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KacheliTV

KacheliTV — the world's stories, read aloud.

Looking for a story to fall asleep to, to ride with on a long drive, or to share at bedtime? Start here.

We read the folk tales and classics of every culture on Earth — complete and unabridged, never excerpts — in fresh English translations, performed by our cast of voices. The fairy tales of Ireland and Japan. The legends of India and Nigeria. Jamaica, the Netherlands, the Cherokee, the Norse — and the Russia of Pushkin and Krylov. The stories your grandmother knew, and stories from shores you've never heard — every culture in the spotlight, no one missed.

New tales arrive every week. Pick a shelf, press play, and let the world's grandmothers talk you to sleep.

Free always — here and on every podcast app. Prefer no commercials? Find us on Apple Podcasts.

From The Dog You Chose LLC, Gulfport, Florida. Public-domain sources, told with respect.

Find us:

YouTube — https://www.youtube.com/@KacheliTVFlorida

Telegram — https://t.me/kacheliTV

Website — https://dogyouchose.com

The Dog You Chose books — https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0FYSTBLQ3

Our cast is a company of AI-generated voices, performing fresh in-house translations of public-domain works from every culture.

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  • S172 · E9
    October 30 · 9 min

    Tales for Sleep: A Guest from the Hidden People

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Tales for Sleep: A Guest from the Hidden People Tonight's tale is "Una, the Elfwoman," from Icelandic Legends, collected by Jón Árnason and translated by George E. J. Powell and Eiríkur Magnússon. Settle in, and listen. Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. On the Hlid farmstead in Iceland, a labourer named Una is taken one night to a hidden farm in the middle of a lake, where she spends three days among a people few ever see — quietly laying out a silver tray for meals that are never quite eaten — and when her master finds her again and asks why she left, she answers, "I did not, but was forced." She will not talk about it. And that is the measure of this gentle tale: no one is harmed, nothing is threatened, and the hidden people ask almost nothing of anyone; the one small liberty of the telling is Una's short-term disappearance, reported and resolved. Listen now, and rest. The tale: 00:15 — Una, the Elfwoman Source: Jón Árnason (1819–1888), collector; George E. J. Powell (1842–1882) & Eiríkur Magnússon (1833–1913), translators, Icelandic Legends, Collected by Jón Árnason, vol. I (London: Richard Bentley, 1864), pp. 68 ff. (Books VIII–XIII on Google Books; scan hunt logged in catalogue/iceland-canon.md) — public domain; performed in the translators' printed English. Gate record: catalogue/iceland-canon.md. Narrated by Magnolia A dry-voice telling — no music, by the Sleep Season's design. KacheliTV — world classics, read aloud.

    • Transcript
  • S172 · E6
    October 30 · 5 min

    Tales for Sleep: The Maiden in the Grass

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Tales for Sleep: The Maiden in the Grass Tonight's tale is "Doll i' the Grass," from Popular Tales from the Norse by Peter Christen Asbjørnsen and Jørgen Moe, in George Webbe Dasent's classic English translation. Settle in, and listen. Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. A king of the country has twelve sons, and when they are grown he sends them out into the world to seek their wives. They set off on horseback, carrying his blessing with them — and they come to a king who has twelve daughters, and all stay and marry, all but Boots, the youngest. Boots rides on alone in search of a wife no bigger than a finger, and he finds her in the grass: the tiniest little maiden, drawn in splendour, who stands and invites him home. He drinks the sparkling wine from the tiny golden goblet she offers, kisses the tiny white hand she holds out, and they are married that very day, in as fine a wedding as any king's. A soft evening's listening — the only hardship in it is a long journey home. The tale: 00:14 — Doll i' the Grass Source: Peter Christen Asbjørnsen (1812–1885) & Jørgen Moe (1813–1882), Popular Tales from the Norse, trans. George Webbe Dasent (1817–1896) (Edinburgh: Edmonston & Douglas, 1859), Project Gutenberg #1532, pp. 213–218 — public domain; performed in Dasent's printed English. Gate record: catalogue/norway-canon.md. The paired tale "Little Annie the Goose-Girl" did not pass the season's screen and is not read. No completeness claim is made for the collection. Narrated by Mira A dry-voice telling — no music, by the Sleep Season's design. KacheliTV — world classics, read aloud.

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  • S172 · E5
    October 30 · 15 min

    Tales for Sleep: Changed by the River

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Tales for Sleep: Changed by the River Tonight, four Korean tales from James S. Gale's Korean Folk Tales: Imps, Ghosts and Fairies (1913), his translation of Im Bang and Yi Ryuk: "The Old Man Who Became a Fish," "The Wild-Cat Woman," "The Soldier of Kang-Wha," and "The Geomancer." Settle in, and listen. Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. An old man of nearly a hundred, burning with fever, asks to be carried to the river that runs before his house — and slips into the water and is changed, becoming a great flatfish that swims away into the deep sea. A duplicate wife, held fast until the cocks crew, falls and changes into a wild cat, and escapes through the door unharmed. A soldier of Kang-wha, alone in midwinter, calls butterflies out of scraps of silk to cheer his wife — and his village alone is spared when the island falls. And a geomancer, fed a bowl of white gruel by a mourner who has not yet found a burial site, repays the kindness with a perfect site in the hills, whose luck a rival later misreads. One honest note on the telling: the wild cat escapes unharmed, and the geomancer's bereavement is background only — a mourner, a funeral not yet arranged, and a grave site found. The tales: 00:19 — The Old Man Who Became a Fish 04:06 — The Wild-Cat Woman 07:57 — The Soldier of Kang-Wha 10:18 — The Geomancer Source: James S. Gale (1863–1937), translator, Korean Folk Tales: Imps, Ghosts and Fairies, from Im Bang and Yi Ryuk (J. M. Dent & Sons / E. P. Dutton, 1913), Project Gutenberg #51002 — public domain; Gale's English performed as printed. Gate record: catalogue/korea-canon.md; all four tales passed on full read and were benched for a later part. Narrated by Orson · Tales for Sleep A dry-voice telling — no music, by the Sleep Season's design. KacheliTV — world classics, read aloud.

