I just did a unit on Stone Soup: Bone Button Borscht by Aubrey Davis, Dusan Petricic (Illustrator) (Kids Can Press, 2002) has beggar who not only brings together a town to make borscht but gets brass buttons to replace his bone ones, which the townspeople need to make more borscht. (They eventually learn how to make it without the buttons.)
Potato Pancakes All Around: A Hannukah Tale by Marilyn Hirsh has a beggar who makes latkes for a family out of a crust of bread. And of course there are the Hershel Ostropoler stories like: The Adventures of Hershel of Ostropol by Eric A. Kimmel, Trina Schart Hyman (Illustrator); Holiday House; (October 1995). Also some Chelm stories involve trickery. Finally, there's "Benny's Luck," in Holiday Tales by Sholom Aleichem: Stories of Chanukah, Passover, & Other Jewish Holidays; selected and translated by Aliza Shevrin, illustrated by Thomas di Grazia; Atheneum 1979. I think it's supposed to be funny that Benny wins all the other boys' money with his special dreydl; I found it horrifying. Benny reminds me of what Harry Lime in Graham Greene's The Third Man must have been like as child. Of course, there are plenty more trickster tales in Jewish folktale collections. Trickery is a way for people without power to triumph. Jokebooks might be another interesting source. Not all tricksters are bad. Some help people as a byproduct of helping themselves and some even use trickery in order to help others. Elijah stories, where a poor stranger helps someone needy and then disappears, involve trickery if only because the "poor stranger" is in fact none other than Elijah the Prophet! I would be interested in knowing what your teacher uses and does. Enjoy! Rose Myers Edith Scheinberg Library Hillel Academy Fairfield, CT 203-374-6147 (call me if you want to talk about stories) =========================================================== Submissions for Ha-Safran, send to: Hasafran at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu SUBscribing, SIGNOFF commands send to: Listproc at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu Questions, problems, complaints, compliments;-) send to: galron.1 at osu.edu AJL HomePage http://www.JewishLibraries.org
