Week 2 Story: The Foolish Mr. Hare
Mr. Hare and his carrots.
Web Source: Edge Effects
Illustrated by: Soyeon Kim
In a land far, far away there was once a sleepy rabbit named Mr. Hare.
Mr. Hare had a forest-known reputation for being the sleepiest rabbit in all the land. Mr. Hare was so tired that instead of returning home to his rabbit abode, he decided to take a nap under a palm tree. Mr. Hare had been asleep for so long that he missed carrot time. He was napping so peacefully when suddenly..
CRASH! Down came a coconut!
While Mr. Hare was sleeping under the palm tree, a coconut had fallen loose and landed near his napping area.
"THE WORLD IS ENDING!" exclaimed Mr. Hare as he ran for his life.
Mr. Hare ran away, never once looking back out of fear that the world he has grown to love, would be washing away behind him.
On his sprint to safety, Mr. Hare continued to shout "The world is ending! Join me to safety!" Mr. Hare was a well-known rabbit in the town of Holland Lop, and his word was considered to be the ultimate truth. When the other rabbits heard these cries, they quickly followed him and did not once think to investigate the loud crash that Mr. Hare heard. Before they knew it, there was hundreds of rabbits running for their lives.
The rabbits continued to run away from the noise, leaving their town in the path of what they were sure was utter destruction. The rabbits motioned for others to join them on their route to safety, and so others joined. First was a deer to join them. Then down the road, a fox too heard their pleas and joined them. Finally, was an elephant. As all of these animals were running, they caught the attention of the brave and feared, King of Beasts.
The King of Beasts is said to be feared more than fear itself. The animals began to tremble as he approached, and some had even claimed to have never laid eyes on the King of Beasts until this very moment. It was then, that they discovered the King of Beasts was a fearsome lion.
The lion approached the group and spoke with Mr. Hare. It was not long before the lion requested Mr. Hare to accompany him back to the town of Holland Lop to investigate "Ground Zero," for the end of the world.
Mr. Hare jumped on the King of Beasts' back and together they returned to town. Upon their arrival, Mr. Hare quickly guided the lion to his initial napping place. It was then that the King of Beasts discovered the coconut. After quick trial and error, the King was able to recreate the sound of the coconut dropping. Mr. Hare confirmed that this was in fact the same noise that had startled him awake and the lion became frustrated.
"YOU ARE SO FOOLISH!" shouted the lion as he departed the town.
The lion returned to the group of animals and explained the confusion. The animals were relieved that their homes were not destroyed and returned with no hesitation. Mr. Hare apologized to the animals and thanked the King of Beasts for investigating. If it were not for the King of Beasts, the animals would still be running for their lives.
Author's Note:
For this story, I decided to give the rabbit of the The Foolish, Timid Rabbit a background and develop his character more. Calling him Mr. Hare was a play on another word for rabbit and the town he is from, Holland Lop, is a breed of rabbit. I also built more of a background on the lion because lions are typically the number one predator, and I felt that the lion should have a reflecting background.
I did keep the ending similar, but did put my own spin on it with having Mr. Hare issue an apology to the group of animals.
Bibliography:
"The Foolish, Timid Rabbit" from Jataka Tales by Ellen C. Babbitt. Web Source
Hi Adriana,
ReplyDeleteI love your play on words. Mr. Hare and Holland Lop those are just so creative. I liked how you gave more depth and background to the characters such as the rabbit and the lion. Your spin on the story made it very interesting to read. I liked the happy ending and the nice resolution to the story. I also love the picture you chose for your story which compelled me to click on it.
Hi Adriana,
ReplyDeleteI really liked your play on this story! This was one of my favorite ones we had to read that week so I liked getting to revisit it. I was happy to see that you included more background information on the characters because that is often something that I feel is missing from these short stories we read! I think it is because they are so short that they jump to the story and skip that part. I also loved how you had little details like bolding the word CRASH, it made me feel like I could hear it better in my head! Great job!
Hello Adriana, I really enjoyed your story primarily because out the stories that we were given for that week, this was my favorite one. I agree with and am glad that you decided to develop the rabbits character more and call him Mr. Hare. I liked your use of Holland Lop because I think they are one of the cutest rabbits. I hope to be able to read more of your stories sometime and see what you write next!
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteHey Adriana!
ReplyDeleteI like how you gave the rabbit from the story a whole personality and name. I think retelling stories in this way where animals are the main characters adds more depth to it and also helps people to connect! Even the breed helps people visualise it better. You mentioned in your note that you wanted to develop the lion a bit more. I would suggest a way to do that (I guess going forward if you found another character in a story you wanted to give a better perspective of) is to retell it from their point of view, or even use flashbacks (which may not apply to this story of course).
-Daana
Hi!
ReplyDeleteI did this story earlier in the semester, and I loved how you added more to it. You kept the integrity and message of the original story. I also liked the name changes. Mr. Hare is a very cute name and it fits a character who would think the world is ending because of a coconut. You also inspired me to look up a picture of a Holland hop. I do not know any think about most animals, so thank you for teaching me something! If you were to expand on this story, it would be cool to tell why Mr. Hare was in an area with palm trees. It seems quite far from their typical environment (the Netherlands). This detail could be quite funny too! He could be on a business trip and ship wrecked or just needed a break from his 53 kids. I loved this story! I hope to read more!
Hi Adriana,
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed your story. I liked how you wrote the story in a way that made it come life. I found myself laughing a couple of times from being able to envision what was going on in the story from your writing. I also really like the image you chose for the story because I think it really fits along with the style of the story.