The Prince with the Enormous Nose:E172
When a king makes fun of an enchantress because of her enormous nose, she casts a spell on his newborn baby boy to teach him a lesson. A fun folktale to teach little ones not to make fun of others AND to beware of those who flatter us. (duration-20 minutes) An episode from storytelling podcast, Journey with Story
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A Funny Fairytale to Remind us- Beware of Making Fun of Others!
The Prince with the Enormous Nose
E172 – January 20, 2022
Have you ever seen a person making fun of someone else for some reason- maybe for what they were wearing, or for how they looked, or for something they did? How would you stop someone from doing such a dreadful thing?
Hello everyone. I’m Kathleen Pelley. Welcome to Journey with Story. Well, in a way, I hope none of you have actually seen someone make fun of another person, because of course, that is NEVER EVER a good thing to do! And I am quite sure all of you would never make fun of someone else for any reason at all. But today’s story is an old fairy tale about a king who does a truly dreadful thing – he makes fun of an enchantress because of the way she looks – because of her nose! However, as you will hear, the enchantress punishes him for his behavior.
Before we get started – grown ups – mums and dads – please take a moment to rate and review this podcast wherever you listen to it and if you can, do share with a friend or two. Thanks ever so much.
Now let’s hear what that enchantress does as we take a journey with…
The Prince with the Enormous Nose…
Long ago, in a far off land, there once lived a king who made the terrible mistake of making fun of an enchantress because of her rather large nose.
So furious was the enchantress, that she cast a horrible spell upon the king. “There will come a time,” she bellowed, “when you shall have a son. He shall be born with an enormous nose and it will remain upon his face until the moment he admits it is a ridiculous nose.”
The king only laughed and scoffed and went on his merry way ignoring the enchantress and her horrid spell. “After all,” he told himself, “if my son has a gigantic nose, he will always see it or feel it and so of course by the time he walks and talks, he will realize and admit that he has an unusually large nose. And so that will be the end of the problem – it will disappear. Not a matter of any concern.”
So, time went by and time went by and finally the Queen gave birth to a dear little boy, called, Edmund. The prince had big blue eyes, a sweet little mouth, and…the most enormous nose anyone had ever seen. It was so big it covered half his face. Sadly, not long after the prince was born, the king, who was rather elderly by now, grew ill and died, leaving the Queen all alone to raise the baby prince.
The Queen was inconsolable when she saw what a large nose her little son had, but the ladies of the court assured her that it was not really as large as it looked; that it was a Roman nose, and you had only to open any history book to see that every hero has a large nose.
Their words comforted the poor Queen, who of course, doted on her darling baby boy. And when she peeked again into his cradle, it did seem to her that perhaps his nose was really not quite so large after all.
Now, as the Prince grew, everyone around him took great care never to bring attention to his large nose. Instead they told him all sorts of dreadful stories about people who had short noses. The only visitors who were allowed to come near him had themselves rather large noses.
Some of the courtiers, in order to please the Queen, even took to pulling their noses several times every day in an effort to make them grow longer. But of course, no matter how they tried, their noses could never compare to the enormity of the Prince’s nose.
When the Prince was old enough to learn about history, his teachers took great care to tell him that all the previous members of the royal family also had very long noses. Every room in the palace was hung with portraits of people who had gigantic noses. In this way the Prince grew up convinced that a long nose was a sign of great beauty.
On his twentieth birthday, the Queen declared it was time for him to find a bride, and ordered the servants to bring the portraits of several young princesses before him. One of these pictures caught the Prince’s attention immediately. Her name was Princess Penelope, and she was the daughter of a very wealthy and important king, and would one day inherit many riches herself.
But the Prince did not care a whit about any of that. He saw only a sweetness and a dearness shining forth from her lovely face. And even though she had a rather, saucy little nose, Prince Edmund was entirely smitten with her.
That caused quite a bit of embarrassment for all the courtiers, who were now in the habit of laughing at little noses. When the Prince overheard two of them joking about Princess Penelope’s tiny nose, he sent them packing.
From then on, the other courtiers took great care before they spoke badly about small noses. Indeed one of them went so far as to tell the Prince that, though it was quite true that no man could be worth anything unless he had a long nose, still, on a woman’s face a smaller nose could be most attractive.
