Issun-boshi, the One-Inch Boy

One inch. That is all. Shorter than a single chopstick, smaller even than the soup bowl a mother fills every evening. Yet that was the whole height of a boy, from the top of his head to his heels, no more and no less. This is a small story that people in Japan have told for generations, about the smallest boy in all the fairy tales of that country.

It begins with an old husband and wife who lived in a remote stretch of countryside. They had shared many rice seasons together, with only one regret: they had never had a child. One day the old couple went to the small shrine at the edge of the village, pressed their palms together and prayed: "Please give us a child, however small, even one no bigger than a fingertip."

Heaven was moved by that prayer. Not long after, the old woman gave birth to a baby boy. But when they lifted him up, the couple froze. The baby was exactly the size of an adult's thumb. They were not sad at all. Instead they wept for joy, held their son close, and named him Issun-boshi, which means a boy exactly one inch tall.

Issun-boshi grew up wrapped in his parents' love, but there was one strange thing. He did not grow any bigger at all. Day after day, season after season, he stayed exactly one inch tall, just as on the day he was born. By the age of 13, the other village children had shot up tall. Issun-boshi was still as tiny as ever, small enough to sit in the palm of his mother's hand.

But his heart was far bigger than his little body. One day Issun-boshi told his parents that he wanted to go to the capital to make his way in the world and become a true warrior. His parents were very worried. A child the size of a finger, traveling far on his own, with so many dangers waiting ahead. But when they saw the determination in their son's eyes, the old couple gave their consent.

His father took a sewing needle and sharpened it until it was very keen, making it into a tiny sword. He also braided a scabbard for it out of a stalk of straw. His mother took a soup bowl to serve as a boat, then handed him a chopstick to use as an oar. Those three simple things, a sword, a boat and an oar, were all that Issun-boshi carried on the road to the capital.

Issun-boshi said goodbye to his parents. He set the bowl on the river in front of their house, stepped in, and paddled with the chopstick, pushing the little boat along. The small bowl rocked on the wide water, sometimes tipping so far that it nearly capsized, but he kept rowing steadily forward. Day after day he went on, until the first rooftops of the capital appeared ahead.

In the busy capital, Issun-boshi sought out the grandest mansion he could see, the home of a powerful high official. He stood tucked beside a pair of huge shoes on the doorstep, craned his neck and called out as loudly as he could, asking to be taken into service. It was the official himself who discovered the tiny boy standing right beside his own shoes. Amazed, he bent down and stared and stared. Issun-boshi explained himself clearly and confidently, and the official gladly took him into his household at once. Before long the boy was given an important task. He became the personal escort of the official's daughter, whom the servants of the house respectfully called the princess.

One day the young lady got ready to visit a temple, and Issun-boshi went along as her escort, as always. Halfway there, a huge dark shape suddenly appeared and blocked the road. It was an ogre with glaring eyes, and it meant to snatch the young lady and carry her off. Issun-boshi did not hesitate for a moment. He drew his tiny needle sword and rushed forward to stand right in the ogre's way.

The ogre looked down and saw a boy smaller even than its own toe. It only snorted with laughter, then opened its mouth and swallowed Issun-boshi in one neat gulp. But the boy was not hurt at all. Inside the ogre's belly, dark and cramped, Issun-boshi calmly drew his needle sword. He began to poke and tickle all around the walls of its stomach.

The ogre gave a jump. It was so tickled that it panicked, and the more Issun-boshi tickled, the more it wanted to laugh, its belly twitching and twitching. At last it could bear no more. It burst into a long fit of coughing and spat Issun-boshi straight out, unharmed, his sword still firmly in his hand.

Terrified, the ogre ran as fast as its legs would carry it, straight into the mountains, never daring to look back. In its frantic rush it dropped a small wooden hammer. This was a magic hammer called Uchide no Kozuchi. Shake it, and any wish would come true.

The young lady picked up the magic hammer and held it out to Issun-boshi with delight. "Just shake this hammer," she said, "and money or rice, whatever you want, will be yours at once." Issun-boshi shook his head and smiled. "I do not want money, and I have no need of rice," he said. "I only want to be as tall as everyone else."

The young lady took the magic hammer, gave it a gentle shake and spoke aloud the wish of her little escort. In the blink of an eye, Issun-boshi shot up tall. His arms and legs grew long, and his shoulders grew broad. He stood there as a tall young man, no different from all the other young men of the capital.

Not long after, Issun-boshi married the young lady he had escorted day after day. Music of strings and flutes and cheerful good wishes rang through the whole mansion. Once a tiny boy, he became a young warrior respected by the entire household, and everyone who met him turned to look.

That afternoon, in the mansion courtyard, three things still lay neatly in a corner of the veranda, as tiny as ever. There was the bowl that had been a boat, the chopstick that had been an oar and the needle that had been a sword. Issun-boshi stood there, tall and strong, looking down at the three small things that had crossed a whole river with him to reach this day. Behind him, the whole mansion sank into the glow of sunset, and the wide, quiet courtyard stretched away toward the horizon.