An Interpretation of the fable Three Wishes

Fables seem so simple as a child, but as you become more complex so do these stories.

Before We Get Started
if you are unfamiliar with the fable Three Wishes you can read the story at this url http://www.kidsgen.com/stories/bedtime_stories/three_wishes.htm

Time To Interpret

I'm going to break the fable into sections and address them and then more broadly address the overall fable.

Life So Far

The Woodcutter was forced into his job by means of survival and his job was hard work. But, he was content "he was singing a song and enjoying the nature and its beauty" (kidsgen).

Opportunity

The Woodcutter finds an enormous tree that will sustain him for the rest of his life. The Woodcutter would never have to work again. Sounds pretty good right, well we will see.

The Snag

But he's begged not to cut the tree, "If you cut this tree, I will be homeless, the winter is approaching fast and I will die of cold" (kidsgen), says the Fairy. Then the Woodcutter receives an alternative, the fairy will grant three desires instead. Now would the Woodcutter have not cut down the tree without the offer of three desires? We don't know.

Patience

The Woodcutter ran home, he was excited and he tried to tell his wife was occurred. At this time the Woodcutter was to excite and his wife got impatient, because she couldn't understand what he was telling her. Now we start to see the cracks in their relationship. Then the Woodcutter appears to demand for food from his wife, again he wasn't asking, but demanding. The wife blames the unavailability of food on the early arrival of the husband. She asks the Woodcutter to wait while she prepares something.

Now we are really digging into the problems; there is an obvious theme of impatience and instant gratification, this is leading to a relationship and communication challenge between the Woodcutter and his wife. Even the food the Woodcutter wishes for echoes themes of impatience, I want sweets and hot pudding.
Important "he ate to his satisfaction and the plate continued to fill again and again" (kidsgen). We'll come back to this line.

Communication

Now the wife is pissed, first the Woodcutter talks non-sense and she can't understand him. Then he's demanding dinner when it's barely after morning. Now he wastes a wish for something the wife believes she could just as easily do manually. Well every action has a reaction. The wife uses a wish, "I wish that the pudding should be pasted on your nose!" (kidsgen).

The Woodcutter's nose is burning from the hot pudding, he can't get it off, the wife is probably laughing at him, because at this point I don't think she cares about the wishes. She seems to be enjoying the moment. The Woodcutter is juggling between lost of money and a nose that doesn't burn. Finally, last wish is used up the pudding vanishes and Woodcutter and wife are no better off than before, arguable worse off. There will be a lot of resentment over this screw up.

Summary

The Woodcutter's wish for sweets and hot pudding:
"he ate to his satisfaction and the plate continued to fill again and again" (kidsgen).
Now this wish while made in haste wasn't all that bad, free food presumable forever. The issue here was the impatience and later the communication break-down between husband and wife. Neither of them realized the potential of this wish and so through impatience and poor communication they squandered it, just like they are squandering their relationship.

The theme of rich comes up over and over. Rich people and rich lives are not rich, because of the dollars to their name. Why did they not wish for a child? What could be greater than that of passing along your legacy to a child? Will money remember you or contain a piece of you?

The Woodcutter was happy in his work, why would he want to give up his livelihood? The Woodcutter jumped for opportunity, before he even consider if the opportunity was true opportune.

Finally
Three wishes are fun, yet you might rather wish for just one. One wish you may be can handle, but three you'll surely misplace.

References:
http://www.kidsgen.com/stories/bedtime_stories/three_wishes.htm - (kidsgen)