The Moon in Literature

Author(s): Kathleen Ratto

Source: Elementary English, Vol. 48, No. 8 (DECEMBER, 1971), pp. 932-936
Published by: National Council of Teachers of English
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/41387006
Accessed: 08-04-2020 18:20 UTC

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 Kathleen Ratto
Bay Elementary School
San Lorenzo, California

The Moon in Literature

From the dawn of civilization, the moon of "What's in it for me?" "How can the
has been a source of mystery and wonder- space program benefit me?"
ment to both man and beast. Man has writ- My own inspiration for this project came
ten stories, created myths, folk tales andafter Mr. William Horvath from the Ames
fables, composed poetry and songs, calcu- Research Center at Moffett Field brought
lated time, photographed, studied, theo- the NASA Spacemobile to the school where
rized, and been challenged, aroused, and I teach. The children, fourth through sixth
inspired by the moon. Beasts have been graders, sat attentively for one hour and a
aroused by it, hunted by its light, and sung
half while Mr. Horvath explained some of
to it.
the aspects of the space program. They sat
Now, in the twentieth century, because patiently, but attentively, for the first part
of modern science and technology, theof the program during which Mr. Horvath
mystery of the moon has in part, beentalked about the scientific details of the
solved. Thanks mainly to Apollos 11 andprogram. However, when he began to talk
12, we know the moon to be a barren and about the wonderful advances that have
remote body, devoid of life, covered bybeen made in medicine, electronics, and
glass-like rocks and craters, a place thatconsumer products as outgrowths of the
could not support human life unless ourspace program, they really "tuned in." Here
own atmosphere could be re-created andwas something for them.
other earth-like conditions simulated. Our discussion in the classroom fol-
To the present-day child, the moon holdslowing Mr. Horvath's presentation sur-
prised me. The children were scornful of
only a scientific interest, for he is acquaint-
ed chiefly with mass-media and knows only NASA's push to get to the moon. "What
of our technological achievements. Current good will it do us?" "Why don't they give
poetry concerns itself with human rights,the money to the poor people?" (Poor
war, death, self-examination and retrospect, people being those possessing only one
and sex. Save for one or two songs fromtelevision set.) "What's so good about the
"Hair", celestial bodies offer little inspira-moon? Nothing's up there anyway."
tion for Rock Music. Today's child knows Thus began our study of one reason why
little or nothing of mythology and the folk man is going to the moon. He is going to
tale, preferring instead to watch "Lost in satisfy his curiosity about this heavenly
Space" and "Star Trek" which emphasize body that his forbears have written about,
again the technological rather than thesung about, and wondered about since his
creative.
earliest beginnings. We are attempting this
And today's child has become jaded and by studying the moon as the source of inspi-
cynical in his outlook. His attitude is one ration for many of the genre of literature.
932

