The Forgotten Tales of the Brothers Grimm _ the Public Domain Review

21102015 The Forgotten Tales of the Brothers Grimm | The Public Domain Review

httppublicdomainrevieworg20121220theshyforgottenshytalesshyofshytheshybrothersshygrimm 159

T

The Forgotten Tales of the Brothers GrimmTo mark the 200th year since the Brothers Grimm first published their KindershyundHausmaumlrchen Jack Zipes explores the importance of this neglected first edition and what ittells us about the motives and passions of the two folklorist brothers

Pencil drawing of Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm from 1843 from the Historisches Museum in Hanau via(httpcommonswikimediaorgwikiFileJacob_und_Wilhelm_Grimmpng)zenoorg

(httpwwwzenoorgKunstwerkeBGrimm+Ludwig+Emil3A+Jacob+und+Wilhelm+Grimm+5B15D)ndash Source (httpcommonswikimediaorgwikiFileJacob_und_Wilhelm_Grimmpng)

he greatest irony of the numerous worldshywide celebrations held this year to honor the 200thanniversary of the first edition of the Grimmsrsquo Kindershyund Hausmaumlrchen published in twovolumes in 1812 and 1815 involves the discovery that most people really donrsquot know the

original Grimmsrsquo tales or much about their lives That is most people have no clue that the Grimmsrsquofirst edition of 181215 is totally unlike the final or soshycalled definitive edition of 1857 that they

260

205

85

72



published seven different editions from 1812 to 1857 and that they made vast changes in thecontents and style of their collections and also altered their concept of folk and fairy tales in theprocess Even soshycalled scholars of German literature and experts of the Grimmsrsquo tales are not awareof how little most people including themselves know about the first edition and ironically it istheir and our ldquoignorancerdquo that makes the rediscovery of the tales in the first edition so exciting andexhilarating Indeed there is still much to learn about the unique contribution that the Grimms madeto folklore not only in Germany but also in Europe if we return to take a closer look at the firstedition for it was this edition that sparked the pioneer efforts of folklorists throughout Europe andGreat Britain to gather tales from the oral tradition and preserve them for future generations

To explain why I believe that a rediscovery of the Grimmsrsquo first edition can be not only exciting butalso illuminating I would like to share some important background information that will place theGrimmsrsquo collection in a socioshyhistorical context and shed light on their remarkable accomplishmentHere we must bear in mind that their collecting was only a minor part of their research andscholarship and that they would be surprised to know that they are more famous today for their talesthan for their superb philological work When Jacob (b 1785) and Wilhelm (b1786) begancollecting all kinds of folk tales and songs at the beginning of the nineteenth century they were veryyoung precocious students at the University of Marburg still in their teens

By 1805 their entire family had moved from their small village of Hanau to the nearby provincialcity of Kassel and the Brothers were constantly plagued by money problems and concerns abouttheir siblings Their father had been dead for some years and they were about to lose their motherTheir situation was further aggravated by the rampant Napoleonic Wars Jacob interrupted hisstudies to serve the Hessian War Commission in 1806 Meanwhile Wilhelm passed his law examsenabling him to become a civil servant and to find work as a librarian in the royal library with ameager salary In 1807 Jacob lost his position with the War Commission when the French occupiedKassel but he was then hired as a librarian for the new King Jeacuterome Napoleonrsquos brother who nowruled Westphalia Amidst all the upheavals their mother died in 1808 and Jacob and Wilhelmbecame fully responsible for their three younger brothers and sister Despite the loss of their motherand difficult personal and financial circumstances from 1805 to 1812 the Brothers managed toprove themselves to be innovative scholars in the new field of German philology by publishingarticles and books on medieval literature Still in their twenties they were about to launch thecollection of tales that was to become second in popularity to the Bible throughout Germany andlater throughout the western world by the twentieth century



ldquoIn a lecture with Jacob Grimmrdquo sketch by Ludwig Emil Grimm younger brother to Jacob andWilhelm in Goumlttingen May 28 1830 ndash Source

(httpcommonswikimediaorgwikiFileIm_Kolleg_bei_Jacob_Grimm_1830jpg)

