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'Once upon a time in mid-winter, when the snowflakes were falling from the sky like down, a queen was sitting and sewing at a window ...'
The tales gathered by the Grimm brothers are at once familiar, fantastic, homely, and frightening. They seem to belong to no time, or to some distant feudal age of fairytale imagining. Grand palaces, humble cottages, and the forest full of menace are their settings; and they are peopled by kings and princesses, witches and robbers, millers and golden birds, stepmothers and talking frogs.
Regarded from their inception both as uncosy nursery stories and as raw material for the folklorist the tales were in fact compositions, collected from literate tellers and shaped into a distinctive kind of literature. This translation mirrors the apparent artlessness of the Grimms, and fully represents the range of less well-known fables, morality tales, and comic stories as well as the classic tales. It takes the stories back to their roots in German Romanticism and includes variant stories and tales that were deemed unsuitable for children. In her fascinating introduction, Joyce Crick explores their origins, and their literary evolution at the hands of the Grimms.
About the author
Joyce Crick taught German at University College London until her retirement. She has written on Kafka's first English translators, Willa and Edwin Muir, and for OWC she has translated The Metamorphosis and Other Stories and A Hunger Artist and Other Stories by Kafka, and Freud's The Interpretation of Dreams, winner of the Shlegel-Tieck Prize in 2000.
Summary
'Once upon a time in mid-winter, when the snowflakes were falling from the sky like down, a queen was sitting and sewing at a window ...'
The tales gathered by the Grimm brothers are at once familiar, fantastic, homely, and frightening. They seem to belong to no time, or to some distant feudal age of fairytale imagining. Grand palaces, humble cottages, and the forest full of menace are their settings; and they are peopled by kings and princesses, witches and robbers, millers and golden birds, stepmothers and talking frogs.
Regarded from their inception both as uncosy nursery stories and as raw material for the folklorist the tales were in fact compositions, collected from literate tellers and shaped into a distinctive kind of literature. This translation mirrors the apparent artlessness of the Grimms, and fully represents the range of less well-known fables, morality tales, and comic stories as well as the classic tales. It takes the stories back to their roots in German Romanticism and includes variant stories and tales that were deemed unsuitable for children. In her fascinating introduction, Joyce Crick explores their origins, and their literary evolution at the hands of the Grimms.
Additional text
Definitely a collection aimed at adults and students, but with all the pleasure of story telling flourishes which make it a joy to read. I'm delighted with this edition.
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The book that afforded me deepest pleasure is 'Selected Tales' by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm (trans Joyce Crick). What a joy to meet Rapunzel, Hansel and Gretel and Ashypet again in these sparkling new versions. Paul Bailey, The Independent
