THE GIRL WHO FARTED
A Swedish Rumpelstiltskin
contributed by Martin Murrell

(From F&F#61 May 2007)

Once upon a time a girl was walking through the woods when suddenly she started to fart. Yes, well, after all, that’s something that can happen to the best of us, can’t it? She began counting her farts: one, two, three, four—altogether there were fifteen!

Just then a young man appeared nearby. He had heard the girl walking along, all on her own, counting as she went, and he was curious to know what it was she’d been counting. He caught her up and asked her. Now there are certain things you can’t tell a handsome young man. But girls are ingenious creatures, and immediately she hit upon an answer. She replied that she’d been reckoning how many skeins of wool she had spun on one and the same day.

“Fifteen skeins,” thought the boy. “Hmm. She must be an extremely capable young woman. She’s the sort one should marry!”

Hardly had he thought this thought than he proposed to her. The girl looked at the young man, his clothes were very fine, and she realised she would really come up in the world if she accepted his proposal. So the girl said yes and they became engaged. The wedding would take place very soon.

But the nearer it came to the wedding day, the sadder and sadder became the girl. That was strange. She should have become happier and happier. But the thing was, the girl had never sat at a spinning wheel in all her life. She hadn’t got a clue how to spin. She realised that one fine day her husband would want to see how good she was at spinning, and then it would all come out that what she’d said had been nothing but lies and deception.

The day before her wedding day the girl was walking in the woods, not knowing whether she was coming or going. She was snuffling and sobbing, and the tears were running down her cheeks.

“Why are you crying, little girl?” a voice suddenly asked.

The girl looked up and saw an old woman, who was so broad in the beam that her backside was as wide as two cowshed doors. The girl explained her situation.

“Is that all it is?” said the old woman. “Then I can help you. If you invite me and my two sisters to your wedding, then everything will be as right as rain. You must just promise to call us mother, aunt and grandma.”

The girl promised.

And so the wedding day arrived. There was a large crowd of guests gathered in the reception room. They ate well and drank plenty. When the party was at its height, there was a knock at the door and in came three old women. Goodness: you should have been there to see them!

The first was so broad in the beam that she needed three chairs in a row to sit down on. The second had such long ears that the lobes reached right down to her shoulders. The third had such long breasts that she had slung them over her shoulders, so they dangled down behind her. People stared at the three, but the girl went up to them and greeted them and bade them sit down. She chatted in a friendly way to them and called them mother, aunt and grandma, just as she had promised. When the bridegroom realised that the three strangely shaped old women were so closely related to his bride, he thought he ought to be polite and chat to them too. He asked the first one why she was so broad in the beam.

“You should know, fine sir, that I got married and had lots of children. To get wool for all the children’s clothes I’ve had to sit at the spinning-wheel day in and day out and spin and spin and spin. You should know, fine sir, that when one sits so much, one’s backside spreads and spreads.”

The startled bridegroom was filled with trepidation.

“My wife’s never going to do any spinning, then,” said the bridegroom.

Then he asked the second old woman why her earlobes reached all the way down to her shoulders.

“You should know, fine sir,” she replied, “that I got married and had lots of children. Day in and day out have I sat and sewn clothes for all my children. It sometimes happened that the needle found its way into my earlobes and pulled them down. Yes, and as I was so hard-working, that actually happened quite often.”

“My wife’s never going to do any sewing, then,” said the bridegroom, appalled.

Then he asked the third old woman why she looked as she did.

“You should know, fine sir, that I got married and had lots of children. Every single day I’ve had to sit at the loom and weave and weave and weave to make cloth for their clothes. So the children wouldn’t get in my way, I slung my breasts over my shoulders, and then the little ones clung to my back as best they could to suckle.

“My wife’s never going to do any weaving, then,” said the bridegroom.

And that’s how it came about that the girl never had to spin or sew or weave. She lived well and enjoyed life to the full. So now you see how useful a few little farts can be!

Note
In the 1880s and 1890s the Swedish author, educationist and social reformer Eva Wigström (1832-1901) published a large number of fairytales and folktales she had collected on her travels all round the province of Scania, in southern Sweden. However, a significant number of those she recorded did not see the light of day until 1985. The present story is among these. It appeared under the title The Three Misshapen Old Women, and while the basic plot is a well-known one throughout the Nordic countries, this particular version, from Ystad, has a number of original, unique features. These are clearly brought out in the version narrated by the Swedish storyteller, author and librarian Per Gustavsson. My own telling in English follows Per’s version very closely, with his permission, and I have adopted his title. In the traditional Aarne-Thompson folktale types classification system the story would be an example of type AT501 The Three Old Women Helpers or The Three Spinstresses.
Translation and note © Martin Murrell, August 2006

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