Week 4 Story: The Magical Deer
Once upon a time there was a young girl that lived in the forest all by herself. Her name was Penelope and she was so beautiful. Penelope and nothing to her name and scavenged and farmed all that she had. One day, as she was walking through the forest looking for anything to eat she came across a baby deer trapped in a hole. Penelope quickly helped the deer out of the hole and it ran away in fear so she went along picking her berries.
The nest day she is outside of her little house tending to her garden she could see the deer standing afar. She tried getting it to come to her but it would not so she left some food out for it and went inside.
The next morning, she found the deer lying next to the front door when she walked outside and the poor deer just laid there. Penelope gave the deer some more food and water because it looked famished and it scarfed it all down.
The deer continued to stay outside of Penelope's house for a few months and she gave the deer anything it needed or wanted. It got to the point to where she started suffering because the deer at all of her food but, that did not bother her.
A while had passed and one night Penelope was tending to the deer and she heard it speak. She was so astonished and thought she was hallucinating from poor nutrition.
The deer said to her, "I am grateful for your hospitality so what do you wish for?"
"I would love a plentiful garden so I would not have to worry about food," said Penelope.
The next morning Penelope awoke her garden was overflowing with all kinds of fruits and vegetables that she had never even seen before. She quickly thanks the deer and tells the deer that he is welcome at her house forever. But, the deer says that his time with Penelope has came to an end. At this point Penelope is so sad to see the deer go but she is thankful for all that the deer has done for her.
"Before I go please follow me into the forest so I can show you something," said the deer.
They both go off into the forest and sees a pack of deer and grazing but in the middle of the pack there was a pile of treasures waiting for Penelope. The deer demands that she takes all of it in order to show his gratitude for her saving him and taking care of him.
A few years pass and Penelope is tending to her still overflowing garden when she sees a young man approaching her. This man seems to familiar to her but she can not make out who it is until she hears his voice. The young man was the deer that had blessed her.
Penelope and the deer lived happily ever after.
Author's Note: This story was based off of The Fairytale Frog. In the original story a man's father dies and his dying wish is for his son to buy the first thing offered to him at the Passover festival. It ended up being a frog whom he brought back to his family and they took care of this frog no matter the cost and so the frog repaid them with a lifetime of wealth. With my story I wanted to do kind of the same concept but I am a sucker for a happily ever after. I liked the idea of the of deer repaying Penelope for her charity by giving her endless wealth but to me that means true love.
Bibliography: Jewish Fairy Tales and Legends by Gertrude Landa (1919).
Hi Kenzie!
ReplyDeleteYou did a great job on this story. I'm curious to know how Penelope ended up living in the woods. What if you explained in her backstory what happened that led her to live in the woods? Was she running away from trouble and made a hideout there? I was also wondering about her family. Does she have family? Is she living in the woods because of things related to her family, like an unhealthy relationship with them, or have they died?
Another aspect I was curious about was the transformation of the young man. How did the deer turn into a young man? I would think it would involve some sort of magic aspect. Was he cursed and turned into a deer as punishment? Is he himself magical and could voluntarily transform himself whenever he wanted? Another small detail that could help the story would be the quality of his voice, specifically so that Penelope recognized him. Did his voice sound exactly the same as the deer's voice, or was it something more nuanced like an accent he had?
Nice job!
Hi Kenzie! I'm also a sucker for happy endings so I completely understand, and I loved it! When I saw in the author's note that it was based off of a story about the frog, the two stories combined kind of remind me of the princess and the frog. One thing I was curious about was the origins of the deer who turned into a man? How did he or any of the other deer become like that or get out of it, unless they're able to to some sort of shapeshifting at will. I think if you ever chose to elaborate on this story in your final portfolio or storybook, it would be interesting to learn more about the deer people and their story. Not only would it add more depth and meaning to this story, but it could be an entirely different story on its own, like a prequel!
ReplyDeleteHi, Kenzie! As a Disney fan -- I really enjoyed this fairy tale, love story you wrote. It actually gave me vibes of older Disney movies like Snow White and Cinderella where a pure heart got them their happy ending. Penelope is a likable character. She's humble and self-sacrificing with a huge, giving soul that she even gave to the deer when she had so little.
ReplyDeleteOne thing I wasn't sure about was her saving the deer when it was a baby. Does that mean the deer grew up as the story progressed from a fawn to a stag? Also, I was wondering how the deer was able to give her wishes and treasure, but couldn't help himself. Was it a curse?
I was thinking if you wrote more about this story, I'd love to read more about the origin story of the deer. Who or what cursed him? How did he gain magical powers? This story was mainly from Penelope's point of view, and I'd love to see things from the deer's too. Again -- what a romantic story! I enjoyed it a lot.
Hi, Kenzie!
ReplyDeleteWow, I really enjoyed the set-up and uniqueness of your story! I really enjoyed how you incorporated so much detail into your writing. I feel as though most people rush through the early descriptions of their story when setting up the plot and the details, but I feel like you really made sure you set the scene well with the surroundings and characters. What if you added a little more detail to the characters? I think you described them great visually, but maybe adding more background to the story as to how the characters developed and are there in the first place, as well as their overall backstories and their relations to other characters that may be present, or will be present, in your upcoming stories?
I really wonder what else you are going to be able to come up with! With how you set up your stories with imagery and background, I am excited to read your future works.
Great job! Keep it up.
Hi Kenzie!
ReplyDeleteI liked your story a lot overall!
I have to agree that happy endings for fairy tales are really nice, and I wasn't expecting the deer to come back as a man, so that was a fun surprise! I'd been expecting the deer to return to her somehow, but I had thought it would still be a deer when it returned.
I do wonder why the deer decided to change his attitude toward Penelope so quickly though. He seemed rather skittish of her before basically becoming attached to her.
As a little tip from someone who works with a lot of writing, if you read your writing back again to yourself out loud, it can help you spot any typos and help to see if you ended up with any run-on sentences. I know that's helped me a lot to catch things like that. :)
Hi kenzie!
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed reading this story. This was not one that I was familiar with, so it was nice to read something new. The ending of the story really surprised me! i was not expecting him to come back as a deer at the end of the story, and im very curious what happened after they decided to run off together, and also why she lived in the forest in the first place. I wish that we could have had a bit more detail on the section where he comes back as a human. i wonder what she was thinking? was she happy or reluctant to live with him in the forest?
I enjoyed this rendition and it was very creative. The only other piece of advice I have is to spellcheck your work and put it into a word or google doc before to catch any small mistakes.
Great job and keep up the good work!