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  • S172 · E2
    October 30 · 14 min

    Tales for Sleep: What the Birds Taught Him

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Tales for Sleep: What the Birds Taught Him Tonight's tale is "The Boy Who Learned the Songs of Birds," a Seneca tale of the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois Confederacy), collected by Jeremiah Curtin and published in his Seneca Indian Myths (E. P. Dutton, 1923). Settle in, and listen. Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. Two brothers live alone in the woods, and the younger — a little fellow who does the thinking for both — learns the songs of the birds, dancing for the feathers in his head-dress until, wrapped in the turkey skin his brother made him, he slowly becomes Turkey himself: wise, watchful, and able to warn his brother of the woman full of witchcraft who comes to lead him west. Two turkeys are killed at the boy's request along the way — one for the two feathers of his head-dress, one for the skin that becomes his pouch — each in a single summarised line, for craft and subsistence, never as a scene. The witch-women's intent to kill the elder brother is reported, never enacted; Turkey follows, and with Moose's help the brother is carried home unharmed, and the two live together ever after, still learning the songs of birds — for from birds, the tale says, came all the songs and dances. The tale: 00:11 — The Boy Who Learned the Songs of Birds Source: Jeremiah Curtin (1835–1906), Seneca Indian Myths (New York: E. P. Dutton, ©1923), pp. 179–184. Curtin's public-domain English read as printed; the tale was screened in full and passed at the shelf's gate — record: catalogue/iroquois-canon.md. Billed as a Seneca tale of the Haudenosaunee, collected by Jeremiah Curtin; no completeness claim is made for Curtin's collection. Narrated by Magnolia A dry-voice telling — no music, by the Sleep Season's design. KacheliTV — world classics, read aloud.

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  • S172 · E1
    October 30 · 9 min

    Tales for Sleep: The Stone That Told the Truth

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Tales for Sleep: The Stone That Told the Truth Tonight's tale is "Little May," from Evald Tang Kristensen's Æventyr fra Jylland, the Jutland tale collection he gathered from the tellers of Denmark — a quiet story of a little shepherdess, a prince who goes courting four times, and the stone inside his door that tells everything anyone has done. Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. Mette tends her sheep by the roadside and answers the Prince of England the same way every time he passes: she draws rag over rag now, but one day she will draw gold over gold. Three foreign princesses come to visit the prince, and each is turned away when the truth-telling stone speaks against her. The fourth, fearing the same road, exchanges clothes with Mette and sends the shepherdess in her place — and the stone speaks for Mette. The prince plaits a gold ring into her hair so that he will know her again, and it is by that ring, glinting in a shepherdess's hair beside the road, that the tale quietly comes home. The tale: 00:13 — Little May Source: Evald Tang Kristensen (1843–1922), "Bitte Mette," Æventyr fra Jylland (Jyske Folkeminder V, no. 7, pp. 57–61). Fresh in-house translation from the Danish as printed; no published translation used or consulted. Gate record: catalogue/denmark-canon.md; full Danish read at the Denmark Part 6 gate (episodes/episode-486-denmark-6/script-notes.txt), verdicted content-clean. Narrated by Mira A dry-voice telling — no music, by the Sleep Season's design.

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  • S98 · E2
    October 30 · 21 min

    Rumanian Bird and Beast Stories — Part 2: The Little Worm, St. Peter and the Cuckoo, The Wolf's Eyes, The Beetle Nun, The Hornet, The Woodpecker, and The Oak | Romanian Folk Tales in English

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Rumanian Bird and Beast Stories — Part 2: The Little Worm, St. Peter and the Cuckoo, The Wolf's Eyes, The Beetle Nun, The Hornet, The Woodpecker, and The Oak | Romanian Folk Tales in English Part Two of Moses Gaster's Rumanian Bird and Beast Stories (1915), rendered into English by Gaster himself: seven more "why" tales of the Rumanian villages — why the little worm glows, how the thief Cuckoo came to call his own name, why the wolf's eyes glow in the dark, why the beetle is called the Nun, why the hornet lives in smoky places, how an inquisitive old woman became the woodpecker, and why the oak should not boast. Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. - Why the Little Worm Glows — an angel who looked too far into a shepherdess's eyes falls to earth as a shower of sparks, and the glow-worms carry them still. - St. Peter and the Cuckoo — the horse-thief Cuckoo is cursed into the bird that can speak nothing but its own name, and the glow-worms are blessed as guides of the wanderers. - Why the Wolf's Eyes Glow — the devil fashions the wolf, God gives it life, and the devil's own hairs become the bristles and the sparks in the wolf's eyes. - Why the Beetle Is Called the Nun — the devil's ill-tempered daughter, made a nun in the hope she would mend, is changed into the insect the sisters named Nun. - Why the Hornet Lives in Smoky Places — the hornet brings God a piece of cardboard, and is cursed to cardboard work, a chimney home, and a nest everyone breaks. - The Woodpecker and the Inquisitive Old Woman — she opens the sack of insects she was warned not to touch, and must pick them up again as a bird, beak first, to this very day. - Why the Oak Should Not Boast — the sparrow, insulted by a sapling, returns after nine hundred years to roll in the dust of the proud oak. The tales: 00:45 — Why the Little Worm Glows 04:39 — St. Peter and the Cuckoo 09:02 — Why the Wolf's Eyes Glow 11:09 — Why the Beetle Is Called the Nun 12:31 — Why the Hornet Lives in Smoky Places 14:33 — The Woodpecker and the Inquisitive Old Woman 17:41 — Why the Oak Should Not Boast Source: Moses Gaster (1856–1939), Rumanian Bird and Beast Stories (London: Sidgwick & Jackson for the Folk-Lore Society, 1915), Gaster's own English rendering; lawful copy Project Gutenberg eBook #43059. Every piece in the collection was read and screened for this shelf: of its 126 numbered and lettered pieces, 61 were excluded by name under the no-violence law and 56 benched by name with reasons; 5 were told in Part 1, the 7 in this part follow in book order, and 17 clean tales remain for later parts. No completeness claim is made for this collection. Gaster's scholarly notes after each tale are not read. Narrated by Amos. Opening and closing theme: Bandoneo Street Romance — with a short instrumental separator between stories, and no music under the narration. KacheliTV — world classics, read aloud.

