The color blue is a rare find in folktales from around the world. However, the following three fairytales largely incorporate the color blue. Enjoy the precious wisdom hidden in these beautiful ‘blue’ stories.
The Blue Mountains Fairytale
The Blue Mountains is a fairytale of three soldiers — a Scotsman, an Englishman and an Irishman — who desert the army together. They walk through the forest deprived of food and drink, sleeping on trees to ward off wild beasts. One day, from the top of a tree, the Scotsman sees a faraway castle. Starved and exhausted, he decides to go to the castle alone. A beautiful lady welcomes him and feeds him generously. He is then taken into a room full of sleeping men. The next day, the Englishman climbs the same tree, sees the same castle, and does the same as the Scotsman.
On the third day, the Irishmen goes through the same experience. But upon his arrival at the castle, he does things differently. He refuses to eat or drink, unless the lady tells him who she is. Enchanted by her beauty, he is the first one to ask her a question in 16 years. She says she is an enchanted Princess. To lift the spell, she says, a man needs to stay in a small room for three consecutive nights. He accepts the challenge. Each night he gets attacked by dreadful creatures, and each time he is almost beaten to death. Every morning the Princess heals him using a cure from a magical bottle.
As soon as the spell gets lifted, the Princess tells him that she has to go away. She promised she would soon be back in a horse carriage. She gives him a rod to be used to wake up those sleeping men. As soon as she leaves, a little lad appears, claiming to be a servant. But instead of serving, every time the Princess is about to arrive, the little lad sticks a pin into the back of Irishman’s coat and makes him fall asleep. When this happens thrice, the Princess decides never to be back, and leaves behind a sword for the Irishman.
Using the rod, the Irishman wakes up all the sleeping men. He feeds them, awards them, and sends them away in search for the Princess. He, too, spends three years trying to find her. Defeated and desperate, he finally decides to kill himself. Taking out the sword she has given him, he finds an inscription written on the blade, ‘You will find me in the Blue Mountains’.
Searching for the Blue Mountains, the Irishman finds an old man. The sage has lived in solitude for 300 years, and he possesses a book of world history. The book contains no record of the Blue Mountains. The sage then blows his magical whistle and the Irishman is miraculously shifted 900 miles away, to the hut of another old man. This sage possesses the gift of speaking with the birds. An eagle from Blue Mountains arrives, ready to carry the Irishman. The eagle places only condition — to be continuously fed throughout the long journey. The Irishman agrees, and gets carried towards the Blue Mountains on the eagle’s back.
Just before reaching, he runs out of meat, and the eagle throws him into the sea. Fortunately, he is close to the shore and is able to swim. He reaches the Blue Mountains castle just on time to save the Princess from being forced to marry another man. And they live happily ever after.
The Blue Light Fairytale
A faithful soldier, wounded multiple times, is no longer fit to serve. Discharged from the King’s service, he leaves the castle, with nowhere to go. Wandering aimlessly, he enters a forest and comes across a house of a witch. The witch agrees to provide him with food and drink and lodging for one night, in exchange for his help in the garden.
The soldier spends the entire next day laboring hard. By evening, he is still from finishing the work. The witch asks him to spend the next day chopping wood. Since everything is under a heavy spell of the witch, this time, too, he fails to finish on time.
On the third day, the witch gives him a final task. He has to go down an old dry well and retrieve her lost blue light. The witch lowers him down the well in a basket, he picks up the blue light, but refuses to give it to her, realizing her evil intentions. Furious, she drops the basket and leaves him inside the well.
Sitting on the bottom of the well, the soldier is sure he is about to die. Wanting to have one last pleasure, he pulls out his tobacco pipe from his pocket, and lights it on the blue burning light. As soon as the smoke fills the air, a black dwarf appears and offers his service. The soldier wishes to out of the well. The dwarf aptly leads him through an underground passage full of hidden treasures. The soldier then orders the dwarf to bind the witch and have her executed.
Although now rich, the soldier feels resentment towards the King. He orders the dwarf to bring him the Princess. She spends the night humiliated and treated like a servant. In the morning, she magically returns to her castle, and wakes up dazed. The next day she fills her pockets with peas and makes a small hole in it, to leave a trace behind. But the dwarf removes the peas from the ground, and she spends another night laboring for the soldier.
On the third night, the Princess hides one of her shoes in the soldier’s chambers. The King orders a search, recovers the shoe, and jails the soldier. The soldier bribes a guard and retrieves the blue light bundle. Moments before execution, the King grants him a last wish — to smoke his pipe. As soon as the soldier lights up his pipe with the blue light, the dwarf appears and creates a deadly havoc. The King begs for mercy, which the soldier grants, in exchange for the throne and the hand of the Princess. The two of them live happily ever after.
The Blue Bird Fairytale
After losing his beloved Queen, a wealthy King finds consolation in the company of a recently widowed lady and marries her. The King has a beautiful and kind daughter, Florine, while the Queen has a selfish and ugly daughter named Truitonne.
When the time comes for the girls to be married, suitors start showing their interest. One day, Prince Charming arrives in the kingdom. The Queen does everything in her power to present Truitonne in the best light — she dresses her in beautiful clothes, and adorns her in precious jewelry. In spite of all that, Prince Charming falls in love with the simple yet lovely Florine.
The Queen locks up Florine, and sends many gifts to Prince Charming on behalf of Truitonne. He refuses all the gifts and insists on seeing Florine. The Queen agrees to arrange a meeting between Florine and him, but plots a devious plan. She has them meet in a dark place where, instead of bringing Florine, she places Truitonne. Not being able to see much in the darkness, and convinced he is talking to Florine, Prince Charming asks the Princess to marry him.
On the wedding day, Prince Charming realizes the deception. When he refuses to marry Truitonne, he gets cursed by Mazilla, Truitonne’s fairy godmother, and immediately turns into a blue bird. The Queen tells the King that Florine has lost her mind, and has her locked in a tower. She also tells Florine that Prince Charming and Truitonne are already married. However, the blue bird keeps visiting Florine in her tower. It brings her many gifts, and tells her the truth.
The Queen gets suspicious of Florine and the blue bird, until one day, after seeing them together, she decides to finish their story. On her order, the fir tree on which the blue bird perches, gets covered with pieces of glass and other sharp objects. The blue bird is wounded and unable to fly. Fortunately, an enchanter hears the cries of the wounded bird and rescues it. The enchanter also convinces Mazilla to reverse the spell and bring back Prince Charming in his human form. In return, the enchanter promises, Prince Charming would accept Truitonne.
All of a sudden, the King dies. The people of the kingdom demand Florine to be released. When the Queen refuses, she gets killed, and Truitonne is forces to flee to Mazilla. Florine becomes the new Queen. Disguised as a commoner, Florine embarks on a journey to find Prince Charming. On her way she meets a fairy woman who gives her four magical eggs, and informs her that Prince Charming has acquired his human form. Florine uses the four eggs to overcome four sets of difficulties on her way to the castle where Truitonne and Prince Charming are now living together.
By offering to sell the beautiful jewelry given to her by the blue bird, Florine tricks Truitonne to let her spend three nights in the Chamber of Echoes. Florine knows that everything she says in the chamber can be heard by Prince Charming. She uses the chance to tell him she has arrived. Truitonne tries to prevent them from getting back together, but the enchanter and the fairy woman turn her immediately into a sow. Prince Charming and Florine finally marry, and they continue to live happily, ever after.
