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A review by ridgewaygirl
Fairy Tales from the Brothers Grimm: A New English Version by Philip Pullman
4.0
Philip Pullman has taken some of the most familiar tales, such as Cinderella and Red Riding Hood, some of the not-so-familiar, like The Goose Girl and The Bremen Town Musicians and several of the least known stories, like Faithful Johannes and Hans-My-Hedgehog and retold them. This isn't a reworking or a collection of imaginative stories based on Grimm's fairy tales, but a faithful retelling. At the end of each story Pullman adds notes about the origins of the story and how he chose to tell it.
It was enjoyable to revisit those old tales and Pullman's writing does justice to them. The stories I had never encountered before were, for me, the most interesting, but the real meat of the book is in Pullman's brief notes about each tale. I read several of these with my ten year old son and he was astonished by the sheer bloodthirstiness of several of the stories. Grimm's fairy tales are very different than the carefully inoffensive Disney versions, often containing a strong religious influence, but also reflecting the harshness and capriciousness of the world in which they were told.
It was enjoyable to revisit those old tales and Pullman's writing does justice to them. The stories I had never encountered before were, for me, the most interesting, but the real meat of the book is in Pullman's brief notes about each tale. I read several of these with my ten year old son and he was astonished by the sheer bloodthirstiness of several of the stories. Grimm's fairy tales are very different than the carefully inoffensive Disney versions, often containing a strong religious influence, but also reflecting the harshness and capriciousness of the world in which they were told.