What fascinated or compelled the Grimms to concentrate on old German literature was a belief thatthe most natural and pure forms of culture ndash those which held the community together ndash werelinguistic and were to be located in the past Moreover according to them modern literature eventhough it might be remarkably rich was artificial and thus could not express the genuine essence ofVolk culture that emanated naturally from peoplersquos experiences and bound the people togetherTherefore all their energies were spent on uncovering stories from the past This is why their friendthe romantic poet Clemens Brentano asked them in 1808 to collect all types of folk tales that hewanted to revise in a book of literary fairy tales In 1810 they sent him 54 texts that they fortunatelycopied Fortunately I say because Brentano proceeded to lose the manuscript in the Oumllenbergmonastery in Alsace and did not use the Grimmsrsquo texts Meanwhile the Grimms kept collecting talesfrom friends acquaintances and colleagues and when they realized that Brentano was not going touse the tales from their manuscript they decided upon the advice of a mutual friend and anotherromantic author Achim von Arnim to publish their collection that had grown to approximately 86



tales which they published in 1812 and then another 70 which they published in 1815 Bothcollections formed the first edition and included footnotes to the tales as well as scholarly prefacesBefore I discuss the unusual quality of the tales in these two volumes I want to comment briefly onthe idealistic intentions of the young Grimms That is I want to summarize the ideological stancethey took by publishing the tales they had collected

Scan of an extract from the 1812 first edition of Kindershyund Hausmaumlrchen ndash Source(httpcommonswikimediaorgwikiCategoryKinder_und_HausmC3A4rchen_(Grimm)_1812_I)

Although the young Grimms had not entirely formalized their concept of folklore while they workedon the publication of the first edition and even though there were some differences between Jacoband Wilhelm who later was to favor more drastic poetical editing of the collected tales theybasically held to their original principle to salvage relics from the past from the beginning to theend of their work on the Kindershyund Hausmaumlrchen Broadly speaking the Grimms sought to collectand preserve all kinds of ancient relics as if they were sacred and precious gems that consisted of



tales myths songs fables legends epics documents and other artifacts mdash not just fairy tales Theyintended to trace and grasp the essence of cultural evolution and to demonstrate how naturallanguage stemming from the needs customs and rituals of the common people created authenticbonds and helped forge civilized communities This is one of the reasons why they called theircollection of tales an educational manual (Erziehungsbuch) for the tales recalled the basic values ofthe Germanic peoples and also other European groups and enlightened people about theirexperiences through storytelling Remarkably the Grimms at a young age wanted to bequeath theprofound oral tales of the people to the German people not realizing that they were about tobequeath unusually striking tales to people of many different nations and that these tales assumedrelevance in all cultures To understand the role that the tales played in their bequest to westerncivilization if not the world we must bear in mind what they stated in the preface of the first edition

It is probably just the right time to gather these tales since those who have been making aneffort to preserve them are becoming even harder to find (to be sure those who know themstill know a great deal because people may die but the stories live on) Where the talesstill exist they live on and no one worries whether they are good or bad poetic or vulgar Weknow them and we love them just because we happen to have heard them in a certain wayand we like them without reflecting on why Telling these tales is an extraordinary custom mdashand this too the tales share with everything immortal mdash that one must like it no matter whatothers say

The Grimms sought to celebrate and argue for the necessity of storytelling to create bonds amongpeople that share their experiences through stories They believed that the tales and all their variantswere distinctive and kept cultural tradition alive They respected difference and diversity and at thesame time they argued that ldquoThe aim of our collection was not just to serve the cause of the historyof poetry It was our intention that the poetry living in it be effective bringing pleasure wherever itcould and that it therefore become an educational manualrdquo



Illustration by Arthur Rackham from the 1916 English translation edition of KindershyundHausmaumlrchen ndash Source (httparchiveorgdetailsfairytalesofbrot00grim)

