As we continue reading Tales of Juha, this book has
become one of my favorite books we have read. This time we read “Social Satire,”
“Cunning and Resource,” and “Naïveté and Stupidity.” I enjoyed each of the sections
but my favorite would be the last section, “Naïveté and Stupidity.” In this
section, Juha is portrayed as someone who is naïve and not on the bright side. While
he is not the butt of the jokes, he provides someone to laugh at. His thoughts
are silly, adolescent, and laughable. He seems very sincere in some of the anecdotes.
I think this section is in great contrast with the first section of “Wit and
Wisdom.” The difference portrays the essence of Juha. He is a diverse character
who represents a range of stereotypes.
A few
common ideas/themes appeared in several anecdotes. For example, one of my
favorite stories from last time involved the “Race Winner.” In the anecdote,
Juha and his wife have been married for three months. At this point, his wife
is ready to give birth to a baby. In the first section (“Wit and Wisdom”), Juha
is on the snarky side. He plainly lies out that something isn’t right. The baby
did what most babies do in nine months in three months. Juha jokingly wants to
name the baby “Race Winner.” But, a different picture is painted in the section
“Naïveté and Stupidity.” Here, Juha is puzzled at the situation. He asks “what
is going on here?” He knows that women carry a child for nine months. But, when
he begins to question his wife, he falls into the not as brilliant stereotype.
Contrary to the previous Juha, Juha is easily influenced by his wife. Instead
of being witty and turning the table, the table is turned on him. Somehow, Juha
is convinced three months to each the mother, father, and baby totals to nine
months. I thought the stories alone were funny, but the way they compared added
to the humor. I experienced a cognitive shift during the second one because I
expected it to follow the same line. I experienced the same thing with another
story involving donkeys. Juha is riding on a donkey along with a number of
other donkeys. He counts the donkeys but always forgets the one he is. Continuously
causing conflicts with himself, he gets on and off the donkeys. I thought it
was interesting to see the straight comparison between two folk tales. The
anecdotes had the basic theme but a different way of telling the story. I’m
curious to see if there will be more similarities like these throughout the
book. Also, I’ll be able to share some more stories with Hashim!
Another pair of Juha tales deals with the ages of women. The first, in the “Wit and Wisdom” section, contains two bickering women; the husband of one comes to Juha to ask him to mediate the fight, but the man is told to go home and the fighting should be over because they had not been fighting about their ages. The second story, in the “Social Satire” section, deals with Juha as a judge who asks a woman to “…swear by Almighty God…to tell the truth.” She is then asked how old she is and responds, “If you were going to ask me that,...why tell me to swear by Almighty God.” What I see most from this repetition of stories written from different points of view is not the various roles that Juha plays, but how integral the topic of women’s ages is to Arabic culture. Why is it something that is not talked about? The first story makes it seem like women are shallow and argue about petty things, but when you see the connection with the second story, it is obvious that women’s ages are a sensitive subject. My theory is that women’s ages are tied to their ability to have children. Anyone else have an idea?
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