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 The Moon in Literature 933

the folk tale. Natalia

We began by speculating what Belting's The Moon
the cave
man must have thought Is A Crystal Ball proved the
about an excellent source
strange
light from above. How book, particularly
must itbecause
have it shows that
affected
people of all cultures have wondered about
his primitive way of life?
We then went on to the moon.
the Selections
myths from this book
ofthat
theI
Greeks, the Romans, used
and were
the "The Norsemen.
Moon Is A Crystal Ball,"
We
used D'Aulaire's Book"How ofthe Sun and the Moon
Greek Mythsand the Wind
and
Went Out to Dinner," and "The Hare in
Norse Gods and Giants. We discussed Di-
the Moon," folk tales from India; "Moon-
ana driving the chariot of the moon across
Bay,"
the sky each night and the Norse myth of a tale told by the Tahltan Indians of
how the earth and the heavens were form-Alaska; "The Cinnamon Tree," a tale told
in China; and "Kwiku Tsin and the Drag-
ed. After this the children tried writing
their own myths. The results were disas-on," a tale told on the West African Coast.
trous. We tried again, suggesting various Another good source of folk tales I found
themes and ways of visualizing any other was The Moon In Fact and Fancy by Alfred
way than the scientific. No luck. Slote. The folk tales in this book represent
Determined not to give up, I launchedmany cultures, including "A Gift of the
into the second stage of our study, that of Python"- an African folk tale that explains
the fable. I was unable to locate any fablesthe origin and phases of the moon; "The
about the moon itself, so I used The BigDog Who Eats the Moon," a Burmese folk
Book of Animal Fables by Margaret Green, tale that explains the eclipses of the moon;
which has some excellent fables in it. The "Tombanokano the Tide Maker," a story
based on a Philippine folk myth; "Kren and
results were a little more encouraging here.
Some of the reading groups had alreadyKa'en-a," a South American Indian Folk
Tale;
discussed fables and the idea of having a "The Moon Children," a tale from
Scandinavia; "The Crafty Hare," a tale from
moral to a story. Thus, after our writing
India; and "How Kereke Went to the
period I was able to glean a few papers
that only needed a little work before they Moon," a tale from the South Pacific.
could really be called fables. The difficultiesTime limitations prevented ощ class
here seemed to fall into these categories: from doing as many activities as we would
have liked to do. Here, however, are two of
1 ) trying to be scientifically correct; 2 ) try-
the stories which evolved from this phase
ing too hard to fit a moral to the story and
failing and; 3) being influenced by fables
of our study.
I had either read to them or that they had How The Moon Got To Be
encountered in their own reading. By Michael Checchi
It was when we got to the folk tale that Once upon a time there was a mouse
these pupils really began to get the idea.who wanted to be high in the sky and
In fact, some of the "fables" they wrotewanted everyone to see him. He was told
by the wind that there was a tall sky-
made better folk tales, so I gratefully ac- scraper in the city. The mouse went to the
cepted them. We are presently still at the skyscraper and when he got to the top he
period of the folk tale. The excitement of saw a piece of cheese twice the size of him.
Christmas replaced the excitement ofHe rolled the cheese over the edge of the
watching the splashdown of Apollo 12, soskyscraper and then he slipped off. Now
the mouse pulls the cheese around the
we postponed the study until after the earth and instead of calling it cheese he
holidays. calls it the moon. Now everyone sees the
At that time we resumed our study with mouse pulling the moon at night.

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934 Elementary English

use the moon

How The Sun Got Itsas Spots
the basis for a calendar
By Tal Shibley
and how the moon represents a different
phase of twirling
One day the sun was life during each month
andof thespin-
year.
The children
ning around in space will then create
when it their own
decided it
would like to see, so it
calendars. started
Those who have little spinning
or no
faster and faster until it whirled right out
difficulty with writing can draw upon their
of orbit and into a different part of space.
own experiences and things that are familiar
It was just about to crash into an asteroid
and rest on it whento them
thein order to create their calendars.
asteroid cried out,
Those who work
"I am the prince of an Almighty better with theirKing
hands Sun.
Please do not crash into me."
can do picture calendars using paintings
The Sun replied, "I will not crash if or
youdrawings to represent the various months
give me an eye." of the year.
The prince said, "Go home. Your eyeI is would next begin to lead up to poetry
waiting." by way of learning about the use of creative
imagery and at the same time, review the
When the sun got back into orbit he had
one fine eye. After a while though he was folk tale. For this stage of our study, I plan
not content with one eye so he went back to use Natalia Belting's The Sun Is A Gold -
and said, "Beware Prince Asteroid or I will en Earring and The Stars Are Silver Rein-
crash into you unless you give me two more deer , picking out those examples that deal
eyes." with the moon. Here, too, I can introduce
The prince replied, "Go home. They are the idea of simile and metaphor, and the
waiting for you." children can experiment with "The moon
is like. . . and "The moon is. . . The
After a while the sun went back again
and again until he had a hundred or morechildren can then devise ways of illustrating
eyes. Finally the King Sun, father of the
their own metaphors and similes.
Prince Asteroid who had watched the sun
By way of review of the folk tale there
go back, again and again, turned all of the
suns eyes into little black gobs of bubbly two delightful examples: one from the
are
goo. He said, "Be happy with what you Solomon Islands which explains why the
have." moon has a dirty face, the other from India
which explains that the shadows on the
Activities which could follow the readingmoon are those of an old woman busily
of these folk tales would include playmak-spinning her thread and her husband stol-
ing, puppet making and plays, the makingidly smoking his water pipe.
of dioramas and roller movies, the painting A recent book of folk tales which uses
or drawing of murals, the writing of theirthe theme of the moon throughout the
own folk tales. More able students mightwhole volume is The Man in the Moon: Sky
be able to draw parallelisms from the folkTales from Many Lands by Alta Jablow and
Carl Withers.
tales representing several different cultures.
This could lead into an interesting study of The children can also choose one of their
the migrations of a culture and of anthro-own metaphors and create a short tale
pology and sociology, as well as history.about each one. They can then illustrate
This type of lesson can be oriented towardthem to be shared with the class as a bul-
geography and map study. letin board or they could be bound together
Following the study of the folk tale, Iin book form.
plan to use Natalia Belting's Calendar To introduce the next stage of our study,
I plan to present Haiku as a further intro-
Moon to show how the people of the world

