Once upon a time, in the rainforest of the amazon, there lived a frog.
This frog slept through the day and lived out his nights hopping to and
from, eating flies and playing games with his fellow frogs, as did so
many other frogs living in the rainforest. Each frog of the forest knew,
however, that when daylight approached their games were to end, for the
predators that lurked in the rainforest were sure to awaken.
One day, as all the frogs were winding down and preparing for rest, the Frog realized that he had left his glasses out while playing.
"Drats! If I don't go get my glasses now, I may never find them!" said the Frog to himself. "If I hurry I should make it back before daylight."
The Frog quickly dashed into the forest and retrieved his glasses, but he had taken too long; the sun was appearing on the horizon. Just then, the Frog heard rustling from the trees beside him, and soon appeared a large and ferocious tiger.
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(Emerald Glass Frog: Wikimedia Commons)
"Why, hello there little frog. I think you'll make a fine snack on this beautiful morning." said the Tiger, inching his way closer to the Frog.
"Wait!" yelled the frog. "I'm ah.. I'm.. I'm the king of all the frogs! I can do anything and beat anyone!"
"Is that so, little frog?" questioned the Tiger. "Tell me, can you beat me in a race? Can those tiny legs of yours carry you faster than these great haunches of mine?"
"Of course they can!" replied the Frog. "I'll race you straight to the tree trunk down there!"
"Very well." said the Tiger. "On the count of three. One.. Two.. Three!"
On the count of three, the Tiger set off at a rapid speed. The Frog, knowing that he could not beat the Tiger in a flat out sprint, instead jumped and grabbed the Tiger's tail in his mouth.
When the Tiger arrived at the tree trunk, he glanced around and found no sign of the Frog in sight.
"Hah!" laughed the Tiger. "I outpaced him so much he's not even in sight."
"Over here!" said the Frog. "What took you so long?"
The Tiger turned around, startled to see the Frog sitting before him. The Frog spit down in front of the Tiger, cleaning out the fur that had stuck in his mouth from the Tiger's tail.
"That fur, how did you get that in your mouth?" questioned the Tiger.
"That uh.. that's from a Tiger I ate just yesterday!"
Afraid of the Frog's apparent strength and speed, the Tiger ran off into the forest to never be seen by the frog again.
Author's Note: This story is based on The Tiger and the Frog from Tibetan Folk Tales by A.L. Shelton. This story tells of a hungry tiger who one day comes across a small frog. The Tiger's first instinct is to gobble the frog up, but the frog declares that he is king of all frogs, saying that he can jump any distance and do anything. This frog challenges the Tiger to a contest as to who can jump across a nearby river. The frog bites onto the tigers tail and uses him to jump across the river. When they get to the other side, the frog tricks the tiger by spitting up his own fur and claiming he had eaten a tiger the day before. Scared, the tiger runs away.
I like your retelling of this story. I thought the introduction of the frogs playing at night but knowing they had to stop in the morning to stay safe was well written. The dialogue was also good. I loved how you made the frog have pauses like "uh" and such while he thinks of the best way to save himself from the tiger.
ReplyDeleteCody, it is amazing how many ways the simple "Tortoise and the Hare" type of story can be told. This is almost exactly like that story. But I loved your retelling of it, as it is always fun to see how the cunning & slower animal will out-smart the faster animal. I also loved the graphic you used for this story - very eye catching!
ReplyDeleteOverall, your story was very well-told, easy to follow, and interesting!! Great job!
Cody,
ReplyDeleteI read this story last week. My thought was that the tiger was really dimwitted. Why would he humor the frog at all? Why challenge him to a race? Even if the frog was the king of the frogs, if the tiger were to just eat him, that would be that. The frog really pulled a fast one on him. I liked your retelling of the story, though.
I liked the whimsical way you chose to tell this story. Even though the tiger was threatening to eat the frog, the story felt very lighthearted to me because the tiger was so gullible. I liked the character of the frog because he thought he was so clever, but really his excuses didn't really make any sense. The whole story made me smile.
ReplyDeleteFirst off, I think this story is very clever and I like how you stuck to the original pretty closely. You switched the setting a little bit from a river to running in the forest, but keeping the same principle of the story was smart. I think it allowed you to keep the central theme of the story and it is a pretty funny one that I enjoyed. Secondly, your dialogue throughout was written perfectly! I never found myself confused as to who was saying what or what was going on. The punctuation and grammar seemed flawless, which I know is hard to do sometimes with dialogue. So, great job!
ReplyDeleteI love the quick thinking on the frog's part at the end! What a clever way to use a pivot out of a potential reveal of a bluff. In fact, I love to see cleverness used in stories, and I think you used it pretty well here. The frog must have quite the poker face to pull it off right in the tiger's face.
ReplyDelete