Chapter One
1. Now, in the reign of David, King of Israel, there was born unto Peleth, son of Gireal, Gimael, and unto Gimael was born Ahazael,
2. And unto Ahazael was born Nun,
3. And unto Nun was born Kish.
4. Now unto Kish was born a daughter of a fair countenance whose name was Leah, and after his wife had died, he remarried.
5. Now, in the fourth month, Kish took to wife Abigail, the daughter of Seth;
6. And Abigail had borne a daughter whose countenance was ugly, and her name was Myra.
7. Now, in their hearts, Abigail and Myra despised Leah for her beauty and charity.
8. And they sought diligently in their hearts to make her life a misery, and plotted how they might go about it.
9. Now Kish, the son of Nun gave up the ghost, in the fourth hour of the ninth month.
10. And Kish left all his fine herds of cattle and his fine riches of gold, and of precious jewells to Abigail.
11. And Abigail and Myra made Leah an maidservant. And called her Cinderella, for, did she not linger among the ashes?
12. And Leah was kind hearted, and never complained or despised them.
13. Now, in the tenth month, King David held a royal ball for all the young ladies of Israel. And Solomon was to take to wife a few fair young ladies.
14. Now Abigail and her household were given an invitation to the ball, and therefore Leah had labor tenfold.
Chapter Two
1. And Cinderella worked diligently. And inquired of Abigail if she might go to the ball, too.
2. And Abigail sought for an answer. And Myra delivered one unto her, and said, shall a scullery maid go to the ball? Yea, even Cinderella? Nay, but she shall have more work to do and then she cannot go.
3. And Abigail thought on these things, and, lo, she decided upon this thing.
4. And Abigail called unto Cinderella, and said, If thou truly desire in thine heart to go to the ball, thou must first please me with cleaning the house good. Clean the windows, the floors and the surfaces. Sweep everywhere, and paint the white room.
5. And in her heart, Cinderella was troubled, for she had already swept and wiped, and now, must she paint also?
6. And Cinderella did all that her stepmother said. And, behold, she was not ready, and her dress not fixed. And she went sorrowfully up unto her room, and wept.
7. But when she got there, lo, in front of her was an old and wise fairy.
8. And the fairy said unto Cinderella, My child, fear not! For I will get thee to the ball. But first, bring me a pumpkin of golden color.
9. And Cinderella, doubting but little in her heart, went to the garden and plucked the most golden pumpkin she could find, and laid it at the feet of the fairy.
10. And the fairy turned it into a sparkling carriage of gold. And Cinderella was astounded at the sight, and nearly fell faint.
11. And the fairy asked for four mice of white color, and Cinderella brought them unto her.
12. And the fairy turned them into four white horses of great strength. And also inquired if Cinderella had an cat.
13. And Cinderella answered yes, and brought it unto her. And, lo, the fairy turned it into coachman.
14. And then, the fairy turned to Cinderella and turned her rags into a dress of a thin gold color.
15. And with one warning, Thou shalt come back at midnight, or thy fine clothes and carriage and all shall vanish to what they were before!
16. And Cinderella pondered her words, and remembered them.
Chapter Three
1. And she did leave for the ball.
2. And when she did enter, she was astounded greatly. And, lo, the prince was dismissing many a young princess.
3. And as she did enter, Solomon was also astounded. And walked up to her, and dIanced with her.
4. But as he was about to marry her, lo, the clock struck twelve.
5. And she did run, and tripped down a step. And lost an glass slipper,
6. And she ran to her carriage, and did get in, but all was gone, in the twinkling of an eye.
7. And she did run through the forest with great fear, and was at her house soon.
8. And, lo, the prince made an proclomation, and it read, Whomever finds this princess whose foot slippeth into this tiny slipper, shall be rewarded. And I shall take her to wife, and thou art to go throughout all the kingdom and try the slipper on every girl, maidservant or princess.
