Fairy Tale Pets

If you're Christmas shopping for children this season, one of the Parents Magazine's top 10 Children's Books of 2017 was Fairy Tale Pets  by Tracey Corderoy and Jorge Martin. Looks pretty cute!

Description:
Bob has decided to be a pet-sitter. He just can't wait for all the cute hamsters and bunnies to arrive! But when Goldilocks asks him to look after her grumpy baby bear, the fairy tale chaos begins... Spot your favourite characters misbehaving in an all-star cast as the golden goose, three billy goats gruff and - yikes! - a troll arrive at Bob's door. Whatever will he do? A hilarious new picture book from award-winning author Tracey Corderoy (Squish Squash Squeeze!, Now!, Why?, More!) and talent illustrator Jorge Martin. Perfect for anyone who has ever wondered what fairy tale pets get up to in their spare time!

Advice Wanted: Best Fairy Tale Books for Young Children

We were given a book of Disney nursery rhymes and fairy tales for Pearson. One story in there is that of "Little Red Riding Minnie." It tells of Minnie, who is going to take cookies and cough drops to her sick grandmother, and how the big bad wolf is out to steal the cookies (no hint of actually wanting to harm anyone). Rather than eating the grandmother, he just takes her clothes off the clothesline and waits for Minnie outside. Then, he accidentally eats all the cough drops instead of the cookies, and runs away with eyes watering.


It's kind of humorous if you think of it as a parody, only it's not meant as a parody-it's meant to be safe for young children. (For more on this, check out Gypsy's post and contribution to this article on why children's theater dumbs down fairy tales). I used to have my own opinions on not dumbing down fairy tales for children, but I have to admit, now that I have my own child, I kind of get it-I'm not sure I want to be reading him bedtime stories about people being eaten. Of course, he's still a baby, and as he goes through different phases of development, hopefully I'll adjust too. (And I have to remind myself of the dangers of shielding your children too much, as Sleeping Beauty and Rapunzel remind us-it's better to educate your children about spindles than to pretend they don't exist, and keeping a teenager in a tower can't really keep them from growing up!)

I have my own collection of versions of "Beauty and the Beast", including some picture book versions, but other than that we don't have other fairy tale books for Pearson yet. He's still in the stage where in order to sit still for a book, it needs to have very little text on each page, and he needs to have a toy on hand to chew on, but I would love to get more fairy tales in his library. So, what would you recommend? I'm happy to start getting recommendations of books for when he gets older but would also like to have some on hand for now as well. I'm certainly not as familiar with children's books as I'm sure I'll get over the next few years, but one book I heartily recommend for kids of all ages (and adults!) is Mirror Mirror: A Book of Reverso Poems by Marilyn Singer, illustrated by Josee Masse. Each fairy tale is told from two different perspectives, with the second poem a reverse of the first, line by line-with only clever changes in punctuation to change the meaning. Long time readers may be sick of hearing about this book by now...(there is also a follow up, Follow Follow, that I have seen but don't own)

H. M. Brock's Beauty and the Beast

Happy New Year! Hope you were all able to spend some time with friends and family over the winter holidays!

I got a few fairy tale treasures over the last month to share! First up, I received another book to add to my Beauty and the Beast collection, H. M. Brock's 1914 illustrated version. The copy I got has an introduction by Jerry Griswold, author of one of my favorite books on BATB.

The prose, adapted by an anonymous writer, follows the traditional French fairy tale pretty faithfully, but with a faster pace than either Beaumont or Villeneuve. One unique aspect I don't think I've read before was that when Beauty wishes herself back with her family, she uses the magic rose. Her sisters try to use the rose for themselves-only as soon as they wish on it, it withers. Beauty is dismayed to find the withered rose on the floor of her sister's room, but as soon as she picks it up, it blooms healthily again.

I wasn't familiar with H. M. Brock's illustrations before. They mimic Walter Crane's 1874 illustrations, but as Griswold discusses in the introduction, Brock has his own unique contributions.