Although there were some other German collections of folk and fairy tales that preceded theGrimmsrsquo Kindershyund Hausmaumlrchen none were as diverse or driven by a the Brothersrsquo cooperativeand collective spirit that spurred them to embrace all kinds of tales from Germanshyspeakingprincipalities As early as 1811 Jacob even composed an appeal ldquoAufforderung an die gesammtenFreunde altdeutscher Poesie und Geschichte erlassenrdquo (ldquoAppeal to All Friends of Old GermanPoetry and Historyrdquo) which was never sent but laid the groundwork for his later more fullydeveloped ldquoCircular wegen der Aufsammlung der Volkspoesierdquo (CircularshyLetter Concerned withCollecting of Folk Poetry) printed and distributed to scholars and friends in 1815 It is worth citingthe initial part of this letter because it outlines the basic principles and intentions of the Grimms



Most Honored SirA society has been founded that is intended to spread throughout all of Germany and has asits goal to save and collect all the existing songs and tales that can be found among thecommon German peasantry (Landvolk) Our fatherland is still filled with this wealth ofmaterial all over the country that our honest ancestors planted for us and that despite themockery and derision heaped upon it continues to live unaware of its own hidden beautyand carries within it its own unquenchable source Our literature history and languagecannot seriously be understood in their old and true origins without doing more exactresearch on this material Consequently it is our intention to track down as diligently aspossible all the following items and to write them down as faithfully as possible 1) Folk songs and rhymes 2) Tales in prose that are told and known in particular the numerous nursery andchildrenrsquos fairy tales about giants dwarfs monsters enchanted and rescued royal childrendevils treasures and magic instruments as well as local legends that help explain certainplaces 3) Funny tales about tricks played by rogues and anecdotes puppet plays from oldtimes with Hanswurst and the devil 4) Folk festivals mores customs and games 5) Superstitions 6) Proverbs unusual dialects parables word compositionIt is extremely important that these items are to be recorded faithfully and truly withoutembellishment and additions whenever possible from the mouth of the tellers in and withtheir very own words in the most exact and detailed way It would be of double value ifeverything could be obtained in the local live dialect On the other hand even fragments withgaps are not to be rejected Indeed all the derivations repetitions and copies of the sametale can be individually important Here we advise that you not be misled by the deceptiveopinion that something has already been collected and recorded and therefore that youdiscard a story Many things that appear to be modern have often only been modernized andhas their undamaged source beneath it As soon as one has a great familiarity with thecontents of this folk literature (Volkspoesie) one will gradually be able to evaluate thealleged simplistic crude and even repulsive aspects more discreetly

This circular letter along with the first edition of Kindershyund Hausmaumlrchen went on to inspirenumerous German Austrian and Swiss folklorists to begin collecting tales and gradually theGrimmsrsquo example and their other editions animated folklorists throughout Europe and Great Britain



to collect and preserve oral folk tales If any of the editions that the Grimms published bestrepresented their intentions and ideals that they kept reiterating until 1857 it was their first editionbecause they did not hone the stories the way they honed and refined the tales in later editions Infact you can hear the distinctive voices of the storytellers from whom they received the tales and tothis extent the tales in the first edition some in German dialect are more authentic folk tales andhave more integrity to them despite the fact that they are not as aesthetically pleasing as those inlater revised versions In other words the Grimms let the tales speak for themselves in a very bluntif not awkward manner that lends them a sense of unvarnished truth or the educational value that theGrimms sought



Frontispiece of the 1840 edition A portrait by Ludwig Emil Grimm of Dorothea Viehmaumlnnin one ofthe most important sources for the fairytales found in Kindershyund Hausmaumlrchen and who was to die in

1815 ndash Source (httpcommonswikimediaorgwikiFileDie_Maerchenfraujpg)



Illustration after a picture by Louis Katzenstein showing the Grimm brothers at the house ofDorothea Viehmaumlnnin from Die Gartenlaube (1892) ndash Source

(httpdewikisourceorgwikiDie_BrC3BCder_Grimm_bei_der_MC3A4rchenerzC3A4hlerin)

