Grimm’s Complete Fairy Tales: Sweet Porridge
“There was a poor but good little girl who lived alone with her mother, and they no longer had anything to eat.”
Sweet Porridge is a silly and sort of sad little tale; I say little because it’s around one-hundred words, and sad because of the implications my adult brain recognizes. It’s about a little girl who meets an old woman in the forest. The old woman sensed the little girl’s sorrow and gave her a pot, which cooks and stops cooking porridge on command. One day, the little girl goes out and her mother asks the pot to cook, but doesn’t know the word “stop” so the porridge fills the house, the street, and the town. Before it overwhelmed the last house in the town, the little girl arrives and tells the pot to stop, “and whosoever wished to return to the town had to eat his way back.”
I’m not sure there’s a direct lesson or message of this tale – maybe don’t talk to random old people in the forest? But Sweet Porridge is a cute story, nonetheless.
Up Next:
Extras:
- Notes from the Grimm brothers translated by Margaret Hunt and compiled by SurLaLune Household Tales
9 Comments
You Can Always Start Now
I think the lesson is make sure you know all the instructions before you use the product!!!
kmac14
Haha that’s a good one!
Anonymous
You usually tell this story in the beginning of a school year to kindergarten children. It’s teaches them the power of the word “stop” which is very important for them to know how to tell their peers when something is too much.
Kelsey @ There's Something About KM
Love that!
Denzil TheBookOwl
What is sweet porridge I wonder? Mind you, I eat porridge every day (and I mean EVERY day), with a wee bit of sugar. But I wouldn’t call it sweet porridge. I remember holidaying in Scotland and being given porridge with salt in it. Heavens alive!
kmac14
Aaah, I don’t know much about porridge so I assumed this was just a type of porridge. Although now I’m thinking it was added to the fairy tale for ironic purposes…interesting.
fancypaperblog
My girls love this one. It put me off porridge as a child though!!
Kelsey
I can understand that! haha
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