Johnny Nut and the Golden Goose

In the village of Hergnies, where the geese are said to be the finest in all the land, there lives a simple cow-boy named Johnny Nut who has never once tasted roast goose. His craving sends him wandering through a France that feels lifted from the oldest fireside stories: he loses a chicken, a cow, and nearly a bride in a cascade of mishaps that would make even the most patient traveler weep. But fortune favors the foolish, and Johnny stumbles upon a magnificent golden goose whose feathers no one can resist touching. When a band of greedy villagers try to pluck them, they find themselves stuck fast, wobbling after the boy in an absurd parade across the countryside. The climax arrives at the palace, where a melancholy princess has never once laughed in all her days. One glimpse of Johnny's ridiculous procession, and something magical happens. Charles Deulin's 1887 tale, adapted by the great folklorist Andrew Lang, pulses with the rude health of oral tradition: broad humor, counterintuitive wisdom, and the ancient fairy tale certainty that kindness and foolishness often wear the same face. For readers who want to remember what it felt like to believe in impossible luck.