The Faithful Daughter

An Indian Folktale

De: Bill Gordh

Narrado por: Bill Gordh

Award-winning storyteller Bill Gordh (Film Advisory Board Award of Excellence winner, National Association of Parenting Periodicals Gold Award winner) presents this folktale live with no script, accompanied only by his own dynamic banjo playing.

There was a king who was a fair and wise ruler who had three daughters. He was fair in most things, but he could not stand ever to admit that he might be wrong. He felt that he should make all the big decisions for his daughters. He called them together and asked if each of them agreed that he would make all the important decisions for them since he was so wise and their father. The two oldest daughters agreed, and the king embraced them and told them he would always take care of them. The youngest told her father she loved him very much and would always listen to his advice, but she needed to find her own future. He was outraged and had her thrown in prison. Every week he would visit her to give her a chance to tell him she had changed her mind, and then he would welcome her back to the palace and (in his opinion) a charmed life. She always listened to her father, but in the end told him she must make her own decisions. He banished her from his kingdom and had his guards leave her in the forest. The daughter found a cave to live in and learned the ways of the forest. One day she found a young man lying on the ground in the middle of the forest. His horse had tripped; he had fallen off, and the horse ran away. She helped him to her cave and tended him until he could walk again. They fell in love. He was a prince from a neighboring kingdom; he brought her home, and they were married. But she missed her life in the forest, and so they built a palace in the forest, and a new kingdom grew up around them, for the word spreads quickly when there is someone as fair and just as the princess, and many want to live in a land like that. It happened that her father, the king, heard of this new kingdom and of the noble king and the wise and fair queen. He made a royal trip to honor the new kingdom and meet this new couple who had gained such a reputation. He did not recognize his daughter at first, for it had been many years, but her voice sounded familiar. She revealed herself. The king recognized that he had been unfair and asked his daughter's forgiveness. She smiled and gestured to her husband, her palace, and the people who now lived in a kingdom where the leaders were always ready to hear others' opinions.

©2013 Bill Gordh (P)2014 Audible, Inc.