Columbia Encyclopedia

tall tale, extravagantly and humorously exaggerated story of the backwoods exploits of an American frontiersman. Originating in the 1820s, the genre remained popular well into the 20th cent. One of the earliest heroes of this type of folklore, Colonel Davy Crockett of Tennessee, boasted:

I'm that same David Crockett, fresh from the backwoods, half-horse, half-alligator, a little touched with the snapping turtle; can wade the Mississippi, leap the Ohio, ride a streak of lightning, slip without a scratch down a honey locust, can whip my weight in wildcats … .

These bold deeds were made famous throughout the West by Crockett's Autobiography (1834) and by his Almanacs (1835-56). Crockett also popularized the deeds of the gigantic Mike Fink, "King of the Mississippi Keelboatmen," who was said to have once slain with a single shot both a deer and a Native American who was pursuing it. From Canada came the tales of the hero of the lumberjacks, Paul Bunyan, whose Blue Ox "Babe" was "forty-two ax handles and a plug of chewing tobacco between the eyes." The cowboys' hero was Pecos Bill, who "taught the bronco how to buck," and Southern blacks told tales of John Henry, the railroader and steamboat roustabout who once won a contest against a steam drill.

Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms

tall tale or tall story, a humorously exaggerated story of impossiblefeats. Several tall stories attributed to the German Baron Münchhausen appeared in the 1780s, but the form flourished in the oral tradition of the American frontier in the 19th century, several tall tales being published by Mark Twain, George Washington Harris, and others.

American tall tale

The tall tale is a fundamental element of American folk literature. The tall tale's origins are seen in the bragging contests that often occurred when the rough men of the American frontier gathered. The tales of legendary figures of the Old West, some listed below, owe much to the style of tall tales.

The bi-annual speech contests optionally held by Toastmasters International public speaking clubs may include a Tall Tales contest. Each participating speaker is given three to five minutes to give a short speech of a tall tale nature, and is then judged according to several factors. The winner and runner-up proceed to the next level of competition. The contest does not proceed beyond any participating district in the organization to the International level.

The comic strip Non Sequitur sometimes features tall tales told by the character Captain Eddie; it is left up to the reader to decide if he is telling the truth, exaggerating a real event, or just telling a whopper.

With "§" indicating legendary figures who are known to be based on actual historical individuals, other subjects of American tall tales include:

• Daniel Boone – Blazed a trail across Cumberland Gap to found the first English-speaking colonies west of the Appalachian Mountains §
• Johnny Appleseed – A friendly folk-hero who traveled the West planting apple trees because he felt his guardian angel told him to §
• Tony Beaver – A West Virginia lumberjack and cousin of Paul Bunyan
• Pecos Bill – legendary cowboy who "tamed the wild west"
• Cordwood Pete – Younger brother to lumberjack Paul Bunyan
• Aylett C. "Strap" Buckner – An Indian-fighter of colonial Texas §
• Paul Bunyan – huge lumberjack who eats 50 pancakes in one minute
• Davy Crockett – A pioneer and U.S. Congressman from Tennessee who later died at the Battle of the Alamo §
• Febold Feboldson – A Nebraska farmer who could fight a drought
• Mike Fink – The toughest boatman on the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, and a rival of Davy Crockett. Also known as the King of the Mississippi River Keelboatmen §
• John Henry – A mighty steel-driving African American§
• Calamity Jane – A tough Wild West woman §
• Casey Jones – A brave and gritty railroad engineer §
• Johnny Kaw, a fictional Kansan whose mythological status itself was in one sense a figment, in that it was created recently, in 1955. Adherents of this assessment deem such stories fakelore
• Joe Magarac – A Pittsburgh steelworker made of steel
• Molly Pitcher – A heroine of the American Revolutionary War §
• Alfred Bulltop Stormalong – An immense sailor whose ship was so big it scraped the moon

Yarn

A yarn is either a campfire story or a shaggy dog story.

Shaggy dog story - a long joke that usually ends in a silly or disappointing way. In its original sense, a shaggy dog story is an extremely long-winded tale featuring extensive narration of typically irrelevant incidents, usually resulting in a pointless or absurd punchline. These stories are a special case of yarns, coming from the long tradition of campfire yarns. (что-то типа «байки у костра»)

Yarn - a story of adventures, travels etc, usually made more exciting and interesting by adding things that never really happened.

First, a Shaggy Dog Story. These are tales that are from a long line of campfire stories that are usually long-winded (too long for their own good, or needlessly long) and have no apparent point or reason. Quite often, at the end, after a long and tedious and sometimes humorous story, there is a short and humorous pun or play on words that results in a twist of the meaning of the story or a charaters understanding of it. The name comes from a story that actually utilizes a shaggy dog as follows:

A grand householder in Park Lane, London, had the great misfortune to lose a very valuable and rather shaggy dog. He advertised repeatedly in The Times, but without luck, and finally he gave up hope. But an American in New York saw the advertisement, was touched by the man’s devotion, and took great trouble to seek out a dog that matched the specification in the advertisement and which he could bring over to London on his next business trip. He presented himself in due course at the owner’s impressive house, where he was received in the householder’s absence by an even more impressive butler, who glanced at the dog, bowed, winced almost imperceptibly and exclaimed, in a horror-stricken voice, “But not so shaggy as that, sir!”

Examples of shaggy dog stories that you might be familiar with include Monty Python and the Holy Grail where there is a completely long winded and humorous story of knights both limbed and limbless and ends completely different and in a meaningless way (if you haven't seen it, rent it... It is worth not divulging the end if you haven't), as well as Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson's Illuminatus! Trillogy (book), just to name a few pop culture examples.

Shaggy dog stories also include jokes that people take a long time to tell, and the punchline is really not all that funny. An anticlimax of sorts.

Campfire yarns include Shaggy Dog Stories, but also other sorts of yarns, such as a story that is repetitive, or scary, and ends anticlimactically.

Some include Folk Takes in yarns and some people you may ask may include them, but I do not as they normally have themes and a purpose beyond just being entertaining (no matter how long winded and how many talking birds appear).

Example: http://www.gutenberg.org/files/2517/2517-h/2517-h.htm

Spirituals

Date: 2015-12-24; view: 831