Like most children when I was little I was obsessed with fairytales. I read my books full of the tales of Charles Perrault, Comtesse de Ségur, and La Fontaine almost every day and dreamed of adventure. This obsession has stayed with me throughout my life.
As I grew older I kept collecting books of fairytales, folklore, fables, myths, and children's literature. When I started to have a little money I started looking for first editions of books by my favourite children's authors like Dr. Seuss' "Horton Hears a Who!", E.B. White's "Charlotte's Web" (Scored at a used bookstore in Flagstaff, Arizona for $4.00), and Roald Dahl's "James and the Giant Peach". My father Henri started me off with a first edition of E.B. White's "The Trumpet of the Swan", which I am now reading with my neighbour's son who loves to read almost as much as I do.
But as proud I am of my collection it is but a tiny, tiny fraction of the children's books collected by Peter and Iona Opie, who collected 20,000 children's books including fairytales, fables, folklore, and myths over the course of their long career. The collection in its entirety is now a part of the Bodleian Library at Oxford and one day I hope to visit the Bodleian and spend a healthy chunk of life studying their collection. In the meantime I use this list of 1200 books I found to beef up my own collection.
I first discovered Peter and Iona Opie when I purchased a book of theirs called "The Classic Fairytales". Much like the fairytale stories I loved as a child it opened a whole new world to me. The extensive sources in the back of the book were full of books I'd never even heard of, but one in particular I had - I just didn't realise it yet. I immediately searched for the name "Andrew Lang" on my bookshelves and there they were - in a four volume Dover Editions set - Lang's famous "Fairy Books".
Lang's Fairy Books or "Coloured Fairy Books" are complete in 12 volumes - red, blue, yellow, green, violet, pink, grey, crimson, brown, orange, olive and lilac. My little four volume set contains the red, blue, yellow, and green fairy tale books and is sadly incomplete. I say sadly because the complete set I'd most like for my library is about $16,000 USD, but are they ever worth pining for! The covers alone are already magical, nevermind the stories held within.
I'm often asked by people who see my library what books I'd most like to own and I always mention these first editions. I have a secret hope that one day I'll write a successful children's book of my own and be able to purchase them.
Two of my favourite fairytales of all time are contained with the Blue Fairy Book, "Why the Sea is Salt" about a hand mill that magically produces so much salt it sinks a boat and keeps on grinding out salt to keep the sea salty and "The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood".
Lang's version draws from Perrault's classic version of La belle au bois dormant, which was originally adapted (and is far less violent and terrifying) from Giambattista Basile's "Lo cunto de li cunto overo lo trattenemiento de peccerille", considered by the Brother's Grimm to be the first collection of national fairytales ever assembled, they are even today known to be some of the oldest known variants of Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, and Rapunzel in existence.
When I was a child I would pretend sometimes to prick my teddy bear's paw on my mother's sewing machine and would rush him to my bed and once he had been asleep for what felt a hundred years; I would fight my way past imaginary dragons and defeat cunning foes until I made it to where he was sleeping to rescue him with a little kiss. Then we would ride one of the chairs in my room which was now an ornate chariot, while all the people of the kingdom would herald me as a hero.
What fairytales do you still hold dear and why?
Further Reading:
The Brothers Grimm - Cinderella (Ashputtel)
Hans Christen Andersen - The Snow Queen (Sneedronningen)
Henri Pourrat - Le trésor des contes
Italo Calvino - Italian Folktales (Bella Venezia/Snow White)
Once Upon a Blog - A blog about fairy tales with a modern take
As I grew older I kept collecting books of fairytales, folklore, fables, myths, and children's literature. When I started to have a little money I started looking for first editions of books by my favourite children's authors like Dr. Seuss' "Horton Hears a Who!", E.B. White's "Charlotte's Web" (Scored at a used bookstore in Flagstaff, Arizona for $4.00), and Roald Dahl's "James and the Giant Peach". My father Henri started me off with a first edition of E.B. White's "The Trumpet of the Swan", which I am now reading with my neighbour's son who loves to read almost as much as I do.
But as proud I am of my collection it is but a tiny, tiny fraction of the children's books collected by Peter and Iona Opie, who collected 20,000 children's books including fairytales, fables, folklore, and myths over the course of their long career. The collection in its entirety is now a part of the Bodleian Library at Oxford and one day I hope to visit the Bodleian and spend a healthy chunk of life studying their collection. In the meantime I use this list of 1200 books I found to beef up my own collection.
I first discovered Peter and Iona Opie when I purchased a book of theirs called "The Classic Fairytales". Much like the fairytale stories I loved as a child it opened a whole new world to me. The extensive sources in the back of the book were full of books I'd never even heard of, but one in particular I had - I just didn't realise it yet. I immediately searched for the name "Andrew Lang" on my bookshelves and there they were - in a four volume Dover Editions set - Lang's famous "Fairy Books".
Lang's Fairy Books or "Coloured Fairy Books" are complete in 12 volumes - red, blue, yellow, green, violet, pink, grey, crimson, brown, orange, olive and lilac. My little four volume set contains the red, blue, yellow, and green fairy tale books and is sadly incomplete. I say sadly because the complete set I'd most like for my library is about $16,000 USD, but are they ever worth pining for! The covers alone are already magical, nevermind the stories held within.
I'm often asked by people who see my library what books I'd most like to own and I always mention these first editions. I have a secret hope that one day I'll write a successful children's book of my own and be able to purchase them.
Two of my favourite fairytales of all time are contained with the Blue Fairy Book, "Why the Sea is Salt" about a hand mill that magically produces so much salt it sinks a boat and keeps on grinding out salt to keep the sea salty and "The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood".
Lang's version draws from Perrault's classic version of La belle au bois dormant, which was originally adapted (and is far less violent and terrifying) from Giambattista Basile's "Lo cunto de li cunto overo lo trattenemiento de peccerille", considered by the Brother's Grimm to be the first collection of national fairytales ever assembled, they are even today known to be some of the oldest known variants of Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, and Rapunzel in existence.
When I was a child I would pretend sometimes to prick my teddy bear's paw on my mother's sewing machine and would rush him to my bed and once he had been asleep for what felt a hundred years; I would fight my way past imaginary dragons and defeat cunning foes until I made it to where he was sleeping to rescue him with a little kiss. Then we would ride one of the chairs in my room which was now an ornate chariot, while all the people of the kingdom would herald me as a hero.
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| Engraving, Dore of Charles Perrault's Sleeping Beauty |
What fairytales do you still hold dear and why?
Further Reading:
The Brothers Grimm - Cinderella (Ashputtel)
Hans Christen Andersen - The Snow Queen (Sneedronningen)
Henri Pourrat - Le trésor des contes
Italo Calvino - Italian Folktales (Bella Venezia/Snow White)
Once Upon a Blog - A blog about fairy tales with a modern take
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