^I'm not Katzentaten obviously, but I'll take a stab at answering your question. Pinocchio wanted to be a "real live boy" and it appears that the dollmaker in this story has a genuine living doll on his hands. But, by the end of the story, we find out that the doll hasn't magically "come to life" but has actually been possessed by the soul of the dead boy in the lake.
why did the tongue go in the lake instead of the fire?
The wood portions of the doll were burned, but the tongue that grew in the doll was flesh. The dollmaker threw it into the lake just as he did with the bodies of the children he killed.
I suppose things could be interpreted multiple ways but I believe that the dollmaker has been killing children to perfect his craft. My reasons:
- There are a lot of missing children in the village
- I don't know why the dollmaker's guilt would manifest itself as a doll who accuses him of multiple murders instead of blaming him for the death of his son.
- The section that begins "Once upon a time, there lived a doll maker who sought to excel in his craft." is not spoken by the doll as far as I can tell. It lays out his child killing pretty plainly as well as letting you know what he did with their bodies.
My interpretation of the doll's metaphorical stories:
An ugly dollmaker convinces a lady to marry him via a gift of one of his wonderful dolls. Not a "cloak" as the dummy says. I think that she finds out that her husband is killing children (not animals) to make his dolls. He is tossing their bodies into a nearby lake. The dollmaker's son is called to the lake by one of his father's victims and is drowned. The dollmaker creates a doll that looks like his son. His wife wrongly assumes that he murdered their child. She dies soon after. The doll patterned after his son becomes possessed by the drowned boy in the lake. The doll torments the dollmaker with his stories to get him to confess to his crimes. When this fails he takes more drastic actions.
The opening paragraph:
“Once upon a time,” the doll began, “there lived a god who feared the dark.
“He cast a shadow over his creations and heard them whisper his doom when he turned away. He feared them so much he stole fire from the other gods and gave it to the tiny creatures, hoping it would take away the dark in their hearts. Instead, they set the god on fire, and that is how the sun was born.”
My interpretation:
This kind of tells the whole story. A dollmaker wants a real son. He "steals fire from the other gods" (kills his neighbor's children) and "and gave it to the tiny creatures" (used his newfound anatomy knowledge to make his dolls appear lifelike.) "Instead, they set the god on fire." ( His murdering children boomerangs on him when one of his dolls becomes too lifelike and kills him) "and that is how the sun was born.” (I wonder if "Sun" is a play on word "son"?
I could be 100% wrong about all of this.
Final thought: A good story with great narration. I'm not wrong about that much at least.
