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| - A tall tale is a story with unbelievable or outright impossible elements (such as an impossibly tall man, hence the name "tall" tale), told as if it were true and factual. Tall tales arose, more or less, from braggy exaggerations and other cock-and-bull stories. They may contain exaggerations of actual characters or events, or they can be entirely made up. Common prototypes for tall tales are fish stories (“it was this big!”) (which makes it transparent where the “tall” humor is coming from), as well as the the hunter's story, the war story, and the traveller's story. Tall Tales are inherently related to Satire, although they are usually humorous and good-natured.
- A tall tale or a tall story was a story about a real person, the facts of which were questionable. In 2268, Captain James T. Kirk offered to tell Ensign Garrovick several tall stories about his deceased father, Captain Garrovick. (TOS: "Obsession" )
- "Tall Tale" is a Sesame Street song performed by Johnny Cash, Noel Cowherd and some other cowpokes. Johnny tells a tale about a town he traveled through where everything was opposite, Noel sings about meeting some aliens on a diet and a cowgirl (performed by Louise Gold) sings about a ring she got from her friend that makes a "tall-tale-teller" disappear. She presses her ring, and Johnny and Noel vanish.
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| abstract
| - "Tall Tale" is a Sesame Street song performed by Johnny Cash, Noel Cowherd and some other cowpokes. Johnny tells a tale about a town he traveled through where everything was opposite, Noel sings about meeting some aliens on a diet and a cowgirl (performed by Louise Gold) sings about a ring she got from her friend that makes a "tall-tale-teller" disappear. She presses her ring, and Johnny and Noel vanish. Johnny Cash's 1992 Sesame Street performance of "Tall Tale" is at present unique to his discography as he is not known to have recorded it in any other venue (unlike a previous Sesame Street-original, "Nasty Dan", that Cash rerecorded for one of his later albums). As of 2016, Cash's performance has yet to be officially released on album or CD.
- A tall tale or a tall story was a story about a real person, the facts of which were questionable. In 2268, Captain James T. Kirk offered to tell Ensign Garrovick several tall stories about his deceased father, Captain Garrovick. (TOS: "Obsession" ) A biography on Davy Crockett that Julian Bashir gave Miles O'Brien in 2375 included several tall tales. Bashir related one in particular, in which "Crockett was supposed to have put up a target against a tree and arranged a series of tin frying pans nearby in a complicated pattern. The idea was that he was going to shoot a bullet at one of these pans which would then ricochet to another and then to another and then to another and then to another." Hearing this tale gave O'Brien a revelation as to why and how a murderer had killed several of Deep Space 9's crew with a TR-116 rifle - namely, via displaced targeting. (DS9: "Field of Fire")
- A tall tale is a story with unbelievable or outright impossible elements (such as an impossibly tall man, hence the name "tall" tale), told as if it were true and factual. Tall tales arose, more or less, from braggy exaggerations and other cock-and-bull stories. They may contain exaggerations of actual characters or events, or they can be entirely made up. Common prototypes for tall tales are fish stories (“it was this big!”) (which makes it transparent where the “tall” humor is coming from), as well as the the hunter's story, the war story, and the traveller's story. Tall Tales are inherently related to Satire, although they are usually humorous and good-natured. Some tall tales also draw on myth or legend; but while Myth and Legend may exaggerate the exploits of their heroes beyond the possible, the Tall Tale is aware of its own absurdity and exaggerates. Note that "tall tale" is sometimes also used in a wider sense for any "story that isn't true" (particularly when the teller pretends it is true); in this looser sense it also covers Shaggy Dog Stories and campfire Ghost Stories (in parts of the US, "tall tale" and "shaggy dog story" are indeed synonyms). Tall tales are also often told in a way that makes the narrator seem to have been a part of the story. If he himself is the hero, there are likely to follow outrageous Badass Boasts (often followed by the praise of one’s own modesty). This kind of a narrator is a Munchausen or a Miles Gloriosus. Standard stylistic devices are also the insistence on factuality, and the pitying of naïve skeptics for their disbelief. Tall tales may also include fantastic creatures. In the USA, the Fearsome Critters of American Folklore are a traditional subject of tall tales. In Australia, expect to see Yowies and Bunyips and Drop Bears, Oh My!. Tall tales are an ancient genre of folktales (as encountered in the tales around Paul Bunyan in the USA or Crooked Mick in Australia). But there is also the literary tall tale; the literary tall tale catalyzed the emergence of such respectable genres as Science Fiction and the Utopia. This page is for the Tall Tale genre. If a work is a tall tale itself, or a compendium of them, or the plot revolves around the telling of tall tales, then it goes in this trope. If it merely contains a braggart who is telling tall tales, but the tales aren't the focus of the work, then the trope you seek is Miles Gloriosus or The Munchausen instead. Examples of Tall Tale include:
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