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  • S163 · E2
    October 30 · 28 min

    Folk Tales of the Hausa People — Part 2: A Test of Skill · A Giant, and the Cause of Thunder · The Spider, the Hippo, and the Elephant | KacheliTV World Classics

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Folk Tales of the Hausa People — Part 2 (A Test of Skill · A Giant, and the Cause of Thunder · The Spider, the Hippo, and the Elephant) Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. Part two of the shelf. Three more folk tales of the Hausa people from R. Sutherland Rattray's Hausa Folk-Lore (1913) — the tales of Maalam Shaihu, collected, transliterated and translated by Rattray — heard in Rattray's English exactly as he printed it. In A Test of Skill, a chief sets his three sons to show their skill at the great baobab by his gate: the eldest thrusts his spear clean through it and rides through the hole, the second lifts his horse and jumps the tree, and the youngest pulls the whole baobab up, roots and all, and comes on waving it at his father. In A Giant, and the Cause of Thunder, a strong man who calls himself A-Man-among-Men will not believe his wife that a greater man exists — until he hides in the giant's meat-store, flees all night before the wind of his pursuer, and is saved only when the Giant of the Forest catches his hunter and the two wrestle up into the heavens, where they are wrestling still: that is the thunder. And in The Spider, the Hippo, and the Elephant, in a year of famine the spider cheats the elephant out of a hundred baskets of grain and the hippo out of a hundred baskets of fish, sets the two great chiefs pulling against each other at either end of his long rope over a horse that does not exist, and, when the fraud is found out, saves himself inside a dead antelope's skin by playing on their fear of his pointing hand. The episode opens and closes with its theme, Imperial Violin Masquerade, heard also briefly between the stories. The tales: 0:45 A Story About a Test of Skill 2:52 A Story About a Giant, and the Cause of Thunder 15:03 The Spider, and the Hippo, and the Elephant From Hausa Folk-Lore, Customs, Proverbs, Etc., by R. Sutherland Rattray (Oxford, 1913), public domain — the tales of Maalam Shaihu in Rattray's English translation as printed; this is his translation, not a new one. Held for the owner's ruling by name: The World · How the Whip and the 'Maara' Spoon Came to the Haunts of Men · The Doctor Who Went a Pilgrimage to Mecca on a Hyena · The Orphan of the Coat-of-Skin Saying · A Jealous Man and What Befell Him · A Great Friendship, and How It Was Put to the Test · Muusa (Moses) · The Spider and the Crows. Excluded by name: How Brothers and Sisters First Came to Quarrel · The Boy and the Old Woman, and the Wasp · A Chief, and How His Sons Observed His Funeral · A Witch, and How the Baby of the Family Outwitted Her · A Chief and His Cook · A Hunter and His Son · A Maiden and the Pumpkin · The Gawo-Tree and the Maiden · The Water of Ladi · The Lizard and the Hyena · The Beetle, and How He Got His Thatching Done · The Spider and the Lion · The Spider and the Dodo. Standing on the bench for Part 3: The He-Goat · The Lion and the Leopard. No claim of completeness for Rattray's book is made. Narrated by Madame de Pamplemousse. Theme: Imperial Violin Masquerade — opening and closing theme, with short separators between the stories. KacheliTV — world classics, read aloud.

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  • S142 · E2
    October 30 · 32 min

    Folk Tales of Chile — Part 2: The Little Orphan Lamb · The Enchanted Little Parrot · The Devil and the Peasant | KacheliTV World Classics

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Folk Tales of Chile — Part 2: The Little Orphan Lamb · The Enchanted Little Parrot · The Devil and the Peasant | KacheliTV World Classics Part two of Folk Tales of Chile. Three more Chilean folk tales collected from oral tradition by Ramón A. Laval and published in his Cuentos populares en Chile (Santiago, 1923), heard here in a fresh in-house English translation made from the Spanish: The Little Orphan Lamb, The Enchanted Little Parrot, and The Devil and the Peasant. Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. The Little Orphan Lamb — a brother and sister flee their stepmother; the girl drinks from a stream whose waters turn her into a little lamb, and a little wand of virtue lets her become a woman for three hours at a time, until a prince asks to marry her. The Enchanted Little Parrot — Manuel gives up an almud of silver for the King's talking parrot; when she flies home to the castle of Flordelis, he follows with a wishing ring, a flying feather, and a cap of invisibility to claim the princess she truly is. The Devil and the Peasant — the Devil farms in partnership with a peasant for three years, and is outwitted three times over: by potatoes, by watermelons and melons, and by maize. The tales: 0:46 The Little Orphan Lamb 17:42 The Enchanted Little Parrot 29:47 The Devil and the Peasant Source and rights: from Cuentos populares en Chile (recogidos de la tradición oral) by Ramón A. Laval (1862–1929), Revista de Folklore Chileno, Tomo IX, Santiago: Imprenta Cervantes, 1923 — public domain; lawful copy Project Gutenberg #63424. Tales Nos. 9, 26 and 27 of Parte I, in book order, in a fresh in-house English translation from the Spanish; no published translation was used. Further tales of Parte I are not read in this episode, each excluded by name after a full reading: El Soldadillo · Delgadina y el Culebrón · El Gallito (heard in Spain, not Chilean tradition) · La Tortilla o el Canarito Encantado · El Cuerpo sin Alma · Las siete Ciegas · Los tres Consejos · El Loro Adivino · Hermosura del Mundo · El Árbol de las tres Manzanas de Oro · Los Hijos del Pescador · El Compadrito León · El Miñaco · Chilindrín y Chilindrón · Juan Valiente · Gallarín y el Gigante · El cuento de los tres difuntos. The book's Parte II belief-notes stand on the bench as a class, with El Chumaco, El Cabro viejo and El Zapatero que se volvía gallo excluded by name. No claim of completeness for the book is made. Narrated by Mira. Music: Bandoneón Street Romance — opening and closing theme, and heard briefly between the stories; no music under the narration. KacheliTV — world classics, read aloud.

    • Transcript
  • S152 · E2
    October 30 · 22 min

    Folk Tales of Catalonia — Part 2 (The Creation · The Three Brothers · John the Fool · The Golden Ox) | KacheliTV World Classics