Turning to the tales of the first edition the first thing a reader might notice is that many of the storiessuch as ldquoThe Hand with the Kniferdquo (ldquoDie Hand mit dem Messerrdquo) ldquoHerr FixshyItshyUprdquo (ldquoHerr Fix undFertigrdquo) ldquoHow Some Children Played at Slaughteringrdquo (ldquoWie Kinder Schlachtens mit einandergespielt haben(httpenwikipediaorgwikiWie_Kinder_Schlachtens_miteinander_gespielt_haben)ldquo) ldquoPuss inBootsrdquo (ldquoDer gestiefelte Katerrdquo) ldquoBluebeardrdquo (ldquoBlaubartrdquo) and ldquoSimple Hansrdquo (ldquoHans Dummrdquo)were deleted in the following editions for various reasons not because they were poorly told butbecause they did not meet some of the requirements of the Grimms who at first sought primarily topublish tales that were Germanic in origin For instance ldquoPuss in Bootsrdquo ldquoBluebeardrdquo ldquoPrincessMouseskinrdquo (ldquoPrinzessin Maumlusehautrdquo) and ldquoOkerlordquo (ldquoDer Okkerlordquo) were considered too Frenchto be included They later learned that this was a mistaken notion because it was and is impossible toknow the exact origins of folk tales Though it is impossible to know fully why certain tales wereomitted or placed in footnotes we do know that ldquoDeath and the Goose Boyrdquo (ldquoDer Tod und der



Gaumlnshirtrdquo) was omitted because of its literary baroque features ldquoThe Strange Feastrdquo (ldquoDiewunderliche Gastereirdquo) because of its close resemblance to ldquoGodfather Deathrdquo ldquoThe Stepmotherrdquo(ldquoDie Stiefmutterrdquo) because of its fragmentary nature and cruelty ldquoThe Faithful Animalsrdquo (ldquoDietruen Tiererdquo) because it came from the SiddhishyKuumlr a collection of Mongolian tales As the Grimmscontinued to collect variants sent to them by friends and colleagues gathered from oral and booksources they either improved the tales of the first edition by combining versions omitted tales infavor of new versions or moved tales to their footnotes

Frontispiece and titleshypage of the of the 1819 edition of Kindershy und Hausmaumlrchen illustrated byLudwig Emil Grimm younger brother to Jacob and Wilhelm This second edition was the first to be

illustrated and the first to omit texts found in the first ndash Source(httpcommonswikimediaorgwikiFileKinder_title_pagejpg)

The second thing a reader might notice about the tales in the first edition is that most of them areshorter and strikingly different than the same tales edited in the later collections They smack oforality and raw contents For instance Rapunzel reveals that she has become impregnated by theprince Snow Whitersquos mother not her stepmother wants to kill the beautiful girl out of envy thewild man is not Iron John and plays a different role in helping the boy who liberates him just as thedevil plays a more unusual role in ldquoDer Teufel Gruumlnrockrdquo later replaced by ldquoBaumlrenhaumluterrdquo

Thirdly a reader will recognize immediately that all these tales are blunt and have little or nodescription The emphasis is on action and the resolution of conflict The storytellers do not beatabout the bush They are prone to tell the truths they know and even though magic superstition



miraculous transformation and brutality are involved the storytellers believe in their storiesMetaphor maps out the reality of listeners and engages people to learn from symbols how to engagetheir realities

Lastly it is important to note that the tales in the first edition were collected mainly from literatepeople whom the Grimms came to know quite well For instance they were well acquainted themembers of the Wild and Hassenpflug families in Kassel and the von Haxthausen family inMuumlnster Wilhelm knew the ministerrsquos daughter Friederike Mannel in a nearby town DorotheaViehmann a tailorrsquos wife provided many tales and in some instances the Grimms took tales frombooks or received tales in letters The literacy of the informants however did not diminish the folkessence of the tales that as the Grimms and other folklorists were to discover were widespreadthroughout Europe and told more often than not in dialect The tales came to the tellers from othertellers or they read tales digested them and made them their own Indeed we always make talesour own and then send them off to other tellers with the hope that they will continue to disseminatetheir stories

The Grimms have often been criticized especially by critics in the last 50 years for having changedand edited the tales from the first to the seventh edition That is they never lived up to their ownwords that the task of the collector is to record the tales exactly as they heard them In other wordsvarious critics have complained that the Grimmsrsquo tales are inauthentic folk tales But this is aridiculous if not stupid argument for nobody can ever record and maintain the authenticity of a taleIt is impossible And yet the Grimms as collectors cultivators editors translators and mediatorsare to be thanked for endeavoring to do the impossible and to work collectively with numerouspeople and their sources to keep traditional stories and storytelling alive In this respect their littleknown first edition deserves to be rediscovered for it is a testimony to forgotten voices that areactually deep within us Hence the irresistibility of the Grimmsrsquo tales that are really not theirs butours



