Yzabel / October 3, 2014

The Original Folk and Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm: The Complete First Edition by Jacob Grimm

My rating: [rating=4]

Summary:

When Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm published their “Children’s and Household Tales” in 1812, followed by a second volume in 1815, they had no idea that such stories as “Rapunzel,” “Hansel and Gretel,” and “Cinderella” would become the most celebrated in the world. Yet few people today are familiar with the majority of tales from the two early volumes, since in the next four decades the Grimms would publish six other editions, each extensively revised in content and style. For the very first time, ” The Original Folk and Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm” makes available in English all 156 stories from the 1812 and 1815 editions. These narrative gems, newly translated and brought together in one beautiful book, are accompanied by sumptuous new illustrations from award-winning artist Andrea Dezso.

From “The Frog King” to “The Golden Key,” wondrous worlds unfold–heroes and heroines are rewarded, weaker animals triumph over the strong, and simple bumpkins prove themselves not so simple after all. Esteemed fairy tale scholar Jack Zipes offers accessible translations that retain the spare description and engaging storytelling style of the originals. Indeed, this is what makes the tales from the 1812 and 1815 editions unique–they reflect diverse voices, rooted in oral traditions, that are absent from the Grimms’ later, more embellished collections of tales. Zipes’s introduction gives important historical context, and the book includes the Grimms’ prefaces and notes.

Review:

(I got an ARC courtesy of NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.)

Though it took me quite some time to finish this book, it wasn’t for want of interest.

It contains both volumes of the tales gathered by the brothers Grimm, published around 1812-1815. I applied for the ARC out of curiosity, and was surprised at some of those stories, at the way the ones I remembered from my childhood was really edulcorated versions: both because of the editing performed by recent publishers, and because of their “authors” themselves, since the brothers reworked many of them years later to make them fit more within Christian morality.

Indeed, while these stories looked familiar, they were also different in how their characters were portrayed, and their actions were carried out. For instance, in the original tales, the “wicked stepmother” is more often than not the actual mother. Parents don’t hesitate to throw children out of their home, to have them killed at the slightest mishap, and the kind of “traditional moral” to the stories isn’t always the one modern readers would have expected. More than the lessons I got used to when I was younger, the tales are examples of how sometimes, cunning or even violence gets the job done faster.

Reading those versions was definitely an intriguing experience, perhaps more from an anthropological point of view than from a leisurely one: somehow, I enjoyed the book’s material more for its comparative value than as a collection of actual tales read for pleasure only. (I guess this may be one of the shortcomings here: I don’t recommend reading everything at once, for a lot of stories become redundant after a while, pôssibly because they’re based off similar traditions. However, if one goes through them at a slower pace, interest remains sparkled. At least, this is what happened to me—and the reason why it took me over a full month to read everything.) The introduction itself is a fairly interesting piece, too, one that gives more information and details about how the Grimm brothers went about collecting the tales.

This book also made me question tales in general. Overall, I mostly read/heard them when I was a child, and later on went to read modern retellings. I had forgotten—or maybe I just didn’t have enough hindsight, nor background at the time to realis this—what kind of place the tales may have had in society, and the way they’re so different from what I’d be looking for today. The place of women, among other things: the greedy wife who always wants more; the jealous mother; the one who wants her own daughter to have it all, while providing minimum effort; the princess shirking responsibility after a hastily-made promise; etc. (Men aren’t spared from this, but I think it just struck me more when it was about women.)

I found the first volume more interesting in general; this may have had to do with how the second one felt more “Christianity-laden”, with characters regularly happening upon “the Lord” or “the Devil”. Those already felt like they bore the traces of what would become their future, more well-known versions.

Overall, it wasn’t such an easy read, but it clearly holds academic value. 3.5/4 stars.

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