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Folk Tales of Catalonia — Part 2 (The Creation · The Three Brothers · John the Fool · The Golden Ox) Part two of the Catalonia shelf: four more folk tales collected by Francesc de Sales Maspons i Labrós and published in his Lo Rondallayre (Barcelona, 1871–1875), heard here in a fresh translation from the Catalan, made for this episode. In The Creation (La creació), the proud bee and the proud salamander ask God for gifts He will not give, and the earth learns why everything returns to her. In The Three Brothers (Los tres germans), a spyglass that sees across the world, a carpet that flies in an instant and an apple that heals are all three needed to win a cousin's hand — and an arrow settles the rest. In John the Fool (Joan lo tonto), a boy who cannot be trusted to sell a sack of walnuts burns the house down, carries a door into the forest, and makes his family rich by accident. And in The Golden Ox (Lo bou d'or), an enchanted princess hidden in a golden ox steals jewel after jewel until her road runs to the palaces of the sun, the stars and the moon. The episode opens and closes with its theme, Wind Swept Flight, heard also briefly between the stories. Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. The Creation — God sets heaven and earth in order, and every creature receives what it deserves. The Three Brothers — three brothers, three wonders, and one arrow shot into the middle of the sun. John the Fool — the boy who could not sell walnuts, and the door that saved his family. The Golden Ox — a golden ox, a thieving little bird, and the palaces of the sun, the stars and the moon. The tales: 1:01 The Creation 3:40 The Three Brothers 6:54 John the Fool 13:04 The Golden Ox From Lo Rondallayre: Quentos populars catalans by Francesc de Sales Maspons i Labrós (1840–1901), published in three volumes (Barcelona, 1871–1875), public domain — The Creation and The Three Brothers from the first volume (1871), John the Fool and The Golden Ox from the third (1875), complete and in book order, in a fresh translation from the Catalan; lawful copies: Project Gutenberg #75409 and #76026. Two tales are held by name for a ruling: La gavia d'or and Barba d'or. Fourteen tales are excluded by name: Lo claveller · La flor del penical · La fustots · La rateta · La perera · Lo beneyt · Las tres taronjas del amor · La cirereta · Altafulla · La cabreta · Los dos geperuts · La noya dels cabells d'or · La coloma blanca · Lo espabilat. One further screened tale, Lo camí del cel, stands aside on a recorded tone flag for a future ruling. The collection's second volume has no lawful copy and the remaining tales of the first and third volumes await screening; no claim of completeness for the collection is made. Narrated by Violetta. Music: Wind Swept Flight, as opening and closing theme and as short separators between the stories; no music under the narration. KacheliTV — world classics, read aloud.

    • Transcript
  • S169 · E1
    October 29 · 27 min

    Folk Tales of the Isle of Man — Part 1 | KacheliTV World Classics

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Folk Tales of the Isle of Man — Part 1 Part One opens a new shelf: three tales from Sophia Morrison's Manx Fairy Tales (1911), collected on the Isle of Man and written down at Peel from the tellers who kept them — a wife too lazy to spin who must guess a giant's name, a farmer who follows his own cows into the Fairy Hill and comes home with the fairies' silver cup, and two humpback cobblers, one of whom earns a straight back from the fairy host and the other a second hump. Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. In this part: - The Lazy Wife — she will do nothing but sit in the corner of the chiollagh warming herself, and "Traa dy liooar" — time enough — is all her husband can get out of her; with one coarse ball spun and the weaver a week away, she bargains with the Giant up the mountain to spin her wool, if only she can learn his name before the week is out. - The Silver Cup — Colcheragh's fine cows come home tired and milkless, and a night hidden in the cow-house straw shows him why: the Little Fellows loose the yokes and gallop the herd to the Fairy Hill; he follows them in, refuses the feast, seizes the stirrup cup of carved silver, and runs for the churchyard with the whole Mob Beg at his heels. - Billy Beg, Tom Beg, and the Fairies — Tom Beg, lost in a grey mist on the mountain, is set to take the fairy password — Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday — and is paid with a straight back; Billy Beg goes the next night to earn the same wage, and adds one word too many. The tales: 00:45 — The Lazy Wife 11:27 — The Silver Cup 19:34 — Billy Beg, Tom Beg, and the Fairies What is not read: two tales stand held for a ruling and are not read or touched — The Buggane of Glen Meay Waterfall and The Fairy Child of Close ny Lheiy. Excluded by name from this shelf and not read: The Buggane of St. Trinian's, Tehi Tegi, The Witch of Slieu Whallian, King Magnus Barefoot, and Joe Moore's Story of Finn MacCooilley and the Buggane. The rest of Morrison's collection has not been screened for this shelf and is not read here; no completeness for Manx Fairy Tales is claimed. Source: Sophia Morrison, Manx Fairy Tales (London: David Nutt, 1911). Morrison (1859–1917) collected these tales on the Isle of Man; the reading copy is the Project Gutenberg plain text (No. 51762), public domain in the USA. The tales are read as printed, Morrison's light Manx dialect words standing as she printed them. Narrated by Magnolia. Opening and closing theme: Golden Monologue — with a short instrumental separator between stories, and no music under the narration. KacheliTV — world classics, read aloud.

    • Transcript
  • S171 · E1
    October 29 · 31 min

    Turkish Folk Tales — Part 1: The Ghost of the Spring and the Shrew · The Crow-Peri · The Piece of Liver | KacheliTV World Classics

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Turkish Folk Tales — Part 1: The Ghost of the Spring and the Shrew · The Crow-Peri · The Piece of Liver Part One opens a new shelf: Turkish folk tales collected by Ignác Kúnos from the mouths of the Turkish peasantry during his travels through Anatolia, in R. Nisbet Bain's English translation — a wood-cutter whose shrewish wife falls into a well and frightens the ghost who lives there, a fowler whose spared crow turns out to be a peri's servant, and a girl, a stork, and a piece of liver. Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. In this part: - The Ghost of the Spring and the Shrew — a poor wood-cutter's wife plumps into a deserted well; the ghost who lives in it is so desperate to be rid of her that he gives her husband three wooden tablets, and with them the man cures two possessed princesses — the second time by swearing his wife is at the door. - The Crow-Peri — a little fowler spares a crow, and she repays him four times over: a marvellous bird for the Padishah, an ivory palace, the bird's peri-queen mistress fetched by a ship-trick, and a healing drug guarded by lions. - The Piece of Liver — a stork snatches the liver a girl is washing, and she works the whole chain — barley-ear, rain, censer, boot, hide, straw, and a kiss — to win it back for her mammy. The tales: 00:43 — The Ghost of the Spring and the Shrew 14:29 — The Crow-Peri 25:28 — The Piece of Liver Source and rights: Ignác Kúnos, Turkish Fairy Tales and Folk Tales (London: A. H. Bullen, 1901), translated by R. Nisbet Bain; performed in Bain's printed English. Kúnos died in 1945 and Bain in 1909; the book and both its makers are in the public domain, and the reading copy is Project Gutenberg #64807. Held for a ruling and not read: Stone-Patience and Knife-Patience, and The Golden-Haired Children. Excluded by name and not read: The Magic Turban, the Magic Whip, and the Magic Carpet; The Cinder-Youth; Mad Mehmed; The Rose-Beauty; The Serpent-Peri and the Magic Mirror; and The Padishah of the Forty Peris. The four Roumanian Fairy Tales printed at the back of the volume are Romanian material and are not read here. No completeness for Kúnos's volume is claimed, and every other tale in it stands unscreened and unread. Narrated by Lulu. Music: Cello Makam Pulse — opening and closing theme, with a short instrumental separator between stories, and no music under the narration. KacheliTV — world classics, read aloud.

