Classic story

Donkey Skin

A French tale
5 chapters
about 21 min

Adventures & Discovery

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A king who has lost his beloved wife struggles with the promise he made to her and eventually asks his adopted daughter to marry him instead. The young princess, deeply distressed by this request, turns to her fairy godmother for help in avoiding the marriage. She cleverly asks for impossible gifts, such as a dress of moonbeams, which the king somehow manages to provide. Realizing escape is her only option, she steals the skin of the king's precious donkey and flees into the countryside. There, she disguises herself as a dirty farmhand named Donkey Skin and works hard at a farmhouse to stay hidden. A kind prince falls in love with her after seeing her through a keyhole and becomes desperately ill without her. He recovers only when she bakes him a cake, secretly placing her ring inside it for him to find. The prince searches the kingdom for the owner of the ring, eventually calling for Donkey Skin herself. When she finally appears and tries on the ring, her disguise falls away to reveal her true beauty. The fairy godmother arrives to explain everything, and the princess is happily reunited with her family. The story ends with a magnificent wedding and the young couple ruling their kingdom with love and wisdom.

How it begins

Donkey Skin There was once upon a time a king who was so much beloved by his subjects that he thought himself the happiest monarch in the whole world, and he had everything his heart could desire. His palace was filled with the rarest of curiosities, and his gardens with the sweetest flowers, while in the marble stalls of his stables stood a row of milk-white Arabs, with big brown eyes. Strangers who had heard of the marvels which the king had collected, and made long journeys to see them, were, however, surprised to find the most splendid stall of all occupied by a donkey, with particularly large and drooping ears. It was a very fine donkey; but still, as…

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Donkey Skin

How it begins

Every story, fully told

A voice for every character

The mood of every line

Pictures of every place

Read along

Your AI voice, for any character

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