9. And when word of it got to Cinderella, she rejoiced greatly in her heart, and made merry.
10. Now, Abigails daughter had been rejected, and Abigail was stirred up in her heart, for, lo, was not Cinderella more beautiful?
11. And when the grand duke got unto the house of Abigail, he did try the slipper on Myra.
12. And, lo, Myra did push and pull, but to no avail.
13. And, lo, when the grand duke asked if there might be any other girl in the house, Abigail sought in her heart of what to say.
14. And, lo, she beared a false witness, and said, My Lord, be it known unto you that there is no other girl in the house. For, if there was, would she not have been here with us?
15. And as the grand duke was getting ready, lo, Cinderella ran down the stairs.
16. And as she did run, she did trip. And, lo, the other slipper fell out. For, did she not wisely keep it in her pocket?
17. And the grand duke was astounded, and hurriedly tried it upon her foot.
18. And, lo, it did fit. And he took her away with him to the prince.
19. And, was there ever a finer wedding seen around? Nay, and for Abigail and Myra, they were made to live in a cottage, and do all the work.
PLEASE tell me exactly what you think, I love honest reviews :)
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125,018 Literary Works • 672,857 Reviews
My first question is why you numbered the sentences. It was really good and quite fun to read. There are only a couple of things I’d like to point out to you because otherwise, this is pretty good. Firstly, in number ten in chapter one you said “And Kish left all his fine herds of cattle and his fine riches of gold, and of precious jewells to Abigail.” ‘Jewels’ has an extra ‘l’ which you can probably see now. Second, in number eleven in the same chapter you say “And Abigail and Myra made Leah an maidservant.” Is the ‘an’ supposed to be that way? I am not familiar with old English or as proficient as you are in it and I am not sure if it is supposed to be like that. If it is supposed to be like that might I suggest in changing your words such as ‘color’ to ‘colour’ as old English was originally based in Europe. Oh, and something I found really interesting, though I hope I don’t sound too pompous or rude when I say that it wasn’t so much old English. In fact, old English is almost unrecognizable to what we call English now. What you have written is closer to what experts call Middle English; the transition between this old English, closer to Latin, to what we have now. Though, I do love your writing, don’t get me wrong.
Now, on to more important matters than history (like your really cool story). “And Solomon was to take to wife a few fair young ladies.” This sentence suggests that he is to marry ‘a few young ladies’ which is completely wrong if you want to be historically accurate (which is why I think you are bringing in King David and Solomon). They are Christian and would only marry one, unless the Bible is hiding a really funny secret. I do have a question as to why you start all you chapters off with ‘And’. It is correct grammar as our elementary teachers always told us were not, however I feel that a chapter shouldn’t start with an ‘And’. That is entirely my opinion and you can obviously ignore it.
Now, just a couple nit-picky things because I really did like it and there wasn’t too much wrong with it. “And Myra delivered one unto her, and said, shall a scullery maid go to the ball?” I think that the ‘shall’ should be capitalized. Even though it is not the start of the sentence it is the start of your characters thought. You have done it with the other speeches so I think, to be consistent, to also capitalize this too. “And also inquired if Cinderella had an cat.” Again, the use of ‘an’ instead of a in case it was unintentional. “And walked up to her, and dIanced with her.” With this you can obviously see what’s wrong, I trust. “And, lo, the prince made an proclomation, and it read” Proclamation is spelled wrong; simple error. “Now, Abigails daughter had been rejected” Abigail needs to have an apostrophe at the end for possessive. “And, lo, she beared a false witness, and said” bared is spelled wrong as well. “And as the grand duke was getting ready, lo, Cinderella ran down the stairs.” Here I recommend adding ‘getting ready to go/leave/depart’ because with this (even though I know what you’re trying to say it should still be fixed) it is ambiguous.
I really enjoyed your work. Keep writing because you do have people who love it!
Oh wow, somebody already commented on old english/middle english. Now I feel foolish
I love this, actually. The variation intrigues me.
