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Europa's Fairy Book By: Joseph Jacobs (1854-1916) |
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FAIRY TALES " Do tell us a fairy tale, ganpa. " " Well, will you be good and quiet if I do? " " Of course we will; we are always good when you are telling
us fairy tales. " " Well, here goes. Once upon a time, though it wasn't in my
time, and it wasn't in your time, and it wasn't in anybody
else's time, there was a " " But that would be no time at all. " " That's fairy tale time. "
[Illustration: The Marshal tells how he killed the Dragon ]
EUROPA'S FAIRY BOOK RESTORED AND RETOLD BY JOSEPH JACOBS DONE INTO PICTURES BY JOHN D. BATTEN G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS NEW YORK AND LONDON The Knickerbocker Press
COPYRIGHT, 1916 BY JOSEPH JACOBS
To PEGGY, AND MADGE, AND PEARL, AND MAGGIE,
AND MARGUERITE, AND PEGGOTTY, AND MEG,
AND MARJORY, AND DAISY, AND PEGG, AND MARGARET HAYS (How many granddaughters does that make?)
MY DEAR LITTLE PEGGY: Many, many, many years ago I wrote a book for your Mummey when she
was my little May telling the fairy tales which the little boys and
girls of England used to hear from their mummeys, who had heard them
from their mummeys years and years and years before. My friend Mr.
Batten made such pretty pictures for it but of course you know the
book it has "Tom, Tit, Tot" and "The little old woman that went to
market," and all those tales you like. Now I have been making a
fairy tale book for your own self, and here it is. This time I have
told, again the fairy tales that all the mummeys of Europe have been
telling their little Peggys, Oh for ever so many years! They must have
liked them because they have spread from Germany to Russia, from Italy
to France, from Holland to Scotland, and from England to Norway, and
from every country in Europe that you will read about in your
geography to every other one. Mr. Batten, who made the pictures for
your mummey's book, has made some more for yours isn't it good of
him when he has never seen you? Though this book is your very, very own, you will not mind if other
little girls and boys also get copies of it from their mummeys and
papas and ganmas and ganpas, for when you meet some of them you will,
all of you, have a number of common friends like "The Cinder Maid," or
"The Earl of Cattenborough," or "The Master Maid," and you can talk to
one another about them so that you are old friends at once. Oh, won't
that be nice? And when one of these days you go over the Great Sea, in
whatever land you go, you will find girls and boys, as well as
grown ups, who will know all of these tales, even if they have
different names. Won't that be nice too? And when you tell your new friends here or abroad of these stories
that you and they will know so well, do not forget to tell them that
you have a book, all of your very own, which was made up specially for
you of these old, old stories by your old, old GANPA. P.S. Do you hear me calling as I always do, "Peggy, Peggy"? Then you
must answer as usual, "Ganpa, Ganpa."
PREFACE
Ever since almost exactly a hundred years ago the Grimms produced
their Fairy Tale Book, folk lorists have been engaged in making
similar collections for all the other countries of Europe, outside
Germany, till there is scarcely a nook or a corner in the whole
continent that has not been ransacked for these products of the
popular fancy. The Grimms themselves and most of their followers have
pointed out the similarity or, one might even say, the identity of
plot and incident of many of these tales throughout the European
Folk Lore field. Von Hahn, when collecting the Greek and Albanian
Fairy Tales in 1864, brought together these common "formulæ" of the
European Folk Tale. These were supplemented by Mr... Continue reading book >>
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Fairy tales |
Fiction |
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