The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales.Written by: Jon Scieszka. Illustrated by: Lane Smith. Genre: Traditional book. Pages: 52. Copyright:1992.
If you like seeing traditional fairy tales get flipped upside down and twirled all around, then this is a great story for you! Join Jack as he takes you along a path of fairly stupid tales involving The Stinky Cheese Man, The Really Ugly Duckling, Chicken Licken, Little Red Running Shorts and so many others! Find out what kind of high jinx they get up to and if in the end, they all live happily ever after.
Summary:
This is a non traditional take on traditional fairy tales that have been told through out generations. It has a very unique style to it that breaks the normal conventions of story telling. The story is narrated by Jack, of Jack and the Bean Stalk fame, and he has quite the hard time staying on task. Constantly being interrupted by Little Red Hen and a pesky Giant. Each "fairly stupid tale" takes on it's own twist that always has an abrupt and often deadly end. The first story, "Chicken Licken" is Scieszka's version of Chicken Little. In this tale, all the animals hop on a plane to tell the president that the sky is falling. At the airport they are met by a devious fox who takes them to the cave to eat them. Unfortunately for them all, he is unable to eat them because the Table of Contents falls and crushes them all.
"The Princess and the Bowling Ball" is his version of The Princess and the Pea. In this story, after three years, the impatient Prince who has met the Princess of his dreams, swaps a bowling ball for the pea, she feels it, and they get married and live happily ever after.
"The Really Ugly Duckling" never becomes a beautiful swan, instead, he just becomes a really ugly duck.
"The Other Frog Prince" was never a Prince, just a frog who tricks a Princess into giving him a kiss.
"Little Red Running Shorts" beats the wolf to Grandmas house but the narrator Jack beats them both to the story telling so in they become annoyed and refuse to tell the story and storm off.
It is during "Jack's Bean Problem" that we are introduced to a very cranky Giant. The two of them argue for a while over the story and it never really goes anywhere and ends up enraging the Giant who was insistent about having a good story read to him.
"Cinderumpelstiltskin" is a mash up of Cinderella and Rumplestiltskin. In this story however, Cinderella doesn't get any favors, never goes to the ball, still has to clean the house, and receives an unfortunate nickname in the process.
"The Tortoise and the Hair" is the tale of a Tortoise who runs continuously at his pace while the Rabbit just grows more and more hair.
"The Stinky Cheese Man"is the story of a stinky cheese man that no one wants to chase because he smells so bad. Eventually he gets dunked in a river and falls apart.
The final part of the book involves the Little Red Hen and her last ditch attempt to tell her story. The problem is she wakes up the sleeping Giant with her squawking and he eats her.
The End.
My Assessment:
It is not often that I have said this but this book was really not for me. I didn't get it. I hate to use this word but, I felt it was beyond stupid. In all fairness, the title of the book suggests as much I just didn't think that it would really be the case. I knew from the beginning though that I was not going to like it only because I take issue with children using the term stupid so loosely and the title here does just that. I didn't think that this was a positive book for children. That being said, it has received numerous amounts of praise and I have a feeling that boys would really like it. I did think it was cleaver how he had the narrator come back and forth through out the book, it made it read a bit more like a conversation. I also liked the Little Red Hen's consistency.
Teaching Tips:
In all honesty, this is not a book that I will use in my classroom. I think that there is just too much negativity in it and name calling and I would rather not expose my students to that since I can avoid it.
What I Loved the Most:
The drawings may have been one of the best things about this book. They were very clever and helped illustrate what the story was going for. My favorite part was probably the Little Red Hen popping up thorough out the story. Its only a shame that she was eaten at the end.
If you like seeing traditional fairy tales get flipped upside down and twirled all around, then this is a great story for you! Join Jack as he takes you along a path of fairly stupid tales involving The Stinky Cheese Man, The Really Ugly Duckling, Chicken Licken, Little Red Running Shorts and so many others! Find out what kind of high jinx they get up to and if in the end, they all live happily ever after.
Summary:
This is a non traditional take on traditional fairy tales that have been told through out generations. It has a very unique style to it that breaks the normal conventions of story telling. The story is narrated by Jack, of Jack and the Bean Stalk fame, and he has quite the hard time staying on task. Constantly being interrupted by Little Red Hen and a pesky Giant. Each "fairly stupid tale" takes on it's own twist that always has an abrupt and often deadly end. The first story, "Chicken Licken" is Scieszka's version of Chicken Little. In this tale, all the animals hop on a plane to tell the president that the sky is falling. At the airport they are met by a devious fox who takes them to the cave to eat them. Unfortunately for them all, he is unable to eat them because the Table of Contents falls and crushes them all.
"The Princess and the Bowling Ball" is his version of The Princess and the Pea. In this story, after three years, the impatient Prince who has met the Princess of his dreams, swaps a bowling ball for the pea, she feels it, and they get married and live happily ever after.
"The Really Ugly Duckling" never becomes a beautiful swan, instead, he just becomes a really ugly duck.
"The Other Frog Prince" was never a Prince, just a frog who tricks a Princess into giving him a kiss.
"Little Red Running Shorts" beats the wolf to Grandmas house but the narrator Jack beats them both to the story telling so in they become annoyed and refuse to tell the story and storm off.
It is during "Jack's Bean Problem" that we are introduced to a very cranky Giant. The two of them argue for a while over the story and it never really goes anywhere and ends up enraging the Giant who was insistent about having a good story read to him.
"Cinderumpelstiltskin" is a mash up of Cinderella and Rumplestiltskin. In this story however, Cinderella doesn't get any favors, never goes to the ball, still has to clean the house, and receives an unfortunate nickname in the process.
"The Tortoise and the Hair" is the tale of a Tortoise who runs continuously at his pace while the Rabbit just grows more and more hair.
"The Stinky Cheese Man"is the story of a stinky cheese man that no one wants to chase because he smells so bad. Eventually he gets dunked in a river and falls apart.
The final part of the book involves the Little Red Hen and her last ditch attempt to tell her story. The problem is she wakes up the sleeping Giant with her squawking and he eats her.
The End.
My Assessment:
It is not often that I have said this but this book was really not for me. I didn't get it. I hate to use this word but, I felt it was beyond stupid. In all fairness, the title of the book suggests as much I just didn't think that it would really be the case. I knew from the beginning though that I was not going to like it only because I take issue with children using the term stupid so loosely and the title here does just that. I didn't think that this was a positive book for children. That being said, it has received numerous amounts of praise and I have a feeling that boys would really like it. I did think it was cleaver how he had the narrator come back and forth through out the book, it made it read a bit more like a conversation. I also liked the Little Red Hen's consistency.
Teaching Tips:
In all honesty, this is not a book that I will use in my classroom. I think that there is just too much negativity in it and name calling and I would rather not expose my students to that since I can avoid it.
What I Loved the Most:
The drawings may have been one of the best things about this book. They were very clever and helped illustrate what the story was going for. My favorite part was probably the Little Red Hen popping up thorough out the story. Its only a shame that she was eaten at the end.