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 The Moon in Literature 935

duction to poetry. poemWe

I had the will discuss
students illustrate it. They the
Haiku form as being used silver gift wrap paperas
Japanese, out of which
having 17
they cut objects mentioned
syllables in a 5-7-5 pattern, of dealing in the poem. with
a nature theme, and These
of werecreating
mounted on black construction
a mental
paper. Several
picture for the readers mind of the
tostudents
complete.did very
well.
I chose two examples from Japanese
Haiku , a Peter Pauper Eleanor
PressFarjeon's book Poems
Book, tofor Chil-
read
to them. One Haiku was
dren, hasby Sokan
two poems and
in it which I felttells
would
about the moon becoming a our
be appropriate to beautiful fan
study. The first "The
and the other by Takuku tells
Night Will Never about
Stay" would the
be particu-
moon playing "Hide larlyand
good forSeek" with
creating mental imagery,theas
autumn rains. it speaks of buckling the night to the sky
with the moon.
Other examples of Haiku I have chosen
are from An Introduction to Haiku , trans-
The second poem "Moonlight" by Elea-
lated by Harold G. Henderson, by Shiki,
nor Farjeon also would be good for creating
Issa, and Ryusui. mental imagery. For this poem I think I
Some explanation was needed here would
thatfirst ask the students to close their
eyes and imagine they were out of doors
the 17-syllable form is many times altered
and alone on a summer night, and imagine
in the translation from Japanese to English.
I plan to have the children experiment
the still, hot moonlit night, the air heavily
with the writing of Haiku involvingscented
thewith roses.
Ogden Nashs book The Moon Is Shining
moon. By way of further stimulus, I plan
to show several non-scientific pictures
BrightofAs Day gives an example of a humor-
the moon. ous poem about the moon. The children can
appreciate
Following the writing of the Haiku, I the value of the moon as a
plan to show several examples of Japanese
source of humor for poets. "The Wind and
art and have my pupils experiment thewith
Moon" by George MacDonald conjures
art of this type using water colors. Then I
up an interesting mental picture and pro-
would have them illustrate their Haiku vides a good opportunity for a play-making
using the water color technique. We would
activity, as there is dialogue between the
then bind the finished products into a book.
wind and the moon and lots of huffing and
We have already encountered Walter de
puffing.
La Mare's "Silver" in our Roberts languageThe second poem from this book is a bit
textbook, The Roberts English Series: moreAthoughtful and should require some
Linguistics Program , Book 6. At that explanation
time and discussion as to the ideas
we read and discussed the poem andpresented.
the This is "Lady Moon" by Richard
meanings of several words that wereMonckton
un- Milmes. This poem also contains
familiar to the children, such as "shoon,"
a dialogue between a person and the moon
"casement," "thatch," and "cote." Weand also
would provide an opportunity for
choral verse.
reviewed the poet's use of images involv-
ing "silver"-things such as shoes, fruit, a
Percy Bysshe Shelley wrote a very plain-
tive poem, "To the Moon", which should
thatched roof, a silver greyhound, silver-
feathered doves, a mouse scampering ingive
the the children something to think about.
moonlight, and even the silvery scales It
ofshould
a also provide an exposure to a more
fish.
sophisticated kind of poetry and a rather
As a correlated art activity with this elevated form of language.