    • Transcript
  • S170 · E1
    October 29 · 21 min

    American Settler Legends — Part 1: Rip Van Winkle · The Baker's Dozen · Dunderberg · Peter Rugg, the Missing Man · The Windam Frogs | KacheliTV World Classics

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Part One of American Settler Legends opens a new shelf: five tales from Charles M. Skinner's Myths and Legends of Our Own Land (1896), the Dutch and English colonial legends of the Hudson Valley and New England — Rip Van Winkle's twenty-year sleep in Skinner's own retelling, an Albany baker taught what a dozen means, the goblin of Dunderberg, a Boston man still driving home through the storm, and the night Windham, Connecticut, armed itself against an army of frogs. Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. In this part: - Rip Van Winkle — Skinner's retelling of the Catskill legend: Rip follows a silent dwarf and his keg up South Mountain, drinks with the still, strange bowlers, and wakes twenty years later in a village that has become a republic. - The Baker's Dozen — Baas Volckert Jan Pietersen Van Amsterdam of Albany sends an old woman to the devil for one cake too many, is bewitched for his stinginess, and learns from Saint Nicolaus himself why a dozen is thirteen. - Dunderberg — the Heer of Donder Berg, the bulbous Dutch goblin of the Hudson Highlands, sends his imps out with the squalls, until a dominie's song of Saint Nicolaus routs him from a schooner's bowsprit. - Peter Rugg, the Missing Man — a Boston man swears he will see home that night in spite of the storm of 1770, and is driving still, his little daughter beside him, asking every road for the way to Boston. - The Windam Frogs — Windham, Connecticut (Skinner prints the tale's heading "Windam"), July 1758: the town turns out with muskets against voices in the night that cry "Colonel Dyer!" and "Elderkin, too!" — and finds its invaders in a ditch of fighting frogs. The tales: 00:59 — Rip Van Winkle 08:43 — The Baker's Dozen 12:01 — Dunderberg 14:48 — Peter Rugg, the Missing Man 19:00 — The Windam Frogs Source: Charles M. Skinner, Myths and Legends of Our Own Land (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott, 1896), read from the Project Gutenberg lawful copy. Skinner (1852–1907). This shelf tells American settler legends only — the colonial Dutch and English tradition Skinner collected here; it does not claim to cover the folk tales of the United States as a whole, and the traditions of the Native nations belong to their own shelves. Joel Chandler Harris's Uncle Remus is held for a future ruling and is not read. Narrated by Orson. Opening and closing theme: Imperial Violin Masquerade — with a short instrumental separator between stories, and no music under the narration. KacheliTV — world classics, read aloud.

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  • S147 · E19
    October 29 · 1 hr 20 min

    Russian Tsar Era Classics — The Death of Ivan Ilyich, Part 2, by Leo Tolstoy

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Russian Tsar Era Classics — The Death of Ivan Ilyich, Part 2, by Leo Tolstoy Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. (Part 2 of 2 — Chapters Five to Twelve.) This episode concludes the novella; Part 1 — Chapters One to Four — precedes it as Episode 4 of this season. A dramatized performance of Tolstoy's novella of a life examined at its end — the complete text in a fresh in-house English translation, performed by the KacheliTV cast. Ivan Ilyich Golovin has done everything as it should be done: the right school, the right service, the right marriage, the right furniture. Then a trivial fall — a knock against a window-frame knob while hanging curtains in the new flat — leaves a pain in his side that will not go away. As the doctors debate kidneys and caecums, Ivan Ilyich is left alone with the one question his correct life never taught him to ask: what if my whole life has been not the right thing? Tolstoy's twelve chapters follow him from the colleagues who hear of his death and think first of promotions, through the long solitude of the sofa, to the black bag, the light, and the last hour — the most famous reckoning with a wasted life in all literature, performed here in full. The chapters: 0:00 — Chapter Five 11:44 — Chapter Six 20:30 — Chapter Seven 32:22 — Chapter Eight 51:42 — Chapter Nine 59:17 — Chapter Ten 1:05:39 — Chapter Eleven 1:13:34 — Chapter Twelve Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910), «Смерть Ивана Ильича» — first published 1886 in «Русский вестник». Public domain. Russian text via ilibrary.ru. Fresh in-house English translation made for this production; no existing translation was used. Nothing has been cut — the novella is performed complete, all twelve chapters. A dramatized performance by the KacheliTV cast: narrated by Felix, with Orson as Ivan Ilyich, Magnolia as Praskovya Fyodorovna, Scratch as Gerasim, Silas as Pyotr Ivanovich and Fyodor Petrovich, Amos as Fyodor Vasilyevich and Peter, Benedetto as Shebek, the doctors, and the voice of Ivan Ilyich's soul, Bruno as the brother-in-law, and Violetta as Liza. Music: "Avian Impressions" (KacheliTV instrumental library) — opening theme, between the chapters, and closing theme. No music under the narration. Season 147 — Russian Tsar Era Classics, Episode 19 (Part 2 of 2; Part 1 is Episode 4). The shelf so far: Lefty, by Nikolai Leskov · The Queen of Spades, by Alexander Pushkin · The Overcoat, by Nikolai Gogol · The Death of Ivan Ilyich, by Leo Tolstoy. KacheliTV — world classics, read aloud.

