Jack and the Three Sillies

Description

The narrator says he's only heard one tale about Jack marrying. Jack's wife learns that others are more foolish than he is after he brings home a rock he acquires in a series of foolish trades. Like the young bridegroom in European variants, the wife returns to Jack after traveling to find other sillies; she finds people (both men and women) trying to get the moon's reflection out of a pool, trying to pull a plow themselves instead of using their mule, and trying to get a man's head through a shirt without cutting a neck hole in it. The wife gets money from each of the people she helps. The well-designed illustration repeated at the beginning and end sums up the whole story. Color and black-and-white drawings alternate throughout the book. Description by Tina L. Hanlon, Ferrum College. See http://www.ferrum.edu/applit/bibs/tales/sillies.htm.

First Sentence

Jack?—Why he was a boy lived back in old times. I reckon he lived somewhere here in the mountains. There’s a lot of tales on Jack...

Subjects

Genres

• folktale