Brock's emphasis, Griswold says (other than the luxurious, Cowardly-lion like locks of the Beast) is on the enchanted servants. Beauty's father is waited on by disembodied hands that seem to foreshadow Cocteau's row of candelabra sconces that appear to be disembodied human arms. Beauty's servants aren't as creepy; she gets monkey servants like in Crane (and in Villeneuve's "original" story). 

Brock's Disembodied hands wait on Beauty's Father

Disembodied arms hold candelabras in Cocteau's 1946 film

Walter Crane's monkey servants in procession with Beauty 

Brock's parallel monkey servant procession

Jack and the Corn Stalk

Tony and I visited a corn maze this fall, and in the gift shop I spied this book, Jack and the Corn Stalk, by Aaron Burakoff and illustrated by Izzy Bean. I flipped through the book-it's for very young readers so it was short. It's definitely a cleaned up, aimed-towards-younger-audiences version of "Jack and the Beanstalk," but it's part of the Fairy Tale Trail series that seems to have a theme of teaching children to connect with nature and care for plants and animals, which is a solid message. For example, you can also read Beauty and the Bees as well as other fairy tale adaptations with an environmental twist.

In the book Jack climbs up a magic cornstalk and meets helpful giants who teach him about corn, and in the end there is a corn maze (which Jack uses as a way to communicate with the giants, which is actually a pretty clever idea).

Also available on Kindle:

There are other corny twists (yup, pun intended) on "Jack and the Beanstalk" out there, such as a modern adaptation starring a girl, Waynetta and the Cornstalk, which is recommended as a good educational story to compare and contrast to the traditional fairy tale.

There are some other folk tales out there related to Jack's magic beanstalk, but in America they've naturally been altered to feature corn, a very prominent plant here in the Midwest. Here's a brief tall tale from Kansas featuring a boy who climbs a corn stalk to look out at the corn field and got stuck on a growing plant. Not quite as fleshed out as "Jack and the Beanstalk" but I'm sure it was influenced by the story and adapted to a corn growing culture.

Cinderella Picture Books with a Twist

 Came across some picture book versions of Cinderella that have delightfully modern twists to them!

Prince Cinders by Babette Cole features a gender bent story in which a male hero is bullied by two brothers. For all the action heroines today, I think what we really need to make feminism more well rounded is to now show males that it's okay for them to step out of the traditional male stereotype.

Ella's Big Chance by Shirley Hughes is set in the jazz age. This time, instead of a teeny tiny heroine with big ugly stepsisters, Ella has a more typical body while her sisters are really skinny. Not only that, but she rejects the duke's proposal because she is in love with another.

Then there's, "Seriously, Cinderella is SO Annoying", part of the Other Side of the Story series that retells classic fairy tales from a different character's perspective. This idea is fairly popular now, especially with Disney's "Maleficent" being such a huge hit, but it's still probably a fresh idea for most parents and kids when it comes to Cinderella.

There are lots of "twisted" fairy tales for adults but I love these books that introduce readers at a young age to versions of fairy tales that don't have to follow the traditional formula. Any other
Cinderella children's books out there that provide a fresh look at the story?

Petite Rouge: A Cajun Red Riding Hood

This children's book, Petite Rouge: A Cajun Red Riding Hood, told by Mike Artell and illustrated by Jim Harris, is not new, but this book caught my eye recently and is very highly rated. Readers are impressed by the authentic Cajun voice and story details, and clever pictures. In this version of the story, the little girl and the wolf are replaced by a gutsy duck and a crocodile.

Fans of the book might also enjoy this page from Jim Harris' website, describing his process in illustrating this story; he shares sketches he did of Petite Rouge as different animals, and why he ultimately decided she should be a duck. He also does so with a sense of humor. My favorite is the caption for Petite Rouge as a bear:

It's always fun to see the behind-the-scenes work of artists! It's clear that Harris did his research, which makes the illustrations rich and authentic. This book does seem like a treasure, check out the duck version of "American Gothic":

*Also: did you enter in the giveaway for Kate Forsyth's Wild Girl over on Once Upon a Blog? It's the last day! Be sure to check out the interview Gypsy did with Kate Forsyth. I am REALLY excited to read this book...