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  • S147 · E4
    October 29 · 1 hr 32 min

    Russian Tsar Era Classics — The Death of Ivan Ilyich, Part 1, by Leo Tolstoy

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Russian Tsar Era Classics — The Death of Ivan Ilyich, Part 1, by Leo Tolstoy Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. (Part 1 of 2 — Chapters One to Four.) The novella is presented in two parts; Part 2 — Chapters Five to Twelve — follows as Episode 19 of this season. A dramatized performance of Tolstoy's novella of a life examined at its end — the complete text in a fresh in-house English translation, performed by the KacheliTV cast. Ivan Ilyich Golovin has done everything as it should be done: the right school, the right service, the right marriage, the right furniture. Then a trivial fall — a knock against a window-frame knob while hanging curtains in the new flat — leaves a pain in his side that will not go away. As the doctors debate kidneys and caecums, Ivan Ilyich is left alone with the one question his correct life never taught him to ask: what if my whole life has been not the right thing? Tolstoy's twelve chapters follow him from the colleagues who hear of his death and think first of promotions, through the long solitude of the sofa, to the black bag, the light, and the last hour — the most famous reckoning with a wasted life in all literature, performed here in full. The chapters: 0:57 — Chapter One 25:47 — Chapter Two 49:28 — Chapter Three 1:11:23 — Chapter Four Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910), «Смерть Ивана Ильича» — first published 1886 in «Русский вестник». Public domain. Russian text via ilibrary.ru. Fresh in-house English translation made for this production; no existing translation was used. Nothing has been cut — the novella is performed complete, all twelve chapters. A dramatized performance by the KacheliTV cast: narrated by Felix, with Orson as Ivan Ilyich, Magnolia as Praskovya Fyodorovna, Scratch as Gerasim, Silas as Pyotr Ivanovich and Fyodor Petrovich, Amos as Fyodor Vasilyevich and Peter, Benedetto as Shebek, the doctors, and the voice of Ivan Ilyich's soul, Bruno as the brother-in-law, and Violetta as Liza. Music: "Avian Impressions" (KacheliTV instrumental library) — opening theme, between the chapters, and closing theme. No music under the narration. Season 147 — Russian Tsar Era Classics, Episode 4 (Part 1 of 2; Part 2 is Episode 19). The shelf so far: Lefty, by Nikolai Leskov · The Queen of Spades, by Alexander Pushkin · The Overcoat, by Nikolai Gogol · The Death of Ivan Ilyich, by Leo Tolstoy. KacheliTV — world classics, read aloud.

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  • S168 · E1
    October 29 · 30 min

    Folk Tales of Wales — Part 1: The Fairy of the Dell · The Pellings · The Long-Lived Ancestors · Old Gwilym · The Old Man and the Fairies · The Fairies' Mint | KacheliTV World Classics

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Wales opens its shelf with six tales from P. H. Emerson's Welsh Fairy-Tales and Other Stories (1894), taken down in Anglesey in the winter of 1891–2: a fairy queen who cures a witch's victims at a sacred well, a fairy wife lost to a thrown bridle, the oldest animals in the world, a drunkard feasted by fairies, gold that turns to cockle-shells, and the fairies' own mint at work in an Anglesey mill by night. Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. In this part: - The Fairy of the Dell — the Queen of the Dell blesses a spring in Mona and cures those the old witch had blinded, lamed and horned; the witch repents, her book and wand are burned, the devils inside her are cast out, and she ends as the healer Madame Dorothy. - The Pellings — a young farmer seizes a fairy at the dance and will not let her go; he learns her name, Penelope, marries her on one condition — never strike her with iron — and loses her in an instant when a thrown bridle falls on her by chance. - The Long-Lived Ancestors — the Eagle of Gwernabwy, courting the Owl of Cwm Cwmlwyd, asks the Stag, the Salmon, the Blackbird and the Frog of Mochno Bog how old she is, and none of them has ever seen her younger. - Old Gwilym — Gwilym Evans finds a golden guinea on his way to buy cheese, drinks it away with the quarrymen, is feasted and bedded by the fairies, and wakes naked in a bunch of gorse. - The Old Man and the Fairies — carried under the earth to a palace of gold, an old man comes home with his bag full of gold; when his wife worries the secret out of him, the box under the bed holds only cockle-shells. - The Fairies' Mint — a miller watches his Anglesey mill lit up and working at midnight, and sees golden coins run where the flour runs; he leaves the fairies alone to coin their money. What is not read: these are selected tales, not the complete volume. Held for a ruling and not read: The Crows and The Baby-Farmer. Excluded by name and not read: The Fairies of Caragonan, The Story of Gelert, and Origin of the Welsh. The book's last six tales, which Emerson himself labels Irish, Scotch, Jersey, Shetland and French, are not Welsh and are not read. Emerson's notes and source commentary are not read; in The Pellings the tale text alone is performed, and Penelope's farewell is heard in the translation the book itself prints. The tales: 00:45 — The Fairy of the Dell 14:54 — The Pellings 18:17 — The Long-Lived Ancestors 22:16 — Old Gwilym 25:00 — The Old Man and the Fairies 27:32 — The Fairies' Mint Source: P. H. Emerson (1856–1936), Welsh Fairy-Tales and Other Stories (London: D. Nutt, 1894), the tales as printed; lawful copy Project Gutenberg #8675. Narrated by Silas. Opening and closing theme: Bandoneo Street Romance — with a short instrumental separator between stories, and no music under the narration. KacheliTV — world classics, read aloud.

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  • S147 · E17
    October 29 · 1 hr 4 min

    Russian Tsar Era Classics — Fathers and Sons, Part 6, by Ivan Turgenev

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Russian Tsar Era Classics — Fathers and Sons, Part 6, by Ivan Turgenev Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. Ivan Turgenev's "Fathers and Sons" (1862) — the great novel of the generation gap — in a fresh in-house English translation, performed by the KacheliTV cast. The complete novel is presented in six parts; this is Part 6 of 6 (Chapters 26–28). May 1859. Arkady Kirsanov comes home from university to his father's estate, Marino, bringing his friend Yevgeny Bazarov — a young medical student and a nihilist, who believes in nothing but what can be dissected, measured, and proved. In a few weeks Bazarov turns the quiet house upside down: he quarrels with Arkady's elegant uncle Pavel Petrovich over everything the older generation holds dear, charms the servants and peasant children, and then, in the town and at the estate of the widow Anna Sergeyevna Odintsova, meets the one force his philosophy cannot dissect. Turgenev's complete novel, carried as written — all twenty-eight chapters, from the dusty highway to the little village graveyard. The chapters: 0:17 — Chapter Twenty-Six: the portico, an overheard conversation, and a proposal answered — "Yes" 18:23 — Chapter Twenty-Seven: home again — the cut finger, the typhus, and the death of Bazarov 53:06 — Chapter Twenty-Eight: six months later — two weddings, Dresden, and the grave under the two young firs Source: Ivan Turgenev (1818–1883), «Отцы и дети» ("Fathers and Sons"), first published in the journal Russky Vestnik, February 1862 — public domain. Russian text via ilibrary.ru. Fresh in-house English translation made for this performance; no existing translation used. Dramatized performance by the KacheliTV cast: narrated by Violetta, with Scratch as Bazarov, Felix as Arkady, Amos as Nikolai Petrovich, Silas as Pavel Petrovich, Magnolia as Anna Sergeyevna Odintsova, Lulu as Fenechka, Orson as Vasily Ivanich, Madame de Pamplemousse as Arina Vlasyevna, Bruno as Sitnikov, Morgana as Kukshina, and Mira as Katya. Music: the theme (Cello Makam Pulse) opens and closes this part and returns briefly between the chapters. No music plays under the narration. Season 147 — Russian Tsar Era Classics, Episode 17. KacheliTV — world classics, read aloud.

