Overview

(Bilingual English-Dari edition) This is a delightful and humorous tale about a chicken who learns to speak as we do - with unexpected consequences. The surprising events that follow intrigue young children and, and at the same time, alert them in a very amusing way to the dangers of being too quick to believe everything they hear. Illustrator Jeff Jackson creates a lively and lighthearted world, rich in color and expression, in which anything can happen. This tale is one of the many hundreds of Sufi developmental stories collected by Idries Shah from oral and written sources in Central Asia and the Middle East. For more than a thousand years, it has entertained young people and helped foster in them the ability to examine their assumptions and to think for themselves.

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9781946270184

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Reviews

... this quirky, good-natured fable, with bright, aptly comical pictures, ably illustrates the maxim, It's important not to believe everything you hear. - Booklist (U.S.) Set in the Middle East, Shah's retelling of a Sufi story sends a gentle message to readers: just because someone says it's so, does not make it so. ... With its simple language and repeating phrases, the story begs to be told, and Jackson's colorful pastel illustrations lend a zany accent to the antics. - School Library Journal (U.S. ) In this story, a talking chicken creates anxiety and disorder in a community until people realize that just because a bird can speak, marvelous though that may be, it doesn't mean the bird knows what it's talking about. Like other stories of its kind, this one uses the ancient Eastern technique of attributing common foibles to foolish characters, gently allowing readers to recognize their own gullibility ... it helps children to develop the habit of critical thinking. - Denise Nessel, Ph.D., Senior Consultant with the National Urban Alliance for Effective Education (U.S.), writing in Library Media Connection: The Professional Magazine for School Library Media Specialists (U.S.) ... a humorous tale that will intrigue young children and alert them to the dangers of being too gullible. - Bookbird: A Journal of International Children's Literature These teaching stories can be experienced on many levels. A child may simply enjoy hearing them; an adult may analyze them in a more sophisticated way. Both may eventually benefit from the lessons within. - All Things Considered, National Public Radio (U.S.) They [teaching stories] suggest ways of looking at difficulties that can help children solve problems calmly while, at the same time, giving them fresh perspectives on these difficulties that help them develop their cognitive abilities - psychologist Robert Ornstein, Ph.D., in his lecture Teaching Stories and the Brain given at the U.S. Library of Congress Through repeated readings, these stories provoke fresh insight and more flexible thought in children. Beautifully illustrated. - NEA Today: The Magazine of the National Education Association (U.S.) Shah's versatile and multilayered tales provoke fresh insight and more flexible thought in children. - Bookbird: A Journal of International Children's Literature These stories ... are not moralistic fables or parables, which aim to indoctrinate, nor are they written only to amuse. Rather, they are carefully designed to show effective ways of defining and responding to common life experiences. - Denise Nessel, Ph.D., Senior Consultant with the National Urban Alliance for Effective Education (U.S.), writing in Library Media Connection: The Professional Magazine for School Library Media Specialists (U.S.) These enchanting stories Shah has collected have a richness and depth not often encountered in children's literature, and their effect on minds young and old can be almost magical. - Multicultural Perspectives: An Official Journal of the National Association for Multicultural Education (U.S.)

Author Information

Idries Shah spent much of his life collecting and publishing Sufi classical narratives and teaching stories from oral and written sources in the Middle East and Central Asia. The tales he retold especially for children are published by Hoopoe Books in beautifully illustrated editions and have been widely commended - by Western educators and psychologists, the U.S. Library of Congress, National Public Radio and other media - for their unique ability to foster social-emotional development, thinking skills and perception in children and adults alike. Told for centuries, these stories express universal themes from the cultures that produced them, showing how much we have in common and can learn from each other. As noted by reviewers, such stories are more than just entertaining; familiarity with them provokes flexibility of thought, since each one contains levels of meaning that unfold in accordance with an individual's experience and understanding.

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