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The Same Story in Different Countries
I was reading a book of Italian stories. The writer was Italo Calvino. I found something very interesting. One story was almost the same as a famous Japanese story!
The Japanese story is called “Spiderweb” (Kumo no Ito). It was written by Akutagawa Ryunosuke. Many Japanese people know this story.
The Italian Story
The Italian story is about St. Peter’s mother. She was a very selfish woman. She never helped other people. She went to hell when she died.
But one time in her life, she did help someone. She gave one piece of leek to a poor old woman. Just one small piece.
God saw this one good thing she did. So God decided to help her. He sent down a leek leaf to pull her out of hell.
She grabbed the leaf. She started going up. But then other people in hell saw her. They grabbed onto her clothes. They also wanted to get out.
The woman became angry. She shouted, “No! Get away! This is only for me! You should have a holy son like I do!” She kicked the other people.
She moved so much that the leek leaf broke. She fell back down into hell.
The Same Message
This story is very similar to Akutagawa’s “Spiderweb.” In the Japanese story, a bad man grabs a spider’s web to escape hell. But he also becomes selfish and falls back down.
Both stories teach us the same thing: being selfish is bad.
Stories Travel Everywhere
Calvino said this story is known all over Europe. The oldest version is from Germany in the 1500s!
I wanted to know where Akutagawa got his idea. I found out he read a translation of an English book called “Karma” by Paul Carus. That book had the same story.
This taught me something important. Many famous stories are not completely new. They come from old stories that people told each other for hundreds of years.
In Calvino’s book, I found many stories I knew. They were like “Little Red Riding Hood” and “Beauty and the Beast.” These stories exist in many countries.
Why Learning Languages Helps
I could read these stories because I know English and Italian. This helped me learn about different cultures.
Stories connect people all over the world. When you learn English, you can discover these connections too.
I hope you will keep studying English. Someday, you might follow your own “cultural spiderweb” around the world!
私立学校に英語教師として勤務中、40代半ばに差し掛かったころ、荒れたクラスを立て直す策として、生徒に公言して英検1級に挑戦することを思い立つ。同様の挑戦を繰り返し、退職までに英検一級（検定連合会長賞）、TOEIC満点、国連英検SA級、フランス語一級、スペイン語一級（文科大臣賞）、ドイツ語一級、放送大学大学院修士号などの成果を得る。
アメリカで生徒への対応法を学ぶ為に研修（地銀の助成金）。最新の心理学に触れた。4都県での全発表、勤務校での教員への研修を英語で行う。現在も特別選抜クラスの授業を全て英語で行っている。「どうやって単語を覚えればいいですか？」という良くある質問に答える為、印欧祖語からの派生に基づく「生徒には見せたくない語源英単語集」を執筆中。完成間近。常日頃洋書の読破で様々な思考にふれているが、そうして得た発想の一つを生かして書いた論文がコロナ対策論文として最近入賞。賞品の牛肉に舌鼓をうっている。元英検面接委員