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  • S158 · E2
    October 29 · 27 min

    Folk Tales of Scotland — Part 2 (Ten Tales): The Fox and the Goose · The Fox and the Cock · The Three Wise Men · The Origin of Loch Ness · The Cat and the Mouse · Why the Dallag is Called the King's Fish | KacheliTV World Classics

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Part Two of the West Highlands tales brings the bench home: ten more tales from J. F. Campbell's Popular Tales of the West Highlands — the two fox fables Campbell's collectors brought back, the great comic tale of the Three Wise Men, the little origin-story of Loch Ness, a singing mouse, three unanswerable questions, two hoodies, and the lawsuit that made the dog-fish the king's fish. Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. In this part: - The Fox and the Goose — the fox invites the goose to play at grinding corn, cheek teeth against cheek teeth; the goose talks back from inside the grip, and the fox's greed finishes the lesson at the cail-wife's meal chest. - The Fox and the Cock — the cock will not sleep alone in the hen-roost, and the fox's grinding game is played a second time — with the other ending. - The Three Wise Men — a gentleman is sent to find three men as senseless as himself, and a deaf miller sends a scholar on the same errand from the other side: a loaf carried against the dog, daylight carried out of a doorless house in a riddle, a drowned man weighed against his wife, and a salmon too big for its boat. - The Origin of Loch Ness — a well door left unshut, a flood out of a hillside spring, and the cry that named the loch. - The Cat and the Mouse — a song for a ransom, in Campbell's own translation of the verse: the mouse wants a tuning fork, and the cat will not listen. - The Three Questions — how many stars are in the lift, where is the middle of the earth, and what am I thinking: a miller answers a scholar three times, in two tellings. - How the Cock Took a Turn Out of the Fox — the cock, carried off in the fox's mouth, talks him into talking. - The Hoodie Catechising the Young One — a mother hoodie's whole school of safety, undone by one question about a stone in a pouch. - The Hoodie and the Fox — a wager on who rises first, lost before the day has well begun. - The Reason Why the Dallag is Called the King's Fish — two kings, one dog-fish, two hooks, and a lawsuit: Fionn keeps the fish, Lochlann pays the fine, and the dallag carries the king's name ever after. What is not read: Campbell's Gaelic parallel texts are not read anywhere in this episode, and neither are his introductions, notes, footnotes, or variant apparatus. In "The Three Questions," everything printed after the tale proper — Campbell's collection note and the long riddle collection that follows — is apparatus and is not read. In "The Cat and the Mouse," only the section Campbell heads TRANSLATION is read. Two tales stand held for a ruling and are not read or touched — The Chest and Murchag a's Mionachag. Excluded by name from this shelf and not read: The Young King of Easaidh Ruadh, the Battle of the Birds, The Hen, the Barra Widow's Son, and the supplement items Gwragedd Annwn, Urashima, and the Wishing Ring frame. The Fenian lays of Campbell's fourth volume are not read in this episode. With this part, every tale the shelf's source audit passed and benched has been told across Parts One and Two; no completeness for Campbell's volumes is claimed. Timestamps: 00:45 — The Fox and the Goose 02:53 — The Fox and the Cock 04:13 — The Three Wise Men 16:29 — The Origin of Loch Ness 17:41 — The Cat and the Mouse 18:52 — The Three Questions 21:09 — How the Cock Took a Turn Out of the Fox 22:30 — The Hoodie Catechising the Young One 23:50 — The Hoodie and the Fox 25:00 — The Reason Why the Dallag is Called the King's Fish Source: J. F. Campbell, Popular Tales of the West Highlands (1860–62), Campbell's English as printed. Narrated by Felix. Opening and closing theme: Bandoneo Street Romance — with a short instrumental separator between stories, and no music under the narration. KacheliTV — world classics, read aloud.

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  • S147 · E16
    October 29 · 1 hr 25 min

    Russian Tsar Era Classics — Fathers and Sons, Part 5, by Ivan Turgenev

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Russian Tsar Era Classics — Fathers and Sons, Part 5, by Ivan Turgenev Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. Ivan Turgenev's "Fathers and Sons" (1862) — the great novel of the generation gap — in a fresh in-house English translation, performed by the KacheliTV cast. The complete novel is presented in six parts; this is Part 5 of 6 (Chapters 22–25). May 1859. Arkady Kirsanov comes home from university to his father's estate, Marino, bringing his friend Yevgeny Bazarov — a young medical student and a nihilist, who believes in nothing but what can be dissected, measured, and proved. In a few weeks Bazarov turns the quiet house upside down: he quarrels with Arkady's elegant uncle Pavel Petrovich over everything the older generation holds dear, charms the servants and peasant children, and then, in the town and at the estate of the widow Anna Sergeyevna Odintsova, meets the one force his philosophy cannot dissect. Turgenev's complete novel, carried as written — all twenty-eight chapters, from the dusty highway to the little village graveyard. The chapters: 0:26 — Chapter Twenty-Two: the left turn at Fedot's — a cold reception, and Arkady rides to Marino by stealth 12:17 — Chapter Twenty-Three: Bazarov alone at Marino — Fenechka in the lilac bower, the rose, Pavel at the hedge 26:12 — Chapter Twenty-Four: the duel at dawn — the challenge, the shot in the fir grove, a fever's dreams 1:02:22 — Chapter Twenty-Five: the ash tree at Nikolskoye — Katya and Arkady; Bazarov's last visit to Anna Source: Ivan Turgenev (1818–1883), «Отцы и дети» ("Fathers and Sons"), first published in the journal Russky Vestnik, February 1862 — public domain. Russian text via ilibrary.ru. Fresh in-house English translation made for this performance; no existing translation used. Dramatized performance by the KacheliTV cast: narrated by Violetta, with Scratch as Bazarov, Felix as Arkady, Amos as Nikolai Petrovich, Silas as Pavel Petrovich, Magnolia as Anna Sergeyevna Odintsova, Lulu as Fenechka, Orson as Vasily Ivanich, Madame de Pamplemousse as Arina Vlasyevna, Bruno as Sitnikov, Morgana as Kukshina, and Mira as Katya. Music: the theme (Cello Makam Pulse) opens and closes this part and returns briefly between the chapters. No music plays under the narration. Season 147 — Russian Tsar Era Classics, Episode 16. KacheliTV — world classics, read aloud.

