Juha, Part 3

I think that the last third of Tales of Juha was actually my least favorite.  There was less variety in these anecdotes, especially in chapter seven (“A Witty Rogue”) and chapter nine (“Justice and Generosity”).  The tales in both of these chapters took place nearly exclusively in court, and though I thought that some of them were clever, I felt like it got redundant after a while, especially since many of them started similarly, either describing the judge or telling us that Juha himself was the judge.  A few started out describing the crime that led the people to go to the judge, but regardless, they all wound up in the same place.

A tale that I did enjoy was the one where Juha told the man to take his nothing and be off.  The whole situation was absurd, with a man going to court in order to get paid the nothing he had been promised.  It’s the sort of situation that can only be setting you up for a punchline.  When Juha had the man find nothing under the book, then instructed him to take it, the situation became even more absurd.  As far as I’m concerned, everyone wound up happy.  One man got his nothing, the other didn’t have to pay it, and Juha got an interesting story to tell.

My favorite chapter in the last third of the book was chapter six, “Boastfulness and False Pride.”  I enjoyed it because we all know at least one person who just can’t resist any opportunity to brag.  Because that sort of behavior can annoy us and grow very old, very quickly, we can’t help but laugh when someone like that gets knocked down just a notch (though they’re usually back to their original state in no time).  I loved it when Juha was building up a grand tale about his horsemanship, and a friend of his cut in and told Juha’s audience that Juha had actually fallen off of the horse.  I love the mental image of Juha getting the crowd excited, and preparing himself to put them in awe of him, only to be humbled by someone who knows him too well to fall for his tales.

Another false pride tale that I enjoyed was the one where Juha fell off of his donkey, with his foot still stuck in the stirrup, but tried to play it off as intentional nonetheless.  I’m pretty sure that most people have done something similarly clumsy and then (jokingly or not) said something along the lines of “Uh…I meant to do that” as they pick themselves up and/or gather their scattered belongings.  I can’t count the number of times that I’ve stumbled and then just tried to play it off as though nothing happened or laughed about it to try and appear confident in my walking abilities (despite the evidence that I could use some work).

The last chapter, “Critic of Despotism,” was even more political than the stories about corrupt judges.  I won’t lie; I had to do an internet search to find out who Tamerlane was.  Once I did, the tales started to make sense.  They were, perhaps, a coping mechanism for the oppressed people who lived under him.  I enjoy learning about how people use humor to deal with adversity, so it was neat to see that it was done even long ago.