The Prince gave that courtier a splendid present as a reward for this good news, and at once sent ambassadors to ask Princess Penelope’s hand in marriage. The King, her father, gave his consent.
At once Prince Edmund set off to meet the Princess. He had to travel for many days and many miles. But at last, he reached he palace, and when the moment arrived for him to kiss her hand, to the horror of everyone, the enchantress appeared as suddenly as a flash of lightning!
Swooping up Princess Penelope, she whisked her away before anyone could stop her. The Prince was beside himself with sorrow and despair, but it was not long before he rallied, mustered his wits and his courage, and declared that he would not return to his kingdom until he had found Princess Penelope and rescued her from the evil clutches of this enchantress.
Refusing to allow any of his courtiers to follow him, Prince Edmund mounted his horse and rode away.
As he journeyed from town to town, he thought all the people he passed must be mad, for all they talked about was the size of his nose. He couldn’t understand why they thought his nose so big, and assumed they were jealous because they suffered with such terribly small noses.
Thus time went by and time went by. Meanwhile the enchantress had imprisoned Princess Penelope in a palace of crystal, and had hidden this palace in a remote corner of the woods.
Still, one day, the Prince eventually stumbled upon that remote corner, and there in the reflection of the crystal walls he caught the image of his bride, and he whooped with joy.
Then, he set to work, trying to break into her crystal prison. But try as he might, all his efforts were in vain.
“If only, I could at least get close enough to speak to my dear heart,” he thought. Princess Penelope was of the same mind, and she began to stretch her hand as far as she could through a tiny crack in the crystal walls, hoping that her Prince might be able to kiss it.
To his sheer delight, Prince Edmund was able to catch hold of her hand. Then he turned first to the right, then to the left and then back again, but…no matter how he twisted or turned, his enormous nose prevented him from lifting her hand to his lips.
For the very first time in his entire life, now Prince Edmund had to face the fact that – he had a very long nose – a ridiculously long nose and so he blurted out, “What a nuisance it is to have a nose that is so enormous that I cannot even kiss my true love’s hand. What a ridiculous nose I have!”
In that same instant, his words sent the crystal palace flying into a thousand splinters.
“Foolish prince!” cried the angry enchantress. “It took all these years for you to realize what a ridiculous nose sits on your face! You’ve been so anxious to believe yourself perfect, you’ve refused to believe anything at all to the contrary, no matter how many people tried to tell you the truth! Not till the moment your nose stood in the way of your own interests did you reckon with it at all!”
Then she dissolved into a fit of laughter, “You foolish humans never cease to amaze me!”she gasped in between her cackles. Then, in a gigantic plume of purple smoke, she vanished.
The Prince Edmund’s nose had now returned to a normal size, the size it would have been if not for the enchantress’ spell before he was born.
With great rejoicing he and Princess Penelope were married. And from that time on, Prince Edmund listened with only with one ear to the flattering remarks of his courtiers, while keeping his other ear open to hear the more honest and truthful remarks.
But most important of all, he and Princess Penelope made sure that no one in their kingdom, ever, ever, ever made fun of another person for any reason whatsoever.
And so in this way they both became the most wise and loving rulers their people had ever known.
Ah, so glad to hear our Prince and Princess became wise rulers – it is good to know that sometimes our mistakes can become very good opportunities for us to grow and learn.
Do you think it was right the enchantress to cast such a horrid spell on the King’s son? Or do you think she should have punished the King more than his son?
What do you think this story’s souvenir is? That nugget of truth about what it means to be human?
Yes, I think there might be a couple of souvenirs here – first of all – we should not make fun of others for any reason whatsoever and certainly, never ever ever for how they look. And secondly, we should not let ourselves be fooled by flattery – untruthful remarks about how we look- they way the Prince’s courtiers did with him and never actually told him the truth.
Does that remind you of another story you have heard on this podcast about a king who believed all the flattery of his subjects until one day a little boy shouted out the truth? Yes, it was called The Emperor’s New Clothes – you might want to take a listen again and compare it to today’s story.
Have fun.
Cheerio then, join me next time for Journey with Story.
