency, I take Ghanaian market literature as one specific case of how African literature for youth foregrounds questions of continuity and change as African societies enter into increasingly complex global relations. In this literature for youth, received notions of love, often constructed out of impressions from American pop and hip hop music, carry new notions of agency that compete with existing "domesticated" forms. Authors like Ike Tandoh and Evelyn Tay employ discourses of love to offer youth alternative avenues for empowerment in a context of socio-economic disenfranchizement. In a creative process of "straddling", this writing both reveals and reproduces the contradictions that obtain in youth configurations of agency.

Roumanian Fairy Tales

V >> Various >> Roumanian Fairy Tales




The whirlwinds returned to Holy Friday and told her about the veil.
Holy Friday was now not only half-angry, but wholly enraged, so she
sent the whirlwinds to the emperor's court to tell Petru he must
intercede with the Fairy Aurora and promise to do whatever she asked,
that light might return to the world. The whirlwinds set out
again--this time somewhat more slowly and peacefully, as people depart
when engaged on a good errand to a friendly person. They reached the
palace. Petru was not there. The whirlwinds began to act somewhat
more willfully. Petru had perished on the way. The whirlwinds circled
around the palace from the left, then from the right, then from the
center, turned it, twisted it, raised it, and hurled it, till there
was nothing left of it. Then they returned to Holy Friday's hut with
the news of Petru's death.

"Go into the world, every one of you, move every thing that can be
moved, and find Petru. Bring him to me dead or alive!" said Holy
Friday, after she had heard the sad tidings.

For three days and three nights the whirlwinds did not stop blowing.
Thrice they uprooted trees, drove the rivers from their beds,
dispersed the clouds by beating them against the rocks, swept the
bottom of the sea and destroyed the surface of the earth. It was all
in vain. They came back to the house, each one more tired, angry and
mortified than the other.

Only one still lingered: the Spring wind, the soft, lazy, warm Spring
wind. What had become of him? They all knew that he could not have
accomplished much. Who knows? Weary as he was, he had perhaps lain
down somewhere in the shade. Nobody troubled his head any more about
him. Suddenly, after a short time, when all were racking their brains
to discover Petru, the leaves began to stir gently.

Holy Friday felt the soft air, and went out. "What news do you bring?"
she asked the favorite of all the winds.

"Sad, very sad, yet good,"--whispered the young wind. "After I grew
tired of so much searching, destroying, and pulling, I reached an
empty well, and, being rid of my brothers, thought I would rest a
while before setting off for home."

"And you found Petru at the bottom of the well?" cried Holy Friday,
joyfully.

"Yes, and the bay by his side."

"May your speech be sweet, your breezes soft, and may you ever bring
good tidings!" said Holy Friday; then she commanded him to hasten to
Holy Thursday and tell her she must be ready with the gold crucible,
for Petru was in a sad case:--from there the Spring wind was to rush
to Holy Wednesday and tell her she must come to the well with the
water of life. "Do you understand?" said Holy Friday. "And go as fast
as you can," and they all set off together.

They reached the deserted well. There was nothing left of Petru except
bones and ashes. Holy Wednesday took the bones and fitted them
together--not a single one was missing. Holy Friday ordered the
whirlwinds to search the bottom of the well, turn up all the dust, and
collect Petru's ashes. This was done. Holy Thursday made a fire,
gathered the dew from the flowers into the gold crucible, and set it
on the flames. When the water began to boil, Holy Wednesday repeated
three spells, looked once to the east, once to the west, once to the
north, and once to the south, and threw the herb of life into the
boiling water. Holy Friday did the same with Petru's ashes. Holy
Thursday counted one, two, three, and took the crucible off the fire.
Petru's ashes and the herb of life were made into a fragrant salve.
The Spring wind blew upon it once and stiffened it, then Petru's
bones were smeared with it seven times from head to foot, seven times
from foot to head, seven times across one way, and seven times across
the other, and, when this was done, up sprang the hero, a hundred
thousand times handsomer, braver, and prouder than before.

"Jump on the horse!" said Holy Friday.

As soon as the bay felt his master on his back, he began to neigh and
stamp. The animal was more spirited than ever.

"Where shall we go?" the horse asked gayly.

"Home," replied Petru.

"How shall we ride?"

"Like a curse."

Petru expressed his thanks for the service done him, and set off; he
rode and rode as fleetly as a curse flies, till he came to the
emperor's court.

Nothing was left of the palace except the ground where it had stood.
No trace of any human being who could have uttered a word or given any
tidings was to be found. At last old Birscha came out of a ruined
cellar. Petru learned what had happened and its cause, turned his bay,
and went back even more swiftly than he had come. He did not even stop
to take breath until he reached the Fairy Aurora's kingdom. The time
that had passed since every thing had been in the condition the queen
had commanded, can not be told in words. It must have been a long
period.

When Petru reached the bridge the sun had only three bright rays,
seven warm, and nine cold ones left; all the others had gradually been
lost.

The Fairy Aurora felt that some remarkable person must be coming, for
it seemed just as it had done when she woke from the dream that had
made her so sad. She was longing for something, she knew not what,
just as she had then.

"Who is coming?" she asked in a low tone.

"Hold firmly, master," said the bay.

Petru struck in the spurs, drew the bridle, and felt nothing until he
was on the other side of the bridge.

"The hero is coming! _Over_ the bridge!" cried the guards, waving
their hats in the air.

The Fairy Aurora did not stir nor speak.

Petru suddenly rushed up to her, clasped her in his arms, and kissed
her--just as fairy princes always kiss bewitching fairies.

The lovely fairy queen felt as she had never felt before. She said
nothing more, asked no more questions, but made a sign to have the bay
led into the stables of the sun, and entered the palace with Petru.

The fairies began to smile merrily, the flowers to smell sweetly, the
springs to pour forth clear waters, the winds to blow cheerily, the
wheel of life whirled faster than a top, the black veil fell, and the
radiant sun rose high in the heavens, higher than it had ever done
before. And in the world there was a light like the sun's, so that for
nine years, nine months, and nine days it was so terribly bright that
nothing could be seen.

Petru rode home, brought back his old father and mother, had a wedding
so magnificent that tidings of it spread through ninety-nine
countries, and became emperor of both kingdoms.

His brothers, Florea and Costan, had their sight restored so that they
might witness Petru's happiness.

This, dear children, was the story of handsome Prince Petru and the
Fairy Aurora, queen of the Land of the Sun.

Petru lived and reigned in peace and health, and who knows whether, by
God's help, he may not be reigning still.

[THE END.]

* * * * *


BY THE

_QUEEN OF ROUMANIA_.

PILGRIM SORROW

A CYCLE OF TALES. TRANSLATED BY HELEN ZIMMERN. SQUARE 16MO. $1.50.

"Like a string of amber beads, each one exquisite by itself,
but seen in perfection when connected with its fellows. They
imprison nymphs of the wood, and naiads of the stream, and
all the sweet and tender graces of nature which she reveals
only to her devoted lovers."--_Pittsburgh Times_.

"The heart experiences of a princess and queen who is also a
true and noble woman."--_Cincinnati Commercial Gazette_.

"The charming tales are full of beautiful thought and
sentiment, and scarcely lack the metrical form to be true
poetry."--_Providence Journal_.

"Wholly attractive and interesting--beautifully
printed."--_Boston Gazette_.

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