BEAUTY AND THE BEAST - A Classic Fairy Tale: Baba Indaba Children's Series - Issue 216

By Anon E. Mouse and Narrated by Baba Indaba

ISSN: 2397-9607 Issue 216
In this 216th issue of the Baba Indaba’s Children's Stories series, Baba Indaba narrates the European story of Beauty and the Beast.
Beauty’s father, a merchant, has a run of bad fortune, he loses all his ships in storms at sea, their house burns down and they lose almost all their possessions and are forced to move to cheaper dwellings, a small country in the cottage.

One day a messenger arrives saying, against the odds, one ship has survived and Beuaty’s father was to hasten to the port at once. But things were not as optimistic as he had hoped. He returns home in the middle of winter just as broke as he was before.
With night overtaking him as he trudged home through the snow, he mistakenly takes a wrong path and he found himself in an avenue of trees, at the entrance of which he halted and rubbed his eyes. For no snow had fallen in this avenue, and the trees were tall orange-trees, planted in four rows and covered with flowers and fruit. At the end of the avenue, straight in front of him, rose a magnificent castle in many terraces. The merchant rode around to the stable courtyard, which he found empty; and there, with half-frozen hands, he unbridled and stabled his horse. Within the doorway he found a staircase of agate with balusters of carved gold. He mounted it and passed through room after room, each more splendidly furnished than the last. They were deliciously warm, too, and he began to feel his limbs again. But he was hungry.

Feeling wary he sits on a comfortable chair and presently dozes off. A while later hunger pains awaken him and he opens his eyes to see a table with meats and wines upon it. Having fasted for more than twenty-four hours, and lost no time in falling-to. He hoped that he might soon have sight of this most hospitable entertainer, whoever he might be, and an opportunity of thanking him. No sooner had he given fancy to the thought than a hideous Beast appeared who started reaching out towards him……..
You are invited to download and read the story of Beuaty and the Beast. Find out what the outcome of the merchant’s encounter with the Beast was?

Baba Indaba is a fictitious Zulu storyteller who narrates children's stories from around the world. Baba Indaba translates as "Father of Stories".

Each issue also has a "WHERE IN THE WORLD - LOOK IT UP" section, where young readers are challenged to look up a place on a map somewhere in the world. The place, town or city is relevant to the story. HINT - use Google maps.

33% of the profit from the sale of this book will be donated to charities.
INCLUDES LINKS TO DOWNLOAD 8 FREE STORIES

• Language: English
• Publisher: Abela Publishing
• Release date: May 5, 2017
• ISBN: 9788826085418

Book preview

Beauty and the Beast

A Fairy Tale

Baba Indaba Children’s Stories

Published By

Abela Publishing, London

2016

Beauty and the Beast

Typographical arrangement of this edition

©Abela Publishing 2016

This book may not be reproduced in its current format

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Abela Publishing,

London, United Kingdom

2016

Baba Indaba Children’s Stories

ISSN 2397-9607

Issue 216

Email: [e-mail]

Website: www.AbelaPublishing.com

An Introduction to

Baba Indaba

Baba Indaba, pronounced Baaba Indaaba, lived in Africa a long-long time ago. Indeed, this story was first told by Baba Indaba to the British settlers over 250 years ago in a place on the South East Coast of Africa called Zululand, which is now in a country now called South Africa.

In turn the British settlers wrote these stories down and they were brought back to England on sailing ships. From England they were in turn spread to all corners of the old British Empire, and then to the world.

In olden times the Zulu’s did not have computers, or iPhones, or paper, or even pens and pencils. So, someone was assigned to be the Wenxoxi Indaba (Wensosi Indaaba) – the Storyteller. It was his, or her, job to memorise all the tribe’s history, stories and folklore, which had been passed down from generation to generation for thousands of years. So, from the time he was a young boy, Baba Indaba had been apprenticed to the tribe’s Wenxoxi Indaba to learn the stories. Every day the Wenxoxi Indaba would narrate the stories and Baba Indaba would have to recite the story back to the Wenxoxi Indaba, word for word. In this manner he learned the stories of the Zulu nation.

In time the Wenxoxi Indaba grew old and when he could no longer see or hear, Baba Indaba became the next in a long line of Wenxoxi Indabas. So fond were the children of him that they continued to call him Baba Indaba – the Father of Stories.

When the British arrived in South Africa, he made it his job to also learn their stories. He did this by going to work at the docks at the Point in Port Natal at a place the Zulu people call Ethekwene (Eh-tek-weh-nee). Here he spoke to many sailors and ships captains. Captains of ships that sailed to the far reaches of the British Empire – Canada, Australia, India, Mauritius, the Caribbean and beyond.

He became so well known that ship’s crew would bring him a story every time they visited Port Natal. If they couldn’t, they would arrange to have someone bring it to him. This way his library of stories grew and grew until he was known far and wide as the keeper of stories – a true Wenxoxi Indaba of the world.

Baba Indaba believes the tale he is about to tell in this little book, and all the others he has learned, are the common property of Umntwana (Children) of every nation in the world - and so they are and have been ever since men and women began telling stories, thousands and thousands of years ago.

Where in the World? Look it Up!