There once was a king named Billy. More than anything, Billy
wanted to find a nail. He decided that since he wanted one so bad, he would go
on a journey to find him. So he began on his journey. He was walking through
the woods thinking that perhaps he might be able to find what he was looking
for. While he was walking, he stepped into a big pile of quicksand and lost his
shoe in it. He couldn’t believe that he lost his shoe like that, but he decided
to continue on. He knew he had to find a shoe though, so he would be searching
for that as well as a nail.
“FOR want of a nail,
the shoe was lost”
Since he didn’t have his shoe, he found a horse to ride. He
rode the horse for a long time, but then in the forest ran into a wolf. This
spooked the horse and the horse ran off.
“For
want of the shoe, the horse was lost”
He was starting to get flustered with
all of his misfortunes, so he began wandering on foot again. Before he knew it,
it became dark. Billy was now lost in the forest with no clue where he was at.
“For
want of the horse, the rider was lost”
While the king was lost in the forest,
his kingdom was attacked. He had no way of knowing this was going to happen,
and no way of leading an army. Since he was lost in the forest, he had lost the
battle at his kingdom.
“For
want of the rider, the battle was lost”
After the attackers won this battle,
they brought their whole army to take over the kingdom. Since the king had no
army to fight them, he ended up losing his whole kingdom over the matter.
“For
want of the battle, the kingdom was lost”
He couldn’t believe that because he was
out searching for a nail, all of this had happened. He thought that maybe if he
would have just sent someone else to do this deed for him, maybe he would still
be ruler of the kingdom today. Now the king lives in this forest in which he
was originally searching for the nail. Still to this day, he has not found the
nail that he was looking for.
“And
all from the want of a horseshoe nail”
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| Image of a horse. Possibly its on the run. Web source: Wikipedia |
Author's Note:
I based this off a nursery rhyme titled For Want of a Nail. Here is the original rhyme.
FOR want of a nail, the shoe was lost;
For want of the shoe, the horse was lost;
For want of the horse, the rider was lost;
For want of the rider, the battle was lost;
For want of the battle, the kingdom was lost;
And all from the want of a horseshoe nail.
I decided to add more of a story to the rhyme. In the original rhyme it doesn't really go into a lot of different details, so I did. I thought it would makes since for him to be a king, since in the original rhyme it talks about him losing a kingdom.
Hello Steven. I think you did a great job of taking what looks like a poem and expanding on it to make it a complete story. When I read this I kept thinking of the phrase "A horse, a horse a kingdom for a horse." I liked how you created a story that followed a progression and continued to build until the end. Good Job.
ReplyDeleteHey Steven! This is such a great story and it makes me want to read the original story. I love the way you changed it to have a rhythmic flow to it because it makes the story even more interesting to read. It’s so ironic that the Prince could have easily asked anyone to fetch the nail but instead he did it himself which led into a trail of misfortunes. You did a great job with your version!
ReplyDeleteSteven,
ReplyDeleteI liked how you took the nursery rhyme that was just a few simple sentences and turned it into a full story. I also liked how you would have a small paragraph relating to each individual line in the nursery rhyme. It helped those who hadn’t read the nursery rhyme before, like myself, know what was the inspiration in each of the paragraphs.
Well I'm gonna do the same thing you did and comment on two stories since we did the intro already. I liked the way your story connected throughout. It's crazy to think how certain events can lead to things we never expect, and I think the things you added between each section of the story conveyed that nicely. Great story man!
ReplyDelete