I loved that book when I was a kid, and my daughter’s pretty fond of it these days. I’ve noticed a few things:
The cover claims that it’s “retold” by Arlene Mosel.
The front flap claims that it’s a “classic re-creation of an ancient Chinese folktale,” and the back flap says that Mosel “first heard the story of Tikki tikki tembo as a child.”
On the other hand, people have pointed out that the name “Tikki tikki tembo” doesn’t sound particularly Chinese, and the name Chang doesn’t mean (and has never meant) “little or nothing” as the book says. One long discussion that Wikipedia links to spends a lot of time discussing whether or not it’s a culturally insensitive book (and if so, just how culturally insensitive – a topic I’ll save for Cafe Society, not GQ), but also points out that another book published in 1968 claims a variation as a Japanese folktale. And a couple of contributors to the thread confirm they encountered it as kids in Japan.
But other variations are noted, as well. Which leads me to my questions:
Is Tikki tikki tembo, whatever the actual name used, an actual Chinese folktale?
Is it a folktale from some other culture?
Does it have an origin in one particular culture, or do similar tales come from lots of cultures?
How interesting. I have nothing to add regarding the origin of the name. I have a cousin that, when we were kids taught me this name by hitting me every time I didn’t get it right.
He would say the name rapidly then tell me it was my turn. If I got it wrong I got smacked. Nice, huh. Rinse, repeat until I learned it.
I thought he had made the phrase up just for a reason to torture me. So seeing this in print was quite a shock.
I’m away from my references until Thursday, but I have to say that:
The plot doesn’t sound familiar from the international folktale corpus. There are a lot of tales whose plots turn on unlikely names (e.g. Rumplestiltskin / Whuppity Stoorie etc.), but this doesn’t sound like any of them. Can you give more of the plot? There are some good indexes of Japanese tales available through JSTOR, but other than the name I can’t search based on what you’ve given me.
It sure doesn’t sound Chinese.
“Retold,” in a folktale context, usually means “loosely inspired by.”
Very few folktales are limited to one language or nation. Although they can have culture-specific features (oikotypes), in general, if you find a Chinese folktale, chances are pretty good you can find essentially the same story in other cultures nearby or even across the world.
How delightfully bizarre to find a thread on this! When I was a youngun I had a recording of this story on a 45 which (to my mother’s annoyance, no doubt) I played a lot. (Just as a frame of time reference, I played it on the hi-fi, and the B-side of the record was “Little Black Sambo” instead of the more politically correct “Little Brave Sambo” so that tells you we’re going back to somewhere near 1970 or so.) God knows why but just a few days ago this popped into my head after 35 years and Tikki Tikki Tembo became my earworm du jour. Here it is again just a few days later. Is this twilight-zoney, or what?
Unfortunately I have no answer to the question, and even more unfortunate is the probability that I’ll suffer the “Tikki Tikki Tembo” earworm again tonight at work. Hopefully my mind will settle on “Little Black Sambo” instead – that one had some pretty neat little songs.
“I’m Little Black Sambo, Little Black Sambo
Dressed in the prettiest clothes,
My jacket is red, my pants are blue
A green umbrella and purple shoes,
I’m Little Black Sambo, Little Black Sambo
Dressed in the prettiest clothes.[sup]*[/sup]”
[sup]*[/sup]I did not write these politically incorrect and possibly offensive lyrics nor do I endorse them. I repeat them here only with the hope that I will transfer my new current earworm out of my brain and into the skull of some unfortunate sucker who also knows the tune. I hope my plan works.
I wasn’t familiar with this story but searching a bit it turns out there is indeed a famous rakugo story that follows the same line. Rakugo is a traditional form of comedic monologue. The Japanese story is called Jugemu. There are several variations on the story. In one, the child falls in a river and drowns before his friends can explain what happened to adults. In another, he gets in a fight but by the time his opponent is done calling out his name no one feels like fighting anymore. In yet another, he doesn’t want to get out of bed and by the time his mother is done calling him, it’s already night.
In the Japanese story, his name is Paipo-paipo-paipo-no-shuuringan-shuuringan-guurindai-guurindai-no-pompokopii-no-pompokonaa-no-choukyuumei-no-chousuke
Even though this name is completely nonsensical in Japanese also, it makes more sense than in Chinese. Ancient Japanese names were quite long. For instance, very early emperors had names like Ikumeiribikoikichi-no-mikoto.
Basically: a mother has two kids. She names the older one Tikki tikki tembo… (the best thing in the world) and the younger, non-valued one Chang which (for the purposes of Mosel’s tale) means “little or nothing.” Chang falls into a well while they’re playing; TTT saves Chang by telling his mother, then getting the Old Man with the Ladder. Chang comes out OK.
