Selected Tales of the Brothers Grimm

by Brothers Grimm, Peter Wortsman (Translator), Pascale Monnin (Illustrator), Franketienne (Illustrator), Edouard Duval-Carrie (Illustrator)

Overview

This new edition of the beloved tales of the Brothers Grimm – selected, translated and edited by Peter Wortsman - is drawn from the 1857 edition of the German original, the last edition reviewed and approved by the Brothers in their lifetime. Over the years, the Brothers' enigmatic narratives have been sanitized by Disney and children's book editors for modern consumption; this indispensable edition restores their sting and vigor to the original prose. In Wortsman’s words, his translation is a return to "a tincture of concentrated man-eating ogre and ground hag tooth, diluted in blood, sweat and tears, as a potent vaccine against the crippling effects of fear and fury." These fortifying imaginative vaccines are accompanied by twenty-four full-color illustrations by Haitian artists, including Edouard Duval-Carrié, Pascale Monnin, and Frankétienne. Edwidge Danticat observes that many Haitian painters bring "forth another canvas beneath the one we see." These works’ imaginative scope, vitality, and evocation of the unconscious open deep channels between the two traditions, shedding new light and shadow on the classic tales.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781935744764
Publisher:	Steerforth Press
Publication date:	05/14/2013
Pages:	280
Product dimensions:	6.40(w) x 7.20(h) x 1.00(d)
Age Range:	8 - 12 Years

About the Author

Jakob Karl Grimm was born on January 4, 1785, in Hanau, Germany. His brother, Wilhelm Karl Grimm, was born on February 24, 1786. Court librarians, linguists, scholars, translators, and writers, the Brothers Grimm collected stories told by peasants and villagers and published them in written form, forming the foundation of the most beloved fairy tales of our time.

Recipient of the 2012 Gold Grand Prize for Best Travel Story of the Year, Peter Wortsman is the author of A Modern Way to Die: Small Stories and Microtales, the plays The Tattooed Man Tells All and Burning Words, the recent memoir Ghost Dance in Berlin: A Rhapsody in Gray, and the forthcoming novel Cold Earth Wanderers. His translations from the German include Robert Musil's Posthumous Papers of a Living Author, Heinrich Heine's Travel Pictures, Peter Altenberg's Telegrams of the Soul, and Tales of the German Imagination: From The Brothers Grimm to Ingeborg Bachmann, an anthology published by Penguin Classics.

Place of Birth:

Hanau, Germany

Place of Death:

Berlin, Germany

Read an Excerpt

The Tale of the Juniper Tree

It happened long, long ago, more than two thousand years gone by. There was a rich man who had a beautiful and God-fearing wife, and they loved each other very much. But they had no children, much as they badly wanted them. And the woman prayed so hard day and night, but still she had no children, not a one. Now in the yard, in front of their house, stood a juniper tree. One day in winter the woman stood beneath it, peeling herself an apple, and as she peeled she cut her finger, and the blood dripped into the snow.

Table of Contents

Foreword Brothers Grimm vii

The Golden Key 3

The Singing Bone 4

The Tale of the Juniper Tree 7

Hansel and Gretel 19

The Golden Goose 29

The Owl 35

A Fairy Tale About a Boy Who Set Out to Learn Fear 38

The Devil with the Three Golden Hairs 50

The Brave Little Tailor 60

The Frog King, or Iron Henry 71

The White Snake 77

The Queen of the Bees 82

The Drummer 86

The Marvelous Minstrel 98

The Musicians of Bremen 102

The Children of Hameln 106

The Master Thief 110

The Blue Light 120

Tom Thumb 126

Faithful Johannes 133

Hans My Hedgehog 143

All-Kind-of-Hide 150

The Seven Ravens 157

The Leaping, Peeping Little Lion's Lark 160

The Girl with No Hands 168

Rumpelstilzchen 175

Rapunzel 183

The Robber Bridegroom 187

Sleeping Beauty, or Thorny Rose 191

Cinderella 195

Snow White 205

Little Red Riding Hood 214

Schlaraffenland 220

An Afterword: Facing Fears and Furies: The Unexpurgated Brothers Grimm 223

The Return of Little Red Riding Hood in a Red Convertible: A Postscript 237

Editorial Reviews

The reason that most people value fairy tales, I would say, is that they do not detain us with hope but simply validate what is. Even people who have never known hunger, let alone a murderous stepmother, still have a sense—from dreams, from books, from news broadcasts—of utter blackness, the erasure of safety and comfort and trust. Fairy tales tell us that such knowledge, or fear, is not fantastic but realistic. …  The Grimm tales still invoke nature, more than God, as life’s driving force, and nature is not kind. —Joan Acocella, The New Yorker

Everyone should possess and know Grimm’s Fairy Tales–one of the great books of the world. —Richard Adams, The New York Times Book Review

...this one book–other than the Bible–that has truly made Western man. —P. L. Travers, The New Republic

Frankétienne¢s work can speak to the most intellectual person in the society as well as the most humble. A very good kind of genius. —Edwidge Danticat

Duval-Carrié¢s large-scale paintings burst off The wall . . . bustling with pattern, landscape, sparkle, and mythos rooted in Haitian Voodou . . . [They] have The technical polish and scope to make a splash at any contemporary art fair. —Boston Globe

From the Publisher