Princess of the Midnight Ball

Although "Twelve Dancing Princesses" is one of my all time favorite fairy tales, I rarely/never see critics writing on it the way they love to delve into other fairy tales and their significance. Surlalune's Twelve Dancing Princesses Tales from Around the World is pretty much the only exception I'm aware of, which includes a brief history/overview of the tales in addition to supplying several variants. Although in a way it's good, because it's one of the few fairy tales I can still read and make entirely my own, not having voices of various other interpretations in my head telling me what each symbol and plot point supposedly means.

Fortunately there are several fictional versions for fans of the story, and there's really so much you can do with the mysterious underground kingdom. Just looking through the descriptions of the plots (Modern Interpretations via Surlalune) each author handles the tale quite differently. As I discovered from Surlalune's book in Underground Kingdom: Parts I and II, even variants of the tale don't agree on what kind of Kingdom it is. It can be evil/neutral/good, and the women in question can go there willingly or as victims.

I decided to check out the novel by Jessica Day George, Princess of the Midnight Ball. It's a fairly traditional retelling of the story but I like how it fleshed out the characters and the plot. It was found in the teen section of my library although it could just as easily have been in the children's section. The writing was easy to follow, and the clues to the mystery a bit obvious, but at the same time it was kind of refreshing to read such an innocent version. The current trend in fairy tales is to explore their darker, adult roots, which I enjoy as well, but sometimes I notice that in order to combat the frilly and saccharine stereotype that fairy tales have, I/the fairy tale community in general tend to get defensive and point out the horrific parts: "fairy tales have VIOLENCE and SEX!" Which is certainly true, but is that why we like them or what makes them good stories?

Anyway, considering the younger audience the writing was pretty good (I would reserve "excellent" for books like Narnia or the early Harry Potters when it comes to children's books). One of my favorite descriptions was of King Under Stone, the ruler of the Underground Kingdom, who was pale and tall and gaunt and had "eyes like chips of obsidian." Doesn't that paint such a vivid picture in your mind?

Ruth Sanderson

And if you're wary of it being too close to the traditional story, George expands the mystery of why the sisters go to the Kingdom every night, and the ending isn't quite as simple as in the Grimm fairy tale, so that part does get a little more exciting. If I were to critique the gender roles-which didn't particularly bother me when reading it-I would wish the girls were a little more proactive, because in this story it's Galen, the soldier, who does all the discovery of the mystery and the ultimate solution to the problem. It's kind of ironic actually-in this old post from 2010 I reflected on the fact that the soldier in "12 Dancing Princesses" doesn't actually do much except for follow the old woman's instructions. It's the females who are having the adventures, and you can surmise that it took something proactive for them to discover the Kingdom in the first place, although that's left up to your imagination. The romance was also too love-at-first-sight for me, especially for a novel in which there is plenty of time to develop a love through multiple conversations.

Errol le Cain

 Overall I would definitely recommend it to adults who either are looking for a light and easy read, and/or are wanting to explore some different interpretations of this fairy tale. And I would absolutely recommend it to a younger reader, it could be a great introduction to the world of fairy tales. Traditional novel retellings are great because the stark and odd details of a fairy tale can seem more realistic and personal.

Anyone else who's read it have anything to add? And what other novel versions of "Twelve Dancing Princesses" would you recommend?

Possible color symbolism in Angela Barrett's Beauty and the Beast?

For new readers, my all time favorite picture book version of Beauty and the Beast is the one written by Max Eilenberg and illustrated by Angela Barrett. The writing hits the perfect mixture of being true to the classic French Villeneuve/Beaumont version, while elaborating to make the characters come to life in a relatable way. The illustrations are just breathtaking and wonderfully imaginative.

I noticed as I was perusing this book that, in the beginning, Beauty is set apart from the wonderfully colored world around her by wearing white. The narration also contrasts her to her sisters, for while they are overdressed and gaudy, Beauty's goodness shines through with a pure beauty that needs no extra ornaments.