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  • S147 · E15
    October 29 · 1 hr 13 min

    Russian Tsar Era Classics — Fathers and Sons, Part 4, by Ivan Turgenev

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Russian Tsar Era Classics — Fathers and Sons, Part 4, by Ivan Turgenev Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. Ivan Turgenev's "Fathers and Sons" (1862) — the great novel of the generation gap — in a fresh in-house English translation, performed by the KacheliTV cast. The complete novel is presented in six parts; this is Part 4 of 6 (Chapters 19–21). May 1859. Arkady Kirsanov comes home from university to his father's estate, Marino, bringing his friend Yevgeny Bazarov — a young medical student and a nihilist, who believes in nothing but what can be dissected, measured, and proved. In a few weeks Bazarov turns the quiet house upside down: he quarrels with Arkady's elegant uncle Pavel Petrovich over everything the older generation holds dear, charms the servants and peasant children, and then, in the town and at the estate of the widow Anna Sergeyevna Odintsova, meets the one force his philosophy cannot dissect. Turgenev's complete novel, carried as written — all twenty-eight chapters, from the dusty highway to the little village graveyard. The chapters: 0:16 — Chapter Nineteen: the apology in the garden, Sitnikov's arrival, the road to Bazarov's parents 15:58 — Chapter Twenty: the old people's welcome — Vasily Ivanich's study, the dinner, a mother's fears 37:51 — Chapter Twenty-One: under the haystack — philosophy, a maple leaf, Father Alexey at cards, the farewell Source: Ivan Turgenev (1818–1883), «Отцы и дети» ("Fathers and Sons"), first published in the journal Russky Vestnik, February 1862 — public domain. Russian text via ilibrary.ru. Fresh in-house English translation made for this performance; no existing translation used. Dramatized performance by the KacheliTV cast: narrated by Violetta, with Scratch as Bazarov, Felix as Arkady, Amos as Nikolai Petrovich, Silas as Pavel Petrovich, Magnolia as Anna Sergeyevna Odintsova, Lulu as Fenechka, Orson as Vasily Ivanich, Madame de Pamplemousse as Arina Vlasyevna, Bruno as Sitnikov, Morgana as Kukshina, and Mira as Katya. Music: the theme (Bandoneo Street Romance) opens and closes this part and returns briefly between the chapters. No music plays under the narration. Season 147 — Russian Tsar Era Classics, Episode 15. KacheliTV — world classics, read aloud.

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  • S162 · E1
    October 29 · 29 min

    Folk Tales of the Baloch People (Balochistan) — Part 1 (The Man Who Stood All Night in the River · The Two Wrestlers · The Four Men Who Made the Figure of a Woman · The Clever Lad · The Three Fools · The Three Wonderful Gifts · Kismat Pari)

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! KacheliTV opens a new shelf: the Baloch people of the Indus frontier, in tales M. Longworth Dames collected in the Dera Ghazi Khan district and published in Folk-Lore in 1892–93 — contests of wit and strength and one of the great absurdity chains in world folklore. Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. In this part: The Man Who Stood All Night in the River — A king offers his daughter to whoever can stand a whole winter's night in the river. One man survives, his heart fixed on a distant fire — only to be refused on a point of logic. The princess turns the king's argument against him, with a griddle on the housetop and a fire in the yard. The Two Wrestlers — A wrestler of Shikarpur travels to Dera Ghazi Khan to challenge its champion, and is undone before they meet by the champion's daughter carrying in a "dead rat" on a spear-point: a young elephant. The match is held on a clod of earth on an old woman's palm. The Four Men Who Made the Figure of a Woman — On four night watches a wooden figure is shaped by the carpenter, clothed by the Darzi, jewelled by the goldsmith, and given breath by the Saiyid's prayer. At dawn all four claim her; the king's judgment turns on custom: it is the bridegroom who gives clothes to the bride. The Clever Lad — A king's discarded wife raises her son by the highway. When the king proclaims a palace to be built with the sky for its foundation, the lad takes the commission; on the road he hides three riddles in talk a king calls madness — read at once by a king's daughter. The first brick must be laid by a man who has never committed a fault — and the search brings the story home. The Three Fools — Three foolish Baloches quarrel over which of them a passing horseman salaamed. His answer — "the biggest fool of you" — sets them confessing: the door neither husband nor wife would speak first to shut, the white hair that cost a man every hair on his head, and the cowherd who paid a whole herd for a wife and child never seen. The Three Wonderful Gifts — Three brothers trade with their uncle's three hundred rupees for a bride: a bead that revives the dead, a flying couch, and a looking-glass that sees a hundred miles. When the glass shows the bride lying dead, the three gifts must work together, and the king must decide which brother earned her. Kismat Pari — A prince falls silent for love of Kismat Pari, glimpsed bathing in a garden pond. A faqir's pointing hand sends him eight days' journey to her bed; she has vowed to marry whoever comes to lie upon it, but her parents refuse a mortal, and the case goes up before the Prophet. The lovers are left wandering the world in search of each other. Chapters: The Man Who Stood All Night in the River — 0:39 The Two Wrestlers — 2:37 The Four Men Who Made the Figure of a Woman — 6:33 The Clever Lad — 8:33 The Three Fools — 14:50 The Three Wonderful Gifts — 20:52 Kismat Pari — 23:37 Source: Folk Tales of the Baloch People (Balochistan) — Balochi Tales, collected and translated by M. Longworth Dames, Folk-Lore, 1892–93. Public domain; read as printed, in English. Dames's spellings (Balochi, Baloches) stand as printed; the shelf bills the people as Baloch. Nine of Dames's nineteen tales are set aside under the channel's rules (among them The Tiger and the Fox, Balach and the Bulethis, Shah-Jehan and Aurangzeb); three more — The King who had a Boil on his Face, The King and the Four Thieves, and The Abduction of Samri — are held for a ruling. No completeness is claimed. Narrated by Benedetto. Theme: Imperial Violin Masquerade — opening, closing and separators only.

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