An illustration from Mjallhviacutet (Snow White) an 1852 icelandic translation of the Grimms fairytale ndashSource (httpcommonswikimediaorgwikiFileSnow_White_Needlepng)



Poster made by Kenneth Whitely for the WPA (Works Programme Administration) in 1939 ndash Source(httpwwwlocgovpicturesresourcecph3b49077)



Jack Zipes is Professor Emeritus of German and Comparative Literature at the University of Minnesota and a pioneer of

scholarship on fairy tales He has published prolifically in this area His many works include Fairy Tales and the Art of

Subversion (1983) The Brothers Grimm From Enchanted Forests to the Modern World (1988) and most recently The

Irresistible Fairy Tale The Cultural and Social History of a Genre (2012) He is also translator of The Complete Fairy Tales of

the Brothers Grimm (httpwwwamazoncomgpproduct0553382160ref=as_li_ss_tlie=UTF8amptag=thepubdomrevshy

20amplinkCode=as2ampcamp=1789ampcreative=390957ampcreativeASIN=0553382160)

Links to Public Domain Works

Kindershy und Hausmaumlrchen (181215 first edition) by Jacob and Wilhelm GrimmScans at Wikisource(httpcommonswikimediaorgwikiCategoryKinder_und_HausmC3A4rchen_(Grimm)_1812_I)Transcription at Wikisource(httpdewikisourceorgwikiKategorieMC3A4rchen_Grimm_(1812E280931815))

Other editions at Wikisource including table of included and ommited stories can be found here(httpdewikisourceorgwikiKindershy_und_HausmC3A4rchen)

Fairytales from the German (1827) by George Cruikshank

Internet Archive (httparchiveorgdetailsfairytalesfromg00grimgoog) (NB Scan byGoogle so is published under a nonshycommercial license)

Household stories from the collection of the bros Grimm (1914 edition) English translationby Lucy Crane with illustrations by Walter Crane

Internet Archive (httparchiveorgdetailshouseholdstories00grim2)

The Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm (1916 edition) English translation by Mrs EdgarLucas with illustrations by Arthur Rackham

Internet Archive (httparchiveorgdetailsfairytalesofbrot00grim)

Further Reading



(httpwwwamazoncomgpproduct0691160597ref=as_li_tl

ie=UTF8ampcamp=1789ampcreative=390957ampcreativeASIN=0691160597amplinkCode=as2amptag=thepubdomrevshy20amplinkId=7CLY2SMWHEUBX4PJ)

The Original Folk and Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm The Complete First Edition(httpwwwamazoncomgpproduct0691160597ref=as_li_tlie=UTF8ampcamp=1789ampcreative=390957ampcreativeASIN=0691160597amplinkCode=as2amptag=thepubdomrevshy20amplinkId=7CLY2SMWHEUBX4PJ) (Princeton University Press 2014)by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm with illustrations by Andrea Dezsouml translation and introduction by JackZipes

For the very first time this book makes available in English all 156 stories from the 1812 and 1815 editionsThese narrative gems newly translated and brought together in one beautiful book are accompanied bysumptuous new illustrations from awardshywinning artist Andrea Dezsouml Zipesrsquos introduction gives importanthistorical context and the book includes the Grimmsrsquo prefaces and notes

BUY FROM AMAZON (HTTPWWWAMAZONCOMGPPRODUCT0691160597REF=AS_LI_TLIE=UTF8ampCAMP=1789ampCREATIVE=390957ampCREATIVEASIN=0691160597ampLINKCODE=AS2ampTAG=THEPUBDOMREVshy

20ampLINKID=7CLY2SMWHEUBX4PJ)


ie=UTF8ampcamp=1789ampcreative=390957ampcreativeASIN=0415610257amplinkCode=as2amptag=thepubdomrevshy20amplinkId=GMPP433ROCO3ZBNJ)

