Reading Notes: Twenty-Two Goblins (B)

Title: The Four Brothers
Author: Arthur Ryder
Link: Story link.

Plot:

• Four brothers move to a small village when the family trust fund is depleted.
• The first brother attempts suicide, but is talked out of it by a passerby.
• The brothers decide that seeking virtuous sciences will give their lives meaning.
• They research and master the necessary skills to resurrect animals.
• Looking to practice their newly found skills, they wander into the forest and find the skeleton of a lion.
• They don't realize that it's a lion skeleton, despite covering it with the "appropriate" lion fur and claws and whatnot.
• The lion comes to life and kills all of them.
• King Triple-Victory decides that the final brother -- who breathed life into the lion -- is most to blame. His reasoning? The others didn't realize they were building a lion. Even though they were covering it with lion parts. And making it look like a lion.
• King Triple-Victory may have a lot of victories, but he leaves something to be desired between the ears.

Illustration by Perham Nahl. Source: Project Gutenberg.

Setting:

• Flower-city, a mythical kingdom somewhere in India. Hometown of the four brothers.
• Sacrifice, an ominously-titled village where the brothers move to after the family money runs out.

Characters:

• Four brothers: They set out after relatives take all their money and decide to pursue the sciences.
• They unwittingly resurrect a lion, and pay the price for their foolishness.

Writing Style:

• The other defining quality of the Twenty-Two Goblins piece is that it's a frame tale. I like the idea of a frame tale for the same reason that I chose to do a portfolio over a storybook: Variety is the spice of life, and frame tales lend themselves beautifully to varied stories. With a basic structure established, the author is free to fill the gaps in between with whatever characters, themes and plots s/he wishes. Frame tales are for authors with commitment issues -- you aren't locked down to a single storyline.