The Blue Fairy Book

This is a lovely edition of the Blue Fairy Book, the first of a collection of twelve collections, each named for a different color, that was put together by Andrew Lang and his wife. Tales were collected from all over the world for this series, and I'd love to have a matching set to put on my shelf!

This collection contains familiar stories (Cinderella, Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast, Puss in Boots) as well as some that were new to me, like The Master-Maid, The White Cat, The Tale of a Youth Who Set out to Learn What Fear Was, and Cinderlad (aka The Princess on the Glass Hill). Goldielocks is also featured, but without a bear in sight, LOL!!

Some of these stories are surprisingly gruesome, even this version which has been 'cleaned up' for show more a child's eyes. Lots of animals put to death for no good reason, not to mention all the people who die, wicked or not. I have an e-copy of the full set of Fairy Books and I'm curious to see how dark they really are!

I knocked off a star for the violence, and also for the fact that this isn't the entire Blue Fairy collection. As much as I'd love to have a matching set of 12 for my bookshelf, I'd also like them to be the actual, complete collections!

Recommended for adult fans of fairy tales. show less

Some of these are familiar - Red Riding Hood suffers a brutal end, Rumpelstiltskin gets ripped off again, Cinderella earns her name by cleaning out the chimney and having dainty feet, but Jack and the Giant-killer makes you wonder how we got the modern day Jack and the Beanstalk. Toss in a sedate and castle-heavy Aladdin and it just doesn't hold as much charm. The Story of Pretty Goldilocks is definitely not the version with three bears and porridge.

The Bronze Ring is long-winded, bizarre, all over the place (an island of mice too? really?) and dull-witted princess wife. Prince Hyacinth - A story that starts off with a bizarre curse test with a poor cat's tale, but then becomes a hilarious and bizarre Long Nose story. "How stupid show more people are not to see their own faults." Unfortunately it is also much too long - there's only so much that can stay interesting about such a long nose on the prince's travels.East of the Sun and West of the Moon - Too long as well, ended up drifting through this one.

The Yellow Dwarf is also incredibly long for a fairy tale but was a highlight of the group and one of the best.

I think I prefer my fairy tales shorter and to the point - some of these that went on too long seemed like they were ending the moral point and focus of the story, but then instead kept going with a new story in one, so that it got kind of old.

The audiobook version had different speakers - my favorite was the man who read aloud The Yellow Dwarf (impressive singing voice too, fella), which may be why I enjoyed that one so much. It was also a new to me tale and stayed interesting enough. show less

Thus far, in the Blue Fairy Book first volume it gets off to a s very rocky start, in comparison to Lang's other volumes in the series. This volume lacks a cohesiveness, where there are some familiar fairytales and far less noted ones, in such an archaic record of the oral tradition. The Blue Fairy book is rather ecclectic in it's display and the way it orates these tales. I find it interesting that many of the true well-known tales aren't actually known in their entirety, as they are revealed in this version. There are some very interesting parallels between stories in this collection and in the Red and Violet collections-- for instance East of the Sun and West of the Moon parallels Soria Moria Castle Published in the Red story. Prince show more Hyacinth parallels Dwarf Long nosed in the Violet. The parallels have to do with how the stories were constructed, motifs, similar themes, structural shifts, motive, characterization, but not about the plethora of how children's fairytales of this era all seemingly have a typical formula that works well revolving around food, the number three, good vs. evil, change vs. losing oneself, listening to ones elders vs. spurning the advice of elders (cynility), entering other dimensions, animals who speak, luck (abundance--rags to riches story), the classic quest story, princesses or princes who are bored and have to marry but want to change their arranged marriage choice, nature/natural world interference, fear vs. bravery (and a ton of other numerous innate human conflicts dealing with consciousness and the human condition).
Basically, we still question these today which is why they are still relevant and rich for discussion. It's why they consume toteism, and comprise our history. Many of us try to hide the truth of how we view literature because it often times reflects with how we view ourselves or know ourselves far better than we think we do. It reveals a deeper and richer discovery of the vulnerability of childhood imaginations, which evolve throughout our lifetimes. show less

3 stars for the audiobook; 4 stars for the book itself.

A good mix of familiar and unfamiliar in this collection of fairy tales. I also liked the fact that fairy tales from different cultures were included (French, Norwegian, Arabic for example).

I was a bit surprised to discover one tale (The Terrible Head) which was basically the Greek myth of Perseus! And a few others were just versions of another fairy tale already in the collection (for example, Little Thumb & Hansel and Gretel).

While I thought that Angele Masters did some very good voices (and a very good Scots accent for the last two tales), there were recurring mouth sounds (mostly sounds of swallowing) that put me off. Glad that I picked up this audiobook as a free Whispersync show more deal, but that brings me to another problem I had with this audiobook. It didn't actually sync with the Kindle book properly -- it worked okay for a while but towards the end, I couldn't get it to play while reading the text. show less

As with all anthologies, some of the stories were stronger than others - meaning I enjoyed some of this book very much and the rest not as much, or not at all. Worth reading if only to compare to other fairy tale anthologies (such as that of the Grimm brothers) or fairy tale retellings.

This is currently my nightly reading with Maya. It's a fantastic, non-Disneyish book of the fairy tale classics including stories from Grimm, Charles Perrault, Arabian Nights, and more! If you are looking for a non-watered down version of classic book of fairy tales...this is a great starting place.

The first of the famous Colour Fairy collection from Andrew Lang. There are several quite familiar stories in here, if you're familiar with Disney, or fairy tales at all. The collection is nice and varied, with some lesser-known but overall pretty solid tales. Most of the tales in these books have their own review/entry on Goodreads, but these stories do not so their reviews are part of this one.

(A complete list of the stories is at the bottom of the review)

4/5 stars for the overall collection.

The Water-lily. The Gold-spinners *** An ok tale, not particularly memorable to me.

Little Thumb *** I thought this might be a version of Tom Thumb, but not really, it had a bit more of a Hansel and Gretel vibe with the parents trying to abandon show more their children in the woods when they can't afford to feed them anymore, and Little Thumb helps himself and his siblings out of their predicament.

Prince Darling **** A pointed tale on morality and kindness. One of the better stories in this collection.

_____

"The Bronze Ring"
"Prince Hyacinth and the Dear Little Princess"
"East of the Sun and West of the Moon"
"The Yellow Dwarf"
"Little Red Riding Hood"
"The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood"
"Cinderella or the Little Glass Slipper"
"Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp"
"The Tale of a Youth Who Set Out to Learn What Fear Was"
"Rumpelstiltskin"
"Beauty and the Beast"
"The Master Maid"
"Why the Sea Is Salt"
"The Master Cat or Puss in Boots"
"Felicia and the Pot of Pinks"
"The White Cat"
"The Water-lily. The Gold-spinners"
"The Terrible Head"
"The Story of Pretty Goldilocks"
"The History of Whittington"
"The Wonderful Sheep"
"Little Thumb"
"The Forty Thieves"
"Hansel and Gretel"
"Snow-White and Rose-Red"
"The Goose-girl"
"Toads and Diamonds"
"Prince Darling"
"Blue Beard"
"Trusty John"
"The Brave Little Tailor"
"A Voyage to Lilliput"
"The Princess on the Glass Hill"
"The Story of Prince Ahmed and the Fairy Paribanou"
"The History of Jack the Giant-killer"
"The Black Bull of Norroway"
"The Red Etin" show less