Fairy Tales and the Art of Subversion(httpwwwamazoncomgpproduct0415610257ref=as_li_tlie=UTF8ampcamp=1789ampcreative=390957ampcreativeASIN=0415610257amplinkCode=as2amptag=thepubdomrevshy20amplinkId=GMPP433ROCO3ZBNJ) (Routledge 2011)by Jack Zipes



How and why did certain authors try to influence children or social images of children How were fairy talesshaped by the changes in European society in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries Zipes examinesfamous writers of fairy tales such as Charles Perrault Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm Hans Christian Andersenand LFrank Baum and considers the extraordinary impact of Walt Disney on the genre as a fairy talefilmmaker


20ampLINKID=GMPP433ROCO3ZBNJ)

(httppuntillodeproduktzeitshydieseshymaerchenshyfestzuhalten)

Zeit diese Maumlrchen festzuhalten (httppuntillodeproduktzeitshydieseshymaerchenshyfestzuhalten) (Puntillo Verlag 2013)by Ralph Schippan

Ralph Schippan presents ndash from the perspective of a bibliophile collector ndash an insightinto the circumstances of how the Grimm Brothers collected their fairyshytales and how thefirst edition of Kindershy und Hausmaumlrchen was edited and printed [In German]

BUY FROM PUNTILLO (HTTPPUNTILLODEPRODUKTZEITshyDIESEshyMAERCHENshyFESTZUHALTEN)



published seven different editions from 1812 to 1857 and that they made vast changes in thecontents and style of their collections and also altered their concept of folk and fairy tales in theprocess Even soshycalled scholars of German literature and experts of the Grimmsrsquo tales are not awareof how little most people including themselves know about the first edition and ironically it istheir and our ldquoignorancerdquo that makes the rediscovery of the tales in the first edition so exciting andexhilarating Indeed there is still much to learn about the unique contribution that the Grimms madeto folklore not only in Germany but also in Europe if we return to take a closer look at the firstedition for it was this edition that sparked the pioneer efforts of folklorists throughout Europe andGreat Britain to gather tales from the oral tradition and preserve them for future generations

To explain why I believe that a rediscovery of the Grimmsrsquo first edition can be not only exciting butalso illuminating I would like to share some important background information that will place theGrimmsrsquo collection in a socioshyhistorical context and shed light on their remarkable accomplishmentHere we must bear in mind that their collecting was only a minor part of their research andscholarship and that they would be surprised to know that they are more famous today for their talesthan for their superb philological work When Jacob (b 1785) and Wilhelm (b1786) begancollecting all kinds of folk tales and songs at the beginning of the nineteenth century they were veryyoung precocious students at the University of Marburg still in their teens

By 1805 their entire family had moved from their small village of Hanau to the nearby provincialcity of Kassel and the Brothers were constantly plagued by money problems and concerns abouttheir siblings Their father had been dead for some years and they were about to lose their motherTheir situation was further aggravated by the rampant Napoleonic Wars Jacob interrupted hisstudies to serve the Hessian War Commission in 1806 Meanwhile Wilhelm passed his law examsenabling him to become a civil servant and to find work as a librarian in the royal library with ameager salary In 1807 Jacob lost his position with the War Commission when the French occupiedKassel but he was then hired as a librarian for the new King Jeacuterome Napoleonrsquos brother who nowruled Westphalia Amidst all the upheavals their mother died in 1808 and Jacob and Wilhelmbecame fully responsible for their three younger brothers and sister Despite the loss of their motherand difficult personal and financial circumstances from 1805 to 1812 the Brothers managed toprove themselves to be innovative scholars in the new field of German philology by publishingarticles and books on medieval literature Still in their twenties they were about to launch thecollection of tales that was to become second in popularity to the Bible throughout Germany andlater throughout the western world by the twentieth century







































































Further Reading



























































































Further Reading






















































































Further Reading

















































































Further Reading












































































Further Reading








































































Further Reading




































































Further Reading

































































Further Reading





























































Further Reading
























































Further Reading

















































Further Reading












































Further Reading









































Further Reading






































Further Reading


















































Documents

The Forgotten Tales of the Brothers Grimm _ the Public Domain Review