What's the Name of That Book??? discussion

I read it in an edition of Children's Digest from sometime in the 1960s or '70s. Setting is presumably a middle-eastern country. Starts out with two of the king's men talking to him, asking for something. Each time they address him, they start with "O king, live ten thousand years...O king, live twenty thousand years...O king, live forever...O king, live forever and a day...O king, live forever and TWO days..." "Enough!" says the king. IIRC, they wanted him to declare war with some other kingdom. He did not. because he didn't want so many soldiers to be killed in a war they might not win. So, one of those guys figures out a way for generals to practice battle strategy without putting troops at risk: he carves a chess set and a chess board, and creates the rules of the game.

"Wonderful!" says the king. "How can I repay you -- name your price?" "Simple," says the inventor. "The chess board has 64 squares. Put one grain of rice on the first square, two on the next, then four, eight, sixteen, and so on until the sixty-fourth." Of course, when that amount is totaled up, there's not that much rice in the entire kingdom! "Yeah, I knew that," says the inventor. "So how about a bag of gold, two camels, and permission to marry the one of your daughter's maidservants that I've been courting with?" Done, says the king. Whew.

I'm sure I'm off on some of the details, but I know the bit about rice and the chessboard algorithm is right, because I remember the illustration. Anyone remember this one?

This is an old Indian (from India) fable. I don't know that it has a specific title. If you look up "rice on a chessboard" in Google, it pulls up a bazillion (ok, maybe not quite that many) hits. I read this in a book called Trickster Tales in the 80s. And, I didn't link the book, because there are a bazillion (again maybe not that many) books with that title, but I can't remember the editor, only the cover, and I didn't see that on the first 20 pages.

Edited to add... It might be Josepha Sherman's version, Trickster Tales. This is a newer edition than I remember, but the one that I read did have trickster tales from around the world. And this was originally published in 1955.

Okay, I'll keep that as a "possible". Thanks for getting back!

I know it isn’t your book, but I think I read The Token Gift years ago, which is basically the same story.

The thing to remember is that this story was supposed to be funny. Your suggestion looks interesting, but it's not what I'm looking for. Thanks, though!

Lorna wrote: "Okay, I'll keep that as a "possible". Thanks for getting back!"

Do you remember the cover of your book? The one that I remember was mostly red. There was a rectangle in the middle with a picture of a fox trickster on it.

I read it in Children's Digest magazine. Heck if I can remember the date or what was on the cover.

"Sissa and the Troublesome Trifles" by I.G. Edmonds, which can be found in this Children's Digest magazine from 1967.

https://archive.org/details/sim_child...

That was a very nice read.

Son of a biscuit! That’s it! Thank you so much.

You're super welcome, glad to help out!