This was made to anime but my retelling is way better, even though I didn't watch the anime, so read this.
One of the most enduring folktales, and, to my mind, one of the sweetest, is the Japanese folktale of The Bamboo Princess.
The story begins with a bamboo cutter who is very poor, which makes sense as it can’t really be that hard to cut bamboo so naturally his skill won’t pay well. The bamboo cutter’s name is Taketori no Okina, which is a mouthful so I’ll just call him bamboo cutter. Also, his name translates as “Old Man Who Harvests Bamboo” which shows that his parents really didn’t love him very much. So anyway, one day, he cuts open a bamboo, and, lo and behold, a beautiful tiny girl is found within. As apparently this was something not out of the ordinary in ancient Japan, the bamboo cutter is not at all terrified or screaming exorcism prayers; instead, he takes the girl home to his wife, and they adopt the bamboo girl as their own, because the couple conveniently did not have a child. The girl grows in beauty, intelligence, skill, manners… I could go on but to sum it up, she is the perfect Asian daughter. She is so perfect that whilst Asian children bring disgrace on their parents when they “why you not like Mr, Chan’s son, he engineer”- since bamboo cutter found his daughter, every time he cuts bamboo, he finds gold.
The bamboo cutter and his wife name the bamboo girl Kaguya-hime, whose name means “Shining Princess of The Supple Bamboo”, and well can she be called a princess because in two years, with all the gold Bamboo Cutter has been accumulating, they become so staggeringly wealthy that Bernie Sanders wants to tax them. Oh, also, in two years, she grew from tiny baby to a normal size legal age adult, bringing light to what boomers mean when they say “we matured faster back in the old days”.
News of Kaguya-hime’s beauty spread, and soon, five super dashing princes come to try to win her hand. I forgot their names, but I’m sure they were mouthfuls like her father’s, so Imma just call them Harry, Zayn, Liam, Nial, and Louie, for no particular reason. But Kaguya doesn’t want to marry them, although her father is anxious to marry her off, as father’s are when their daughters have already reached the ripe old age of two. Kaguya-hime, being a good daughter, finally agrees, on the condition that they go off and do impossible tasks. Since the tasks are impossible, none of them are able to achieve them. They all live though, except for Zayn, who has been dead to me since 2015.
Now, after all this, The Emperor of Japan hears of the famed beauty of Kaguya-hime. The Emperor is puzzled that a commoner could be so beautiful so he goes himself comes to see if it is true. And what he sees is more than he could have ever dreamed of, or perhaps, the stuff dreams are made of. He falls in love, and, as men in love do, asks her to marry him. But Kaguya-hime refuses, telling him “I am not of this country; I cannot live with you.” She and the emperor kept in touch and would write letters to each other. Despite the refusal, the Emperor still loved Kaguya-hime with all his heart.
“Anime is degenerate.” - Plato, probably
That summer, whenever the full moon came about, Kaguya-hime’s eyes would fill with tears as she would gaze at the bright orb that illuminated the world below. “What’s wrong?” her parents would ask, and she would shake her head, until finally she could bear it no longer; she told them the truth.
“I am not of this world,” she said weeping. Then, casting her lovely eyes to a world that no mortal man had ever set foot on, she continued, “I am part of the celestial beings. I come from the moon. I have committed a crime and have been sent here for punishment, but now my punishment is over and I must go back….” her voice trails for a little as she looks at her parents faces, willing them to understand what she knows they cannot. “The gold,” she says, in a desperate attempt to clear the matter “the gold you found, it was in payment for my upkeep…”. But the gold meant nothing to them without a daughter- their daughter, their own lovely Kaguya-Hime- to love and care for.
The day came, just as Kaguya-hime knew it would, when the heavenly beings, in all their splendor, descended to earth to take their own back with them. Beings of great beauty, of great strength- the Moon people, as they were known to those on earth, dazzled and blinded the mortals sent by the emperor to guard his true love. Her parents clung to her, weeping, knowing that there was nothing they could do- or anyone could do. “I love you,” Kaguya-hime said to her parents, as she held them close to her heaving chest. Then, she drew from her robes a small vial and a letter, and beckoned to a guard stationed nearby. “Give this to the Emperor…” she told him, but she never quite got to finish, as a celestial, in all his radiant splendor, approached and draped a feathery cloak on her shoulder.
The Kaguya-hime her parents knew and the Kaguya-hime the emperor loved was gone, it seemed. In her place was the same striking woman, but no tears were falling now from her eyes. She seemed more like an ideal- a living statue of a regal queen,untouched by the degenerate emotions that plagued mortals. And she rose, together with her people away to Tsuki no Miyako, or, as it is translated in English, The City of The Moon.
When the Emperor heard of what happened, he was overcome with grief. The vial that Kaguya-hime had given him contained the Elixir of immortality; but life had no meaning for the Emperor without her. “Find the highest mountain and burn the gift she sent me”, the Emperor instructed his soldiers. “Perhaps the scent will reach the heavens and perhaps she will think of me.”
And so the legend goes that the word不死 (fushi), which is translated in English to immortality, is the basis for the Mountain which the Japanese call Mt. Fuji, from where the Emperor had the elixir of immortality burned.
Folktales endure because they often speak of the human condition in so humble a language that the reader is touched by the deeper meaning behind the facade of simplicity, although he may sometimes lack the means of articulating what he feels.
The story of Kaguya-hime is touching enough by itself but it’s made more beautiful when one knows of the culture when the story was written. Back then, it was custom for Japanese nobles who had committed crimes to be exiled for a little bit. Could it have been possible that the tale was based somewhat on an actual event, with the mystical aspects simply representing the divide that a peasant would feel regarding his class and the nobility? It is hard to say, although very tempting to let one’s imagination run wild. But more than the possibility of whether the events were inspired by reality is the theme of this story; the conflict between love and duty.
The first love was for family, as embodied in Kaguya-hime’s relationship with her parents, the second love being the doomed romantic love between her and the Emperor. The love for family is pretty self explanatory. With the Emperor, it shows a romantic love that was unconditional, albeit doomed. The Emperor didn’t try to have Kaguya-hime killed for refusing him, and neither did he threaten her to marry him. He didn’t break off or sulk away when she said no. He was, it seems, content to keep in correspondence with her; in essence, he just loved her for who she was, and not in a controlling or possesive way, as some of these folktales happen to venture into.
The conflict arises when duty comes in. And the duty here is a product of her circumstance; Kaguya-hime is a celestial being, and not a mortal. Her duty is first and foremost to be with her people. Kaguya-hime loved her family, cared for the Emperor, and didn’t want to be separated from them. And yet, when the celestials came, she did not fight or bargain with them; she accepted, meekly, her duty, and was rewarded for it by a place in the heavenly city and the loss of her humanity.