As Kyll said, though, this isn't Old English, this is Biblical style. Try reading the original Beowulf some time. Can't read it? They make versions with the old style on one page, the translation on the other.
Now, there are places where you've overdone it just a bit. For instance,
You're using "lo" far too frequently, even for this style. Wasn't it used as a sort of proclamation? As in, "And lo, something important happened." I haven't read KJ recently, so the only reference I can think of is, "And lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the age." See? What's said there is very important.
You also have a few sentence fragments. No big, and I was going to leave it alone, but I saw at least five. Since I'm reviewing, not editing, I'll leave that part to you.
Nothing else to say, so I bid you adieu. Happy writing!
I love this, actually. The variation intrigues me.
As Kyll said, though, this isn't Old English, this is Biblical style. Try reading the original Beowulf some time. Can't read it? They make versions with the old style on one page, the translation on the other.
Now, there are places where you've overdone it just a bit. For instance,
You're using "lo" far too frequently, even for this style. Wasn't it used as a sort of proclamation? As in, "And lo, something important happened." I haven't read KJ recently, so the only reference I can think of is, "And lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the age." See? What's said there is very important.
You also have a few sentence fragments. No big, and I was going to leave it alone, but I saw at least five. Since I'm reviewing, not editing, I'll leave that part to you.
Nothing else to say, so I bid you adieu. Happy writing!
Sorry! Didn't mean to double-post.
First things first, hooray for experimentation! It's always fun to see and try out different styles of writing, though in this case, I'm not sure this style was the best for this story.
The next thing is I was super excited to see some Old English tropes and storytelling conventions, so this was a disappointment, to be quite honest. The Bible may be old, but it was translated into English, so it can't be said to be written in any English style. Additionally, Old English is so far removed from the English we speak today, that it's practically a separate language.
Take this passage from the Bible:
That's John 3:16 in Early Modern English, which is what Shakespeare wrote his plays in. It's recognizable, but very different. Compare it to Middle English:
And Old English:
Old English is hardly recognizable, isn't it.
Anyway, my main point is that the format really isn't an old English style, but actually Biblical, so it'd make more sense to change the title to "Fairy Tales in Biblical Style" or something like that. If you do want to write in an older English style, I recommend looking up old tales and legends like Beowulf and King Arthur (the Welsh Triads in particular). They'll give you a good idea of what storytelling was like way back before Britain became a single, unified country.
With that said, I don't really think the Biblical form works that well with fairy tales. It felt like taking the story (which was serious enough if you look up the older, pre-Grimm versions) and made the story even more serious, and so much drier. It wound up making the story of Cinderella rather boring, and a boring fairy tale is not a fairy tale people want to (or do) remember.
I think if you were to find a more creative way of retelling the story (like telling it from the point of view of the evil stepmother), it would be much better.
ok hi there.
Getting them to say things that is really scripture like is funny. 
So I got to say that the first chapter was a bit confusing. the 5th part but maybe that was just the old english confusing me. I had to re-read it to understand it properly.
So I see you wrote it in numbered points but I think it would have been better to write it out in a paragraph. I think I kind of get what you were trying to do there but I'm not entirely sure. I think the english you were trying to do was the scripture king of english...Thats what this makes me think of. There are other ways of old english too. Like the ever hard to read Shakespear. Anyways As I was saying, the paragraphing system might suit this better.
I think it would have been funnier if you replaced those words like Fairy and switched it to something more...you know miraculous like or you know another way people called mythical creatures in the past? Something you would read in a scripture kind of. But thats just me thinking that way.
Good job with the old english. I especially liked how you wrote out the speeches. I also liked your use of nameing but to be honest I didn't laugh. I think if yu are trying to write this out in scripture like english then stick to using the words that way. Maybe you meant it to be that way and you can leave it so. You could try getting them to say things in old english. I smiled at the part where the step mom was bearing witness.
I hope this helped you
-Zo