The Boy Who Cried Wolf
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The Boy Who Cried Wolf, also known as The Shepherd Boy and the Wolf, is a fable attributed to Aesop (210 in Perry's numbering system).[1] The protagonist of the fable is a bored shepherd boy who entertained himself by calling out "wolf". Nearby villagers who came to his rescue found that the alarms were false and that they'd wasted their time. When the boy was actually confronted by a wolf, the villagers did not believe his cries for help and his flock perished. In some versions when the villagers ignore him the wolf either kills him, or more often, simply mocks the boy saying that now no one will help him and that it served him right for playing tricks.[citation needed] The moral is stated at the end of the fable as:
- Even when liars tell the truth, they are never believed.
The English idiom "to cry wolf", derived from the fable, refers to the act of persistently raising the alarm about a non-existent threat, with the implication that the person who cried wolf would not be taken seriously should a real emergency take place. It can also be used to describe an alarm system that regularly goes off falsly, causing it not to be believed when a real emergency occurs. In one tragic case, a dorm fire resulted in many more serious injuries and deaths than usual since the fire alarm often "cried wolf" previously causing the residents to not believe it when it went off for real.
On the TV series, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, the Cardassian Garak has a different understanding of the story, suggesting its message is "Never tell the same lie twice". On the Simpsons episode "Marge Gets a Job", Bart Simpson indeed tells not one but several different lies to avoid taking a test, only to literally be attacked by a wolf and, subsequently, not believed.
A cynical interpretation is also possible: Do not lie too often, and do not tell lies just for your own amusement; save lies for when they are urgently required.[citation needed] Ricky Gervais provides another cynical approach by stating the moral of the story is in fact not "do not lie" but "don't tell the same lie twice".[citation needed]
[edit] See also
- Aesop's Fables
- Cassandra, a seer in Greek mythology who made accurate warnings but was not believed.
- False alarm
- The Girl Who Cried Monster
- King You of Zhou's folly fooled the nobles repeatedly so they would not rescue him in a real danger.
[edit] References
- ^ Ben Edwin Perry (1965). Babrius and Phaedrus, Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, p. 462, no. 210. ISBN 0-674-99480-9.
[edit] External links
- The Boy Who Cried 'Wolf', translated by Laura Gibbs
