Goats, Trolls, & Numbskulls A Middle School Lecture on Folklore Genres with Lise Lunge-Larsen Sample Preparation and ASL Interpretations by Doug Bowen-Bailey License Info | Table of Contents | Overview | Your Assignment | Preparation | English Lectures | Sample Interpretations | Transcripts of English Lectures | Interpreter Notes | Building Involvement in ASL | Credits

Transcript of Talking Animals Genre

Back to Lectures

The next one is the talking animals, stories like The Three Pigs, or The Three Bears, or Henny Penny, Goosey Loosey, and all of those kinds, the Brer Rabbit stories, the Ananzi stories … my very favorite one which all of you ought to know, but I don't know if I've told it to you … If I have, I haven't told it for so many years, I'm going to do it anyway, is the story of the Three Billy Goats Gruff. (Pause) You must have. I know you have. It's very short so I have time.

Once upon a time, a long, long time ago in a far, far away country called Norway there lived three goats and the name of all three goats was The Billy Goats Gruff. Now these goats had a huge problem because in order to go up into the mountains to get grass, which is nice and juicy up there, they had to go across the bridge. And underneath this bridge lived the most hideous troll you have ever laid your eyes on. He was a huge, enormous creature with eyes as big as pewter plates and a nose as long as a poker. But there was no way around it. Across the bridge they had to go.

So the first one to go across the bridge was the teeniest and the tiniest of the three little goatsand when he walked across the bridge he made a teeny tiny noise like this, “trip,trap, trip, trap …”

“WHO'S STEPPING OVER MY BRIDGE?” roared the troll.

“I-I-it's o-only me, I'm the t-teeniest, tiniest of the three little billy goats and I'm on my way up into the mountains to get f-f-fat.”

“WELL, I'M GOING TO COME AND GOBBLE YOU UP NOW!” roared the troll.

“P-please, d-don't eat me up. Wh-why don't you w-wait a little while ‘til my brother comes. He's really a lot bigger and f-f-fatter than I am.”

“ALL RIGHT THEN!” roared the troll. And off ran that little goat as fast as he could go.

Now the next one to go across the bridge was the second of the three goats. And when he walked across the bridge he made a sound like this, he went “Trip, Trap. Trip, trap.”

“WHO'S STEPPING OVER MY BRIDGE?” roared the troll.

“Ho-ho-hit's only me, I-I'm the second of the three b-billy goats and I'm on my way up into the mountains to get f-f-fat.”

“WELL I'M GOING TO COME AND GOBBLE YOU UP NOW” roared the troll.

“Oh, please don't eat me. Why don't you wait a little while until my b-b-big brother comes? He's really a lot bigger and f-fatter and t-t-t-tastier too.”

“ALL RIGHT THEN!” roared the troll. And off ran that little goat as fast as he could go.

Now the next one to go across the bridge was the biggest of the three goats. He was just huge. His fur was shimmering and shining and he had these two gigantic horns in front of his head and he was so heavy that when he walked across the bridge, it sounded like thunder. And it went “TRIP, TRAP, TRIP, TRAP, TRIP … “WHO'S STEPPING OVER MY BRIDGE?” roared the troll. “It's me. I'm the biggest of the three Billy Goats Gruff and I'm on my way up into the mountains to get fat.”

“WELL, I'M GOING TO COME AND GOBBLE YOU UP NOW” said the troll.

“Well, why don't you come along. I've got two spears, with those I'll poke out your eyeball and ears. I've got two curly stones with those I'll break your body and bones. And he went at that troll and he broke every bone in his body and poked his eyes out and he shoved him way down into the river. And then he went with his brothers up into the mountains where they ate and got so big and so fat that if the fat hasn't fallen off them yet, why, they're still there.

Snipp snapp snute her er eventyret ute! All right! You're doing good.

So what kinds of movies or TV shows do you have that are about talking animals today? (Inaudible student response) Okay, what else? Think of all those Disney movies? Bambi, Lion King, Beauty and the Beast … yeah, that's more, yeah, we'll get to that one. No,not the Cinderella... those are not just talking animals.

Think of … Winnie the Pooh? That's...that's talking toys. That's called a fantasy. And the difference is they're based on a book which has a known author. So those are not out of the oral tradition. Remember the difference is author versus no author. All folk tales have no known author that we know about. So good observation but they belong in the literary fantasy genre, not in the traditional folk tale. Because Winnie the Pooh is written by A.A. Milne, remember?

What's the one with the dog and the cat that disappeared over the mountains you know and got lost and all that stuff... “Homeward Bound!” that was a good example. There's a million Disney movies based on exactly that kind of a theme. So that's a very popular one

Back to Lectures