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936 Elementary English

Robert Frost wrote throughout

a lovelyhistory? Has it been recently
poem called
"The Freedom of the changed? How? Why? which clearly
Moon"
romanticizes the moon Finally, instead and presents
of culminating the unit al
at this point,
sorts of opportunities for I would use our reviewwritin
creative as an
introduction to our science
and imaginative thinking. In unit thisabout the
poem he
treats the moon as moon.aI would
piece hope thatof this jewelry
kind of study an
would for
arranges it in the sky better enable
variousthe students to appre-
effects.
The moon has long ciate provided
the significance of inspiration
that "one giant
leap for
for stories and poems of mankind."
magic and mystery.
Mary Jane Carr talked about the fairie
dancing beneath the moon in "When A
Ring's Around the Moon"Bibliography
in the Arbuthno
Anthology of Children s Literature. Th
poem imaginatively creates
The Arbuthnot images
Anthology of Children's Literature. of sma
Compiled
folk tripping along inby Maydancing
Hill Arbuthnot. Scott, Fores-
shoes an
man and Company: Glenview, Illinois, 1961.
curtsying as a fairy
Belting, fiddler
Natalia. Calendar Moon.fiddles
Holt, Rinehart, on his
tiny instrument. and Winston: New York, 1964.
Belting, Natalia.
I plan to present this poem The Moon Isas
A Crystal
anBall.
element
Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc.: New York, 1952.
of folk culture. Today's
Belting, Natalia. The Sun child is rather
Is A Golden Earring.
Holt, Rinehart,
sophisticated and very fewand Winston: New York, 1962.
children show
D Aulaire, Ingri and
much interest in fairy Edgar Darwin.and
tales Book of Greek
make-be-
Myths. Doubleday and Company: New York,
lieve. However, I do1962. plan to ask that the
do some research on their own here to D'Aulaire, Ingri and Edgar Darwin. Norse Gods
and Giants. Doubleday and Company: New
find additional poems or stories dealing
York, 1967.
with fairies and magic and the moon.Farjeon, Eleanor. Poems for Children. J.B. Lippin-
My choice for a final sample of literature
cott and Company: Philadelphia, 1926.
Frost, Robert. You Come Too. Holt, Rinehart, and
for our study of the moon is a poem by
Winston: New York, 1959.
William Butler Yeats entitled "The Cat and
Green, Margaret ( editor ) . The Big Book of Animal
the Moon", in which the reader witnesses Fables. Franklin Watts, Inc.: New York, 1965.
Henderson, Harold G. (translator). An Introduc-
a cat dancing in the moonlight and watches
tion to Haiku. Doubleday and Company, Inc.:
the changes of the moon reflected in the New York, 1958.
eyes of the cat. Nash, Ogden. The Moon Is Shining Bright As
After some discussion of the poem,Day.I J.B. Lippincott Company: New York, 1953.
Slote, Alfred. The Moon in Fact and Fancy. World
would hope the students could begin toPublishing Company: Cleveland, 1967.
recognize a similarity between the wonder-
Williams, Oscar (editor). F. F. Palgrave's The
ment of the cat and that of man. I would Golden Treasury , New American Library of
World Lit., Inc.: New York, 1961.
ask the students what they see in their minds
Withers, Carl and Jablow, Alta. The Man in the
when they hear the poem. How do they Moon: Sky Tales from Many Lands. Holt, Rine-
feel when they look at the moon? Do they hart, and Winston: New York, 1969.
see the moon as a cold and lifeless source Yeats, William Butler. The Collected Poems of
W. B. Yeats. MacMillan Company: New York,
of light? Has this been the attitude of man
1959.

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