The Story of the Young Man Who Went Forth to Learn About Fear

I love this story. It’s not exactly one you’ll see reproduced by Disney, though. You’ll see why…

Once upon a time there were two brothers. One was very capable; the other was a dunce. He couldn’t manage to do anything right. The other brother did everything well—but he wouldn’t go into the churchyard at night to ring the bell. The place was scary—it made him shudder.

The younger brother had never shuddered—he wanted to learn how. So when his older brother was away and his father asked him to go to the churchyard to ring the bell, he leaped at the chance. Meanwhile, the father asked the sexton to go after him and see if he could give his son a good scare.

So the young brother went up the church tower to ring the bell. He was alone one minute; the next he turned around and saw a silent figure behind him, dressed all in white. The brother asked who it was; the figure said nothing. Three times the brother asked; three times the form was silent. So the brother took him for a ruffian and threw him down the stairs.

Turned out it was the sexton, and he’d broken his leg in the fall.

The young brother went out in the world to find out what fear was—and nobody could teach him. He sat down under a tree with seven hanged men swinging from it; he winds up trying to warm them with his fire and setting them on fire themselves (he’s not too bright), but he’s not scared.

Finally he winds up at a haunted castle. The king has offered his kingdom and the hand of his daughter to anyone who can spend three nights alone in the castle (I guess that’s one way to get around a bloody war of succession). The young man jumps at the chance.

On the first night, he’s approached by cats and dogs with blazing red eyes and sharp claws. He nails down their feet and kills them and dumps them in the moat.

On the second night, he’s visited by a bunch of ghouls playing ninepins with human bones. He leaps into the game and loses some money, but isn’t scared. He sees a dead man in a coffin and once again tries to warm him up, this time with body heat (ew). He lays down in the coffin next to the corpse, which tries to strangle him. Understandably miffed, he shuts the coffin lid and kicks the coffin into the moat.

On the third night, he’s visited by an evil old man who tries to kill him. He nails the man’s beard to an anvil and beats him until the old man offers to show him the riches of the kingdom. He leads the young man into the dark basement, shows him some dusty old chests—and then disappears, taking all the light. The young man has to feel his way out of a pitch-black dungeon—which is dusty, but not scary.

At the end of the day, the King is impressed, the daughter is impressed, and the young man wins the kingdom. But he still hasn’t learned how to be scared, or “how to shudder” as he puts it. Finally, his new wife dumps a barrel of fish over his head—and that’s when the young man learns how to shudder.

The moral of the story? Never try to warm up a corpse. They are ungrateful bastards and they just might try to strangle you.