(Pablo Picasso, Le petit pierrot aux fleurs (Portrait of the artist's son, Paulo, as Arlecchino, 1923/24)
With Carnival currently being celebrated here in Italy, my boys have been learning a children's tale about the famous character Arlecchino (Harlequin in English). Arlecchino is the most popularly known of the zanni or comic characters from the Italian Commedia dell'arte. Introduced by the successful Italian actor Tristano Martinelli in the 1580s. The original story of the Arlecchino revolves around a comic incident in the lives of its five main characters.
Today I want to share this children's version of Arlecchino, the story of a poor boy who desperately
wants to attend the carnival party but has no costume to wear.
Many, many years ago there was a boy called Arlecchino, he was very poor and lived with his mother in a humble cottage. At Arlecchino's school to celebrate carnival ,his teacher decided to organize a nice party and proposed to all the children to dress up in masks and costumes. Arlecchino's friends decided to dress up on the very last day of carnival with clothes sewn by their mothers. Arlecchino was very sad because his mother, who was poor, could not buy the fabric to make him a costume. Arlecchino's friends see how sad he is, and decide to ask their mothers to each give a piece of left-over fabric to Arlecchino's mother so that she could also sew him a costume.
The day of the party Arlecchino was so happy and proud of his new costume, it was the most beautiful and most original. The end
This little tale teaches children about caring, sharing, hoping, and helping. I hope you enjoy sharing it with your children.
xTracey
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