KidLit Forum

THE SAD PRINCESS
Hungarian Folk Tale
Collected by Arany Laszlo (1844-1898), Hungarian poet and folktales collector. He was the son of the famous literary personality Arany Janos. He collected folktales all over Hungary and he printed them under the collection named ’’Original Folktales” in 1862.
This folktale is part of his collection.
Plot
Once upon a time there wasa king who had a daughter who never smiled and was always sad. No one could make her laugh not even smile. He was very worried because of her so he decided that the young man who will succed in making her cheerful will become his son-in law and will inherit his kingdome.
On his lands lived a shepherd who had a sheep with golden wool. This was not an ordinary animal because whoever touched it he or she would be completely and unseparably stuck to its wool. One morning the sheep were on the pasture and a trader’s girl was just passing by when she saw the little animal and she patted it and her hand immediately stuck. There came a priest and seeing the girl he wanted to scold her with his walking stick but it immediatly stuck to the girl. The shepherd lead his flock forward and went past a woman holding a frying shovel who seeing the priest’s his scolding gesture wanted to reprimmand him for his behaviour and hit his buttocks and her frying shovel immediately stuck. Next a soldier riding his horse passed by and mischievously grabbed the woman’s hand. Then came a weaver carrying a lot of fabric and hit the backside of the horse. A shoe maker carrying leather saw them and touched the weaver’s shoulder asking him what he was starring at.
The shepherd kept tending his flock and his golden sheep with the trader’s girl, on her back the walking stick of the priest, on his buttocks the frying shovel of the womanand her hand held by the riding soldier followed weaver stuck at the backside of the horse and finally the shoemaker toching his back. They were advancing on the pasture when the princess caught an eye of them. She suddenly burst into laughter. The king had no choice than to keep his word.
It is to identify some of Propp’ s functions but still e can recognize the INITIAL STATE which introduces us the situation and the main characters.
The ABSENTATION can be considred the loss of joy of living that needs to be restored in the life of the princess.
The INTERDICTION can be considered the characteristics of the golden sheep: if somebody touches her wool it will immediately stuck.
The VIOLETION OF THE INTERDICTION takes place when several characters will stuck to each other.
In the end of the tale when the girl regains her joy of life we can identify the RESOLUTION, the moment when the initial lack or misfortune is solved.
Finally the WEDDING takes place when the princess and the shepherd marry.
According to Propp’s character’s function the princess is definetely the prize and the hero, the shepherd, will win her at the end of the tale.
The shepherd can be regarded as a hero, even though he does not surprise us by his struggle. In fact he does not resemble to the hero who undergoes threating situations.
The golden sheep can be considered as the hero’s helper who will help him win the princess
The dispatcher is the princess’s father, the king, who promised his daughter to anyone who would make her smile.
A similar folktale is that of the ’’ Golden Goose” collected by the Grimm Brothers and in the same way the young boy who carries the golden goose in his arm will gather an unwilling parade behind him which finally will amuse the king’s daughter, the princess who could not smile for a long time.

I think this tale must exist in almost every folk narrative tradition. It's supressed bawdiness is probably even funnier when we have those dialogues which were probably reduced in your summary.

Your discussion through proppian lens is fine, but you should edit this post a bit and add some extra spaces between its sections as your colleagues did.