(That's Beauty in the upper right corner)

I was curious as to whether Beauty's wardrobe in the rest of the book was symbolic. For several pages we don't see a clear picture of Beauty. When she arrives at the Beast's palace, ready to sacrifice herself, she is wearing dark and drab colors, for reasons easily imaginable. She believes she is getting ready for her own funeral.

As Beauty becomes more comfortable in the Beast's palace, she is seen wearing colors for the first time. Now she fits in with her surroundings rather than standing out-maybe because for the first time she feels like she has found somewhere she belongs? Or maybe, after her youthful innocence and naivety (white), she was disillusioned by loss of wealth, hard work, loneliness, and the threat of her father's existence, and this is represented by the dark colors. Only after she overcame that was she able to really experience the various colors of life-explore her personality and interests, not being confined by either her inexperience or grief.

I love this panel-each night at dinner the scene is exactly the same, except for the color of her dress.

I don't know how well my color theory holds up, though, because at the end of the book Beauty is in white again-as a nightgown and then in this beautiful picture (look familiar? From my header?) where she blends in with the snow. But I think the stark black and white of this picture, with a blue tinge, serves to capture the poignancy of the moment in a way color would ruin.

I may just be reading into things, but it's fun to think about the possible reasons behind the artist's choices!

Scans of the book available here

Disneyland resource

Man-just when I think I'm a Disneyland geek, I find there are lots of people out there WAY more into it than I am. It's kind of amazing what a loyal fanbase a theme park can have...and this coming from someone who is considering spending some of her precious sightseeing time in Paris later this spring going to Disneyland Paris, in place of some of the other major attractions that can only be found in Paris.

Daveland has a blog and a regular site full of photos and information about Disneyland, past and present. Just a look down his blogroll and you can see plenty of other blogs dedicated to Disney history, Disney parks, or other surprisingly specific topics-like one blog entirely devoted to The Original Disneyland Hotel. And it has 43 followers!





Little books like this can be found in antique stores, and unfortunately the Disney ones are usually really expensive. Fortunately I found this one in a corner and knew I had to have it:






I had hoped that the lands and rides of Disneyland would be more incorporated into the story than they were-most of the story didn't even take place in Disneyland (though some may recognize the above picture as the entrance to Storybookland). Still, it's a fun little way to remember Disneyland without buying overpriced souvenirs in the park!

Nancy Willard and Barry Moser's BATB

It's not my intention to discuss every children's version of "Beauty and the Beast" on this blog, simply because there are simply too many-but every once in a while one will jump out at me.

Nancy Willard has paired text with Barry Moser's almost eerie and somber wood engraved pictures in this book. It is geared towards a slightly older audience than a typical picture book but isn't quite a chapter book either. Willard sets the story in turn of the century New York. The historical setting makes the whole story more plausible-though it still contains magical elements, it's more grounded in reality. She follows the original fairy tale plot closely but adds enough details of her own to make it unique, and the characters more human than the typical fairy tale cliches (when Beauty's sisters insult her, though she is still gracious, she secretly keeps a gold pen of Mona's she had once borrowed and forgotten to return). The writing is delightfully descriptive, and sometimes just a little bit creepy-(the shadows on the walls of the Beast's attic don't reflect the objects there, but shapes of men and women).

An excerpt, as Beauty is travelling to the Beast's house: "The air grew warm. New leaves misted the maples and shag-bark hickories. In this part of the forest the snow was gone, and now the bees hummed, and the creamy plumes of the chestnuts gave off a soapy smell. They passed through a clearing, rich with wild strawberries so juicy that the horse's hooves seemed to be dripping blood.

Ahead of her, cypresses swayed like dark flames. The white horse quickened its pace through the forest. Beauty felt her own heart quicken. The fragrant chill of spruces surrounded her, then the woods opened into another clearing. At the end of the road loomed a tall, dark house that both terrified and enchanted her. The horse trotted up to the front steps and stopped as if to say, 'This is as far as I go. You must find your own way from here.'...Life had never seemed sweeter now than at this moment when she was about to lose it, but what use was regret now?"