Baucis and Philemon: a book club kit

Where it comes from. Ovid, a poet in Rome, wrote down this old myth from Phrygia about 2,000 years ago, and people still tell it to praise a kind welcome.

In short (for the leader; it gives the ending away). Zeus and Hermes visit a village in disguise as poor travelers, and every family turns them away except an old couple, Baucis and Philemon, who share their small supper. Their pitcher magically stays full. The gods spare the couple, turn the valley into a lake and their cottage into a temple, and later turn the couple into two trees growing side by side.

The lesson, in one line. Be kind to strangers and share what you have, even when it is little.

Reading plan, by the story's parts. Meeting 1: Part One, “The Shut Doors” and Part Two, “Supper in the Cottage”, pages 1–7 (about 5 minutes aloud); Meeting 2: Part Three, “The Pitcher That Stayed Full” and Part Four, “The Lake” and Part Five, “The Two Trees”, pages 8–16 (about 6 minutes aloud). Each stop's own questions, which never give away what comes next: Baucis and Philemon by chapter.

Questions to talk about

1. What is the moral of Baucis and Philemon?
   The story's answer: Be kind to strangers and share what you have, even when it is little. The rich village shut its doors on the travelers, but the poor old couple welcomed them, and the gods rewarded them.
2. Who wrote the story of Baucis and Philemon?
   The story's answer: It is an old myth that the Roman poet Ovid wrote down in his long poem the Metamorphoses, about 2,000 years ago. Nathaniel Hawthorne retold it for children in A Wonder-Book in 1851, calling it The Miraculous Pitcher.
3. What did Baucis and Philemon turn into?
   The story's answer: When they were very old, they turned into two trees at the same moment: Philemon became an oak and Baucis a linden. The trees grew side by side, so neither of them was left alone.
4. Why was the pitcher in Baucis and Philemon always full?
   The story's answer: Their guests were the gods Zeus and Hermes in disguise, and the pitcher filled itself by magic. That is how the old couple first guessed who they were.
5. What does this myth explain, or try to explain?
   Listen for: Many myths explain how something came to be: a season, an animal, a name.
6. Was the main character right or wrong? Was the ending fair?
   Listen for: Myths are often hard on people; let the group disagree.

Did you know?

• The Roman poet Ovid told this myth in his Metamorphoses, written about 2,000 years ago.
• In Ovid's Latin poem the gods are called Jupiter and Mercury, the Roman names for Zeus and Hermes.
• Phrygia was an old kingdom in the land that is now Turkey.

Activity: Make a new myth

Each reader explains something they see every day (why cats purr, why puddles dry up) with a short made-up myth of their own, told round the circle in three sentences.