The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales
 | |
| Author | Jon Scieszka |
|---|---|
| Cover artist | Lane Smith |
| Country | United States |
| Genre |
children's books picture books |
| Publisher | Viking Press |
Publication date | 1992 |
| Pages | 56 |
| ISBN | 978-0-670-84487-6 |
| OCLC | 25248190 |
| [E] 20 | |
| LC Class | PZ8.S3134 St 1992 |
The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales is a postmodern children's book written by Jon Scieszka and illustrated by Lane Smith. Published in 1992 by Viking, it is a collection of twisted, humorous parodies of famous children's stories and fairy tales, such as "Little Red Riding Hood", "The Ugly Duckling" and "The Gingerbread Man". Illustrated in a unique style by Lane Smith, the book won the New York Times Best Illustrated Book award, was a Caldecott Honor book, and has won numerous other awards in various countries.
The book has proved to be popular with children and adults, as its lighthearted approach creates interest while educating young readers about some of the features of books (such as title and contents) by poking fun at those conventions.
The book was re-released in a tenth anniversary edition in 2002, and included a new story.
Plot
The star of the book is Jack of Jack and the Beanstalk, who tells the stories and deals with the rest of the cast. There's a very annoying Little Red Hen that comes in to complain about no one helping her make her bread (or do anything.) Chicken Licken believes that the sky is falling, and demands that someone calls the President. Jack introduces Little Red Running Shorts, a counterpart of Little Red Riding Hood, by blurting out the entire story — including the ending — so she refuses to be in it. The Stinky Cheese Man, a counterpart of The Gingerbread Man, is afraid to be near anyone because he thinks they will eat him... though they are really trying to get away from his horrid smell.
Also in the book are "The Princess and the Bowling Ball", "The Other Frog Prince", "The Really Ugly Duckling", "Cinderumplestiltskin" and "The Tortoise and the Hair". In the first, a retelling of The Princess and the Pea, the Prince finally finds a girl he really loves. Sick of his parents rejecting potential wives when they don't feel a pea under one hundred mattresses, he slips his bowling ball under her mattresses when his parents have her over. In "The Other Frog Prince", the princess kisses the frog: he says "I was just kidding," and hops back in the lake. "The Really Ugly Duckling" (a parody of Hans Christian Andersen's The Ugly Duckling), grows up to be a Really Ugly Duck, rather than a swan. "Cinderumplestiltskin" combines Cinderella and Rumplestiltskin. In "The Tortoise and the Hair", a re-telling of The Tortoise and the Hare, the Hare says he can grow his hair (one on the top of his head) faster than the Tortoise can run. So they race, and race, and race; this story has no ending, the last words of it being "not the end".
The foreword includes a parody of Goldilocks and the Three Bears as an example of a "Fairly Stupid Tale". Also, the table of contents includes the title, "The Boy Who Cried Cow Patty," a story nowhere in the book. The latter story was printed on the back of the dust jacket for the book's tenth anniversary edition (whereas the original edition had the Little Red Hen complaining about buying this book while asking who "this ISBN guy" is and complaining that she's only in three of the pages as a book gag).