Later, TTT falls into the well. Chang runs to tell his mother, but has to repeat TTT’s whole name several times before she pays attention to him; the same thing happens when he goes for the Old Man. TTT is rescued from the well, but spent so much time down there that it was a long time before he was healthy again.
jovan, it’s interesting to see that there is a known Japanese tale. I wonder if Mosel a) heard it as a Chinese tale herself, or b) for whatever reason decided to set her version of the story in China.
I remember this book. I love the fact that there’s a specific character called the Old Man With The Ladder. (That sounds like it should be the name of Iron and Wine’s next album…)
I can’t really find anything on JSTOR. One article I found mentions the Internet discussion in question but it’s used as an example of applying critical theories to children’s literature. (Harris, Violet J. “Applying Critical Theories to Children’s Literature.”) Haven’t found anything about the folktale itself.
By the way, I searched a bit more and found that the rakugo story Jugemu’s original form is attributed to one of the early stars of rakugo, Hikohachi Yonezawa (d. 1714).
The original story gives a better explanation for the long name: the parents of the newborn child, looking for an auspicious name ask a Buddhist monk for advice. He gave them a list of auspicious expressions from which they could chose a name. Taking no chance, the parents decided to squash all the expressions into a single name.
And, it turns out, I had only part of the child’s name in my last post. (There are variations, from teller to teller).
There is one connection to China, and that is the part (the silliest sounding) that goes: paipo-paipo-paipo-no-shuuringan-shuuringan-no-guurindai-guurindai-no-pompokopii-no-pompokonaa
The explanation given is that during the Tang dynasty, there was a kingdom in China called Paipo. The king was called Shuuringan and his queen was Guurindai. Their children were called Pompokopii and Pompokonaa and all of them lived long lives. Of course, all of this is made up. Now, none of these names wound “Chinese” but China is very large and there are many ethnicities that don’t speak Chinese. To an 18th century Japanese, these would sort of sound like names that might come from the far side of China.
I was waiting for my kids to get home so they could recite the name for me, me being unable to remember more than the first couple of parts to it! They do this story at school in the second grade or so, and one of my kids did it as his school play, so the entire class can recite it in a rather high, sing-song voice that is both cute and hilarious…
Holy crap, I was just thinking of this story too, but the best I could remember for the name was Riki-Tikki Tembo no Sarembo Pip Peri Pip Peri something something -embo. Wish I could speak Japanese-- as soon as I can one of the things I want to do is see rakugo (again. It wasn’t very helpful the first time around).
fiver, I think I had that record too, except I was a little kid in the 80s. Did my parents hang onto the record from somewhere, or buy it at a yard sale? I don’t think my copy had Tikki Tikki Tembo on the other side though. Did your version say this his pants were blue, or his trousers? I think mine had the latter. Odd the things we remember, ne?
Tikki Tikki Tembo, No Sa Rembo, Chari Bari Ruchi, Pip Peri Pembo
Does sound more Japanese than Chinese to me. Any of the names quoted (or guessed at) above could be Chinese names as pronounced in Japanese–since the same characters are used in both but pronounced differently.
There is no /ti/ sound in Japanese. And, anyway, I already quoted the Japanese version of this story, which is at least 300 years old. (And apparently fairly well known. I asked my wife about it and she remembered the whole name by heart.)
After some creative googling, I have some highly irrelevant news.
Growing up (in the '80s), my siblings and I used to sing a song whose plot was essentially identical to the Tikki Tikki Tembo story, except it happened in an anonymous American farm town, and the hero DOES drown in the well. The song was called (as it turns out) “Sama Kama Wacky Brown.” In this iteration of the story, the hero’s name is Eddie-Coochie-Catcha-Kama-Tosa-Neera-Tosa-Noka-Sama-Kama-Wacky Brown. I have discovered that the song was popularized by The Brothers Four, and was the second track on their first album, published in 1960. That link also gives the lyrics, if you’re interested.
Every time I hear about Tikki Tikki Tembo I think about Rikki Tikki Tavi, the mongoose from Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book, which Wiki states was published in 1894. The story takes place in India. A connection there, perhaps?
Starving Artist, I don’t know if there’s a connection outside of a few of our heads, but growing up I always thought RTT was TTT’s pet.
While the question’s still open, can I ask about the name’s cadence? That is, to some people reared on Sesame Street, the numbers 1 - 12 go one.two.three…FOUR…FIVE…six.seven.eight.NINE.TEN…eleven.twelve, and certain letters of the alphabet come closer together.
As RhythmOlderBrother used to read it to wee Rhythmdvl (before I could read), it went something like:
Tikki Tikki TEM-bo | No Sa REM-bo | Chari Bari RU-chi | Pip Peri PEM-bo
With (as best as I can describe it) quarter notes for the first two syllables in each bar, a dotted quarter in the third, and a slightly clipped fourth syllable. The sing-song pronunciation pretty much followed suit. (I really hope all that was coherent).
Man I loved that book. Well, that and that and learning to read from RhythmOlderBrother
