Bundles - Stories - Story-Lovers SOS

BUNDLE - BUNDLES
Stories, Folktales, Folklore, Legends, Fairy Tales,
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SOS: SEARCHING OUT STORIES
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	BUNDLE - BUNDLES Stories, Folktales, Folklore, Legends, Fairy Tales, Myths, Nursery Rhymes, Fantasy and Facts Scroll down or click on your choice below • SOS: Searching Out Stories/Info - Bundle - Bundles Advice, Comments and References from Storytellers, Teachers and Librarians Click on illustration for info about Knights of the Dinner Table: Bundle of Trouble, Vol. 1)

SOS: SEARCHING OUT STORIES AND INFORMATION - BUNDLE - BUNDLES
Advice, Comments and References from Storytellers, Teachers and Librarians
(excerpts from Storytell posts plus original research)

Book titles, movie titles and online links are in blue and underlined. Click on them to get more information.
Story and song titles are in quotation marks.
To retell any stories, obtain permission from the copyright holder if the material is not in the public domain.
Posts are added chronologically as they are received by Story Lovers World.

1) Re: Bundles of Troubles, Bundles of Blessings - Allison Cox
http://www.healingstory.org/treasure/bundles/bundles_of_troubles.html
You'll find it in The Bundle Of Sticks (Community version) The Book of Virtues by William Bennett.
Think we're dealing with two stories here. One is the Aesop type story of "in unity is strength" (Bennett) and the other is one Allison cites from a German origin that deals with a concept of "looking at others' troubles makes us realize our own aren't as bad." Both stories stories have value - just different ones.

2) Three short versions here
http://www.tomsdomain.com/aesop/id17.htm
This site has hundreds of fables
http://oaks.nvg.org/re1ra4.html

The Father and His Sons (Aesop)
A father had a family of sons who were perpetually quarrelling among themselves. When he failed to heal their disputes by his exhortations, he determined to give them a practical illustration of the evils of disunion; and for this purpose he one day told them to bring him a bundle of sticks. When they had done so, he placed the faggot into the hands of each of them in succession, and ordered them to break it in pieces. They tried with all their strength, and were not able to do it. He next opened the faggot, took the sticks separately, one by one, and again put them into his sons' hands, on which they broke them easily. He then addressed them in these words: "My sons, if you are of one mind, and unite to assist each other, you will be as this faggot, uninjured by all the attempts of your enemies; but if you are divided among yourselves, you will be broken as easily as these sticks."

3) There's a version of the story in Ooka the Wise: Tales of Old Japan by I.G. Edmonds. It's called Ooka and the Stronger Stick. This book of "wise judge" stories from Japan was also published in paperback by Scholastic under the title Case of the Marble Monster and Other Stories.

4) BUNDLES of sticks, bundles of troubles, bundles of blessings all A. Bundle of sticks stories show: "Strength in numbers," US motto on Great Seal and many US coings - E Pluribus Unum - Latin means one out of many, Kwanzaa principle of Umoja (unity).1) Bundle of Sticks - Unity story
http://www.tomsdomain.com/aesop/id17.htm

5) It's a unity story with arrows in one of Joseph Bruchac's book Iroquois Stories.

6) Try as Reeds of Strength - use reeds instead of sticks - A father is dying and does not want his three sons to drift towards disharmony after he has passed away. He is going to give each a share of the estate, each part is quite nice and valuable by itself, but the greater wealth comes from cooperative working. (It's a farm setting.)

7) Another variation suggested on Storytell was to use bits of easily broken string. Then weave or braid them together to show strength of woven rope.

8) Bundle of Troubles, Bundles of Blessings - "One usually chooses own troubles over others."

9) The Trouble Tree, by P. Schram's book Chosen Tales: Stories Told by Jewish Storytellers. In it, the "Pekl Story" is about a pekl--Yiddish for a small bundle--which shrinks when the woman involved sees that every woman in the shtetl has packed a pekl of her problems and they're all ones that she doesn't want. Her own pekl, at the end, is smaller than the one she brought.

10) One story of this sort is "Bundles of worries, bundles of blessings," from Ruthilde Kronberg's and Particia C. McKissack's A Piece of the Wind and Other Stories to Tell (1990). Less than two pages in the book, it is about a woman who feels bogged down with her worries, and a friends says, "Take your troubles to God and don't despair." There unfolds a story that worry bags are on your left shoulder, but that blessing bags are on the right one.

Created 2003; last update 7/16/09

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