--- title: The Endless Tale. — Fifty Famous Stories Retold · full text with trees description: The Endless Tale., «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin: the whole chapter, every sentence with its dependency tree and pragmatics. It begins: In the Far East there was a great king who had no work to do. --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [Fifty Famous Stories Retold](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/) / The Endless Tale. # The Endless Tale. The Endless Tale. of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin: the whole text, 43 sentences and 672 words. Every sentence has its own page with its syntax tree and pragmatics, parsed by Mova itself; 1 of them are in the tales treebank and were checked by a teacher model. - [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/1/) — In the Far East there was a great king who had no work to do. - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/2/) — Every day, and all day long, he sat on soft cush-ions and lis-tened to stories. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/3/) — And no matter what the story was about, he never grew tired of hearing it, even though it was very long. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/4/) — "There is only one fault that I find with your story," he often said: "it is too short." - [5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/5/) — All the story-tellers in the world were in-vit-ed to his palace; and some of them told tales that were very long indeed. - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/6/) — But the king was always sad when a story was ended. — checked by a teacher - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/7/) — At last he sent word into every city and town and country place, offering a prize to any one who should tell him an endless tale. - [8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/8/) — He said,-- - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/9/) — "To the man that will tell me a story which shall last forever, I will give my fairest daugh-ter for his wife; and I will make him my heir, and he shall be king after me." - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/10/) — But this was not all. - [11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/11/) — He added a very hard con-di-tion. " - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/12/) — If any man shall try to tell such a story and then fail, he shall have his head cut off." - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/13/) — The king's daughter was very pretty, and there were many young men in that country who were willing to do anything to win her. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/14/) — But none of them wanted to lose their heads, and so only a few tried for the prize. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/15/) — One young man invented a story that lasted three months; but at the end of that time, he could think of nothing more. - [16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/16/) — His fate was a warning to others, and it was a long time before another story-teller was so rash as to try the king's patience. - [17](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/17/) — But one day a stran-ger from the South came into the palace. - [18](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/18/) — "Great king," he said, "is it true that you offer a prize to the man who can tell a story that has no end?" - [19](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/19/) — "It is true," said the king. - [20](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/20/) — "And shall this man have your fairest daughter for his wife, and shall he be your heir?" - [21](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/21/) — "Yes, if he suc-ceeds," said the king. " - [22](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/22/) — But if he fails, he shall lose his head." - [23](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/23/) — "Very well, then," said the stran-ger. " - [24](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/24/) — I have a pleasant story about locusts which I would like to relate." - [25](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/25/) — "Tell it," said the king. " - [26](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/26/) — I will listen to you." - [27](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/27/) — The story-teller began his tale. - [28](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/28/) — "Once upon a time a certain king seized upon all the corn in his country, and stored it away in a strong gran-a-ry. - [29](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/29/) — But a swarm of locusts came over the land and saw where the grain had been put. - [30](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/30/) — After search-ing for many days they found on the east side of the gran-a-ry a crev-ice that was just large enough for one locust to pass through at a time. - [31](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/31/) — So one locust went in and carried away a grain of corn; then another locust went in and carried away a grain of corn; then another locust went in and carried away a grain of corn." - [32](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/32/) — Day after day, week after week, the man kept on saying, "Then another locust went in and carried away a grain of corn." - [33](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/33/) — A month passed; a year passed. - [34](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/34/) — At the end of two years, the king said,-- - [35](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/35/) — "How much longer will the locusts be going in and carrying away corn?" - [36](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/36/) — "O king!" said the story-teller, "they have as yet cleared only one cubit; and there are many thousand cubits in the granary." - [37](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/37/) — "Man, man!" cried the king, "you will drive me mad. - [38](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/38/) — I can listen to it no longer. - [39](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/39/) — Take my daughter; be my heir; rule my kingdom. - [40](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/40/) — But do not let me hear another word about those horrible locusts!" - [41](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/41/) — And so the strange story-teller married the king's daughter. - [42](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/42/) — And he lived happily in the land for many years. - [43](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/45/43/) — But his father-in-law, the king, did not care to listen to any more stories. - ← previous: [The Barmecide Feast.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/44/) - next →: [The Blind Men and the Elephant.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/46/) - ↑ back to [Fifty Famous Stories Retold](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/)