Week 2 Story: The Naive Little Rabbit
*NOTE* This story can now be found on my portfolio, which can be found here.
Once upon a time there was a young, naive rabbit. He had soft white fur that quivered when he was cold or frightened.
One day while he was lying under a tall tree, he began to think about the worse of things. His brother had told him long ago there was an earthquake that killed almost all of the animals.
He wondered out loud, "Oh, what would I do if the earth were to suddenly start to shake and quiver and break?"
A mischievous little monkey in the tree above heard the young white rabbit's worries. The monkey found a large coconut growing on the tree, and threw it down as hard as he could behind the little white rabbit.
BOOM.
The ground shook like an earthquake, and the little white rabbit squealed and quivered and shouted "The earth is quaking! The earth is breaking!" He had not seen the mischievous monkey's coconut joke.
The naive little rabbit began to run and run and run as fast as he could away from where he thought
the earth was splitting.
Another young rabbit saw him running and quickly caught up to him.
"Rabbit, rabbit, why do you run so fast?"
"The earth is quaking! The earth is breaking! Run fast or else the quaking will kill us all!"
This terrified the other young rabbit and so he began to run with the naive little rabbit.
A little bear saw the two rabbits running. She caught up with them and asked, "little rabbits, little rabbits, why do you run?"
"The earth is quaking! The earth is breaking! Run fast or else the quaking will kill us all!"
The little bear was scared of their warning, and began to run fast with the little rabbits.
Before long, hundred of foxes, deer, pigs, and other animals joined them. No one wanted to be caught in the quaking.
An old lioness saw the mob of animals. She roared, "Stop young ones and old ones! For what causes you all to run so?"
"The earth is quaking! The earth is breaking! We must run fast before the quaking kills us all!"
"Who has seen this breaking and quaking of the earth?" She asked.
The animals all looked around trying to find the original runner. At long last, a quivering little white rabbit came forth.
"I did, lioness. I was sitting beneath a tree and suddenly the earth began to shake, so I began to run and found these friends along the way."
The lioness looked down at the little white rabbit and said softly, "Show me where you first saw the earth break."
So all the animals ran back to the beginning, to the tree that the little white rabbit had mentioned. Once there, the lioness circled the tree and found the large coconut the mischievous little monkey had thrown. It was split down the middle and cracked opened wide. She picked up a piece of the coconut and showed it to the naive little rabbit.
"See, little rabbit? It was nothing at all but a coconut that startled you. It is always best if you check what you believe is true, otherwise you may cause trouble for the ones around you," she said as she looked from the little rabbit to the hundred of animals that he had gathered in his run.
If it hadn't been for the lioness's wisdom, all of the naive animals could still be running to this day.
**AUTHOR'S NOTE**
The original story told that the rabbit was resting against a tree when a monkey threw down a coconut and startled him. He then ran and ran while telling any animal that questioned his running that "The earth is all breaking up!" Eventually, a king lion asks the mob of animals why they are running, and the rabbit tells him about hearing the earth breaking all up. Only the lion and the rabbit go to the tree and find that it was just the sound of a coconut. The lion calls him foolish and the rabbit quickly goes to tell the other animals what it was. This story originally had all male animals. I wanted to change the lion to an old lioness, because I feel that older, female animals have a more wise and graceful presence. The story originally called the naive little rabbit a timid, foolish rabbit. I didn't really like that they called him foolish so I changed it to a naive little rabbit because younger people and animals usually don't know any better. I also wanted all the animals to go and see it for themselves because I feel that "seeing is believing."
*Bibliography*
The Foolish, Timid Rabbit by Ellen C. Babbit, From the Jakata Tales
(The little rabbit, Pixabay)
(A resting lioness. Pixabay)
Cheyenne, I really enjoyed your take on this story! I almost wrote about this one but changed my mind last minute, so I liked that I got to see how someone else took it and ran with it! I think that your changes are really admirable because I too did not like that they called him foolish. Your use of descriptive language was really strong, and it helped the story come to life! I think I need to incorporate more of that into my stories as the weeks progress. Great job!
ReplyDeleteHi Cheyenne! I love your vivid description and imagery. I can imagine the scene really well. I also enjoyed that break in the paragraph when you added the onomatopoeia. The dialogue is also amazing and well organized into paragraphs by the character that they’re bringing along on their escape. I like how you changed the story because I felt bad for the rabbit too.
ReplyDeleteHey Cheyenne, I liked your version of the story. It makes sense to me that lioness would correct the little rabbit compared to the king lion. I liked how you brought all the animals in the end instead of just rabbit and lion going to check on the original tree. Your story was also very descriptive and detailed and I love those little added bits in the story. This story also has a good lesson and it is always good to check on something before you actually commit to it. Dialogue between the characters were also great and matched really well with the original story. Keep up the good work!
ReplyDeleteWow Cheyenne, I liked your dialogue and the imagery you used. I really enjoyed the Boom effect giving me as the reader a view as what is happening in the rabbits world. I also liked the gender swap with the lion to the lioness.
ReplyDeleteI wonder if any of the animals were angry with the rabbit for being so scared and causing such an uproar.
What if on the way back to the coconut tree there was a legitimate small earthquake, not a large one. Just big enough to put a crack in the ground that wasn't there before, just for humor of making it seem like the rabbit was right.
Hi Cheyenne! Great job on your story, I really liked the minute changes that you made throughout the story. While it was similar to the original, the changes that you made made the story yours and added more depth that the original. Having all of the animals come up to the place where the rabbit says there was an earthquake is very interesting and different. I would typically think that they would be too scared to go to the 'source' of the earthquake, but the way you told the story made it seem like they would go. Maybe putting another animal besides the Rabbit as the dunce could add more originality to the story. An animal such as a squirrel would be new because I haven't seen many stories so far in this class about squirrels. Great job on your story I look forward to reading more throughout the semester.
ReplyDelete