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    Tyne and Wear Folk Tales for Children
    Tyne and Wear Folk Tales for Children
    Tyne and Wear Folk Tales for Children
    Ebook128 pages2 hours

    Tyne and Wear Folk Tales for Children

    By Adam Bushnell, Dave Silk and Nigel Clifton

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    About this ebook

    Wise witches, flying donkeys and Half Hanged Macdonald: Tyne and Wear has a rich and diverse history of folklore, magic, evil fairies, saints and even the Devil himself. Storytellers Adam Bushnell and Dave Silk bring to life the rolling hills, winding rivers and Jurassic coastline in this illustrated collection of lively tales for children.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherThe History Press
    Release dateDec 21, 2018
    ISBN9780750990271
    Tyne and Wear Folk Tales for Children
    Author

    Adam Bushnell

    ADAM BUSHNELL is a published author, educational consultant, storyteller, voice-over artist and teacher. He has written over forty books including County Durham Folk Tales for The History Press. He works in the UK and internationally in both state and private education, delivering creative writing workshops to all ages. Previously a teacher, he also delivers CPD to teachers and others working in education on how to inspire writing in the classroom.

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      Book preview

      Tyne and Wear Folk Tales for Children - Adam Bushnell

      INTRODUCTION

      It was a real challenge to select which folk tales from the rivers Tyne and Wear we would tell in this collection for children. There were some monsters that simply had to go into the book, such as The Lambton Worm and the Bishop Auckland boar. There were some characters that needed to be included too, such as St Cuthbert and Jackey Johnson. In the end, we went with a mixture of well-known tales and those not so well known. We also added new characters such as Tia Maria, the wise witch, too.

      Even though the book is aimed at children, we want the tales to be enjoyed by anyone who reads them. They can be read alone or be told aloud to an audience. The tone of voice is meant to be that of a local lad sharing the tales of the past with the whole community: tales that have been told many times before across the whole of the North East of England, but perhaps never quite like this.

      Hold on to your flat caps and your whippets, ladies and gentlemen. These folk tales are not your ordinary retellings. There are triple-plaited nasal hairs, donkeys that zoom across the sky and witches that don’t use broomsticks to fly but plates on their feet! There’s more madness and shenanigans within these pages than can be kept in a wizard’s cave.

      So read on to find something old, something new, something borrowed and it’s all just for you!

      Illustration

      The people of Castle Eden Dene were shocked. As shocked as finding a kitten in a carrier bag! That’s how shocked they were. And it was all down to a rabbit.

      It had begun as something that they thought of as quite funny. At first, anyway. Some little black rabbit had started to watch the villagers as they went about their daily business. It sat and eyed them curiously.

      ‘There he is again!’ they would laugh when the furry bundle would sit and watch.

      ‘It’s so cute!’ laughed a small girl.

      ‘I want it as my pet!’ declared her friend.

      But then the rabbit began not just to watch but to interfere with the daily business in the village.

      When the maids would go to milk the cows, they found that the rabbit had beaten them to it! The milk was already taken. Drunk dry by the little furry fiend.

      When the blacksmith was looking for his hammer, the rabbit had hidden it. Actually, taken it and buried it out in the fields!

      When the fisherman had gone down to the river, he found his fishing lines had been chewed right through.

      ‘That’s it!’ bellowed the farmer.

      ‘What’s it?’ asked his wife.

      ‘That rabbit!’

      ‘What about it?’

      ‘It has to go!’

      ‘Go where?’

      The farmer jumped to his feet. ‘Right into the jaws of my hunting dog, that’s where!’

      Soon a bit of a crowd was following the farmer as he huffed and puffed to the edge of the village. He was dragging along a rather dishevelled-looking greyhound named Bolt.

      ‘Right, Bolt.’ The farmer grinned. ‘You see that rabbit, there?’

      Bolt looked into the distance. He didn’t reply. He didn’t nod. But the farmer knew he understood every word.

      ‘Get him!’

      Bolt scratched his ear with his back leg and then sat down.

      ‘Bolt!’ the farmer said, stamping his foot. ‘Get that rabbit!’ The farmer gave Bolt a nudge and he was off chasing after the rabbit. Now you might think that a greyhound racing over the land toward its prey might make a rabbit move. But this rabbit did not. It just sat there with an almost mischievous grin upon its face.

      Bolt drew nearer.

      The rabbit just sat there.

      Bolt was almost on top of the furry creature.

      It didn’t even blink.

      Bolt leapt into the air.

      The rabbit stepped to one side and Bolt landed in a gigantic heap of cow poo. Splat!

      The rabbit turned and looked at the villagers. It stuck out its tongue and did a long and loud raspberry sound.

      THHHHHPPPPPPTTTTTTTTT!

      With that, it was off.

      The farmer was furious! Bolt wasn’t too happy either.

      Illustration

      ‘Don’t worry!’ called the blacksmith. ‘We’ll ALL get our dogs and be ready for him tomorrow!’

      The very next day, the villagers were ready. No fewer than twelve fine hunting dogs were gathered at the edge of the field where the rabbit always showed up first. There were three greyhounds, two beagles and seven dogs whose breed could have been anything. They were up early and they were ready!

      ‘Here he comes!’ snarled the farmer.

      Bolt sat upright. He did not like baths yet had to take one yesterday. He growled when he saw the rabbit appear from the hedgerow.

      The rabbit stopped when it saw the crowd ready and waiting. Then it turned its tail to them and started waving it at them.

      ‘Is it teasing us?’ a boy asked.

      ‘Well it’s twerking its tail,’ a girl sighed. ‘What else do you think its doing?’

      Then the rabbit turned to the villagers and gave out another enormous

      THHHHHPPPPPPTTTTTTTTT!

      That was it. Bolt was off. The other dogs ran close behind. The rabbit continued to do its weird dance, all the while making trump sound after trump sound.

      It was only when the dogs were impossibly close that the rabbit turned and zoomed in and out of the hedgerow. The dogs bounded after it and each one got stuck! They whined and whimpered from the thorny hedges. They cried and called for their owners. All the while the rabbit seemed to be laughing! It was enjoying itself. It gave each dog a little kick before disappearing into the hedgerow for one last time.

      ‘What are we going to do?’ asked the farmer, once Bolt had been freed from the hedge. ‘That rabbit is making us look like fools!’

      ‘We’ll go see the only one who knows about these things!’ announced the blacksmith. ‘We’ll go see

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