STORIES FOR KIDS
In spite of the title stories of monsters for kids, it is not a scary or horror story because of the fantastic character that it has and the funny and entertaining monsters that take part in it.
Let it be noticed that the style of the tales about monsters is very simple, with very short sentences and quite basic ideas, like hunger, play, monsters and friendship.
Because it is based on a true story of children-monsters it is a rather personalized story. It is funny that the children may have certain identification with the monsters.
The true story consisted of a walk around a large park which had a small lake. The photos are of the lake, and one can see that it does indeed look like a lake of monsters that provoked more fear and horror than the actual story.
It is a funny, fantastic story with a moral, because it warns children about the dangers of getting too close to a lake with the excuse of the existence of monsters which eat kids.
At the same time, it is insinuated to them that whatever strange thing that children see must be told to their parents.
There are other morals more or less direct but I will leave them to the analysis of the story teller and the children’s sense.
THE LAKE OF MONSTERS
Once upon a time,
in a little village near Brussels called Tervuren,
there was a big park and in the middle of the park
there was an enormous wood and in that wood,
there was a dark and gloomy lake
and in that lake there lived a Monster called Monstruo.
Monstruo had eaten all the other monsters
who used to live in the lake and all the children
who used to go near the side of the lake
and for that reason, he had an enormous round tummy.
It was so big that when the monster moved,
it scraped along the bottom of the lake
and so that he could move better,
he had to hold on to the branches of the trees around the lake
and they were all broken and almost touching the water.
Monstruo the M... was hungry; there was no more to eat;
he had eaten all the monsters
and the children didn't go near the side of the lake anymore
because they were scared.
Until one day, near the lake,
a group of children were playing football
and one little boy kicked the ball so hard
that it landed near one corner of the lake.
Monstruo, who was getting more and more hungry every day,
looked at the round thing near the corner of the lake
and thought: I could eat that. So he went to the corner,
his tummy scraping along the ground
and holding on to the branches of the trees
and with one gulp in one mouthful he swallowed the ball.
So the monsters and the children who were inside his tummy
began to play a game of football
and one monster kicked the ball so hard that it blew up.
All the air inside the ball began to escape
and the monster's tummy began to get bigger and bigger
until it too exploded.
So all the monsters came out of the monster's tummy
and all the children went running home
to tell their parents "we're here at last"
and to tell them everything that had happened.
Monstruo's tummy was not big and round anymore
and it didn't touch the ground and he was thin.
He could walk without grabbing
on to the branches of the trees,
but most of all he had friends.
There were more monsters in the lake
and he could play with them.
So Monstruo thought:
"I'm not going to eat any more monsters or children".
And from that moment on,
Monstruo only ate fruit from the trees near the lake
and when children went near the side of the lake,
Monstruo gave them rides on his enormous tail.
And they all live happily ever after
And now…
NOW, SLEEP!