The Fool of the World and the Flying Ship

The Flying Ship, or The Fool of the World and the Flying Ship, is a Ukrainian fairy tale (Ukrainian: Летючий корабель). Andrew Lang included it in The Yellow Fairy Book and Arthur Ransome in Old Peter's Russian Tales.

Uri Shulevitz illustrated a version of Ransome's tale, The Fool of the World and the Flying Ship, for which he won the Caldecott Medal in 1969. Also, a made-for-television stop motion-animated film with the same name was released in the United Kingdom in 1990. It aired as part of WGBH's children's series, Long Ago and Far Away. Rabbit Ears Productions also produced an audiotape version, featuring Robin Williams, which was released on Showtime in 1991. It aired as part of Rabbit Ears' "We All Have Tales" series. In addition, Terry Gilliam's 1988 film The Adventures of Baron Munchausen contains several elements inspired by this story, particularly the opening sequence set at the court of the Grand Turk.

A couple had three sons, and the youngest was a fool. One day, the Tsar declared that whoever made him a ship that could sail through the air would marry his daughter. The older two set out, with everything their parents could give them; then the youngest set out as well, despite their ridicule and being given less fine food. He met a little man and, when the man asked to share, he hesitated only because it was not fit. But when he opened it, the food had become fine.