The Hard Facts of the Grimms' Fairy Tales [Paperback]

Maria Tatar (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 6, 2003 | ISBN-10: 0691114692 | ISBN-13: 978-0691114699 | Edition: Revised

Murder, mutilation, cannibalism, infanticide, and incest: the darker side of classic fairy tales figures as the subject matter for this intriguing study of Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm's Nursery and Household Tales. This updated and expanded second edition includes a new preface and an appendix containing new translations of six tales, along with commentary by Maria Tatar. Throughout the book, Tatar skillfully employs the tools not only of a psychoanalyst but also of a folklorist, literary critic, and historian to examine the harsher aspects of these stories. She presents new interpretations of the powerful stories in this worldwide best-selling book. Few studies have been written in English on these tales, and none has probed their allegedly happy endings so thoroughly.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This erudite, cogent perusal of Wilhelm and Jacob Grimm's Nursery and Household Tales is, for the most part, accessible to a lay audience. Tatar charts the evolution of the tales through manuscript form and the various editions, and offers what she maintains is the first complete English translation of the prefaces to the first and second editions. The Grimms abandoned a scholarly effort to salvage pure remnants of folk poetry, advances Tatar, and "with each new edition, the tales veered more sharply away from the rough-hewn simplicity of their first versions to a sanitized and stylized literary form that proved attractive to both parents and children." She demonstrates how the Grimms purged the collection of references to sexuality and incestuous desire but intensified violence, particularly when it took the form of revenge. In opposition to child psychologist Bruno Bettelheim, Tatar warns that some cautionary tales may instill fear, rather than confidence, in children; regarding "Bluebeard," she faults Bettelheim for turning a tale depicting the most brutal kind of serial murders into a story about idle female curiosity and duplicity. Tatar (Spellbound: Studies on Mesmerism and Literature) chairs the German literature department at Harvard University. Illustrated.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Tatar brings into focus both familiar and not-so-familiar fairy tales as she by highlighting a number of important areas: the genesis and editorial history of the tales as they evolved from folk material to children's stories; interpretive approaches; nature and structure; the humble, fearless hero and humbled, hard-working heroine; villains; and, briefly, revenge. Her observations are unburdened by Marxist, psychoanalytical, or pedagogical biases, instead resting on sound and thorough scholarship and careful reading and comparison of texts. The absence of a bibliography is lamentable but should not prevent acquisition of this exceptional study by every library with a fairy tale collection. Patricia Dooley, formerly with Drexel Univ., Philadelphia
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 360 pages
• Publisher: Princeton University Press; Revised edition (May 6, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0691114692
• ISBN-13: 978-0691114699
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 5.9 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #79,178 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #39 in Books > Literature & Fiction > History & Criticism > European

More About the Author

Maria Tatar teaches folklore, children's literature, and German cultural studies at Harvard University. She chairs the Program in Folklore and Mythology. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

27 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars close look at the uncensored tales, January 19, 2003

By 

Lynne Shaney "sandrag" (Minneapolis MN USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Hard Facts of the Grimms' Fairy Tales (Paperback)

It was really interesting to find out about how the Grimm's collection was put together and how it was rewritten. I was surprised to read that the Grimms added violence in order to make the stories more parent-friendly--I guess parents in those days really believed that punishments would produce virtue. Loved the stories at the end, which are pretty hair-raising.
I was surprised to learn that these stories went so far back in time and that they were originally for adults.

46 of 54 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fabulous New Look at the Grimms' Tales, April 28, 2000

By 

Julia Starkey (Medford, MA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Hard Facts of the Grimms' Fairy Tales (Paperback)

I really have to disagree with the previous reviewer. Tatar doesn't force the interpretations at all. She has spent years in archives looking at the varying editions of the Grimms' tales, and working with materials about life at the time the tales were collected. She's very rigorous in her research, and I think the conclusions she draws are really amazing. Her writing can be dense at times, but not so much so that you can't understand where she's going. This book is more scholarly than popular, but it's well worth reading for fans of the Grimms and other 19th century collections of fairy tales. A great companion to the Zipes editions of the Grimms.

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Rambling, Poorly Edited, May 4, 2009

By 

Ana Mardoll (United States) - See all my reviews
(TOP 100 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: The Hard Facts of the Grimms' Fairy Tales (Paperback)

Hard Facts of Grimms' Fairy Tales / 0-691-11469-2

Like many of us, I am deeply interested in fairy tales and I eagerly anticipated this book, looking forward to an engaging, informative handling of the content and textual analysis of the Grimms' tales, with a focus on the un-"child-friendly" elements so common in the stories, due to their original intent to entertain mature audiences.

Unfortunately, I was profoundly disappointed in this book. Clarity and organization are severely lacking and the whole book feels very much like a hastily expanded dissertation that was haphazardly padded to 'book size'. The writing runs in various different directions, often seemingly at random, with no clear view of why a certain topic was discussed, nor how it led into the next topic.

For example, in the first chapter ("SEX AND VIOLENCE: The Hard Core of Fairy Tales"), Tatar deals very briefly and very superficially on the existence of sex and violence in fairy tales before moving hurriedly on to devote the bulk of the chapter on the Grimms' financial difficulties, publishing woes, irritation over harsh critics, and such varied and dissimilar themes as the differences in vernacular between various editions, the misfortunes of modern compilers who have not had the older, less heavily edited versions available, and authors who failed to realize that the "Grimms" author were two people, not one. Most of these topics, as the shrewd reader will note, have little or nothing to do with sex or violence in Grimms' fairy tales or any others, so it is deeply unclear why this comprised the bulk of a chapter titled "SEX AND VIOLENCE".

Another flaw in this book pointing to a dissertation source is Tatar's baffling obsession with diagrams. Multiple diagrams are devoted to detailing the difference between "fairy" tales and "folk" tales. This was not a topic that interested me whatsoever, and the multitude of pages devoted to it was deeply annoying. What does the difference between a fairy/folk tale have to do with the "hard facts" of the Grimms' tales? Nothing, as we later find out. It's just something Tatar is interested in, and she hopes we will be, too. Slightly more pertinent is the number of diagrams devoted to detailing the relationships between various story archetypes, but once again, I did not buy this book to learn about the archetypes of fairy tales, but rather to deal with the "hard facts" of the Grimms' tales - specifically the existence of, explanation for, and critical analysis of the sex, violence, and abandonment in the Grimms' tales, along with the fact that a number of endings were very much "happily ever after". The lack of serious treatment of these grim topics makes me feel that this book was misnamed in an attempt to drum up sales.

I do not think it is appropriate to market a book to an audience expecting analysis and explanation of the content of the Grimms' tales, when the book should more accurately be billed as a "history of the publication of the Grimms' tales" or "an analysis of relationships between archetypal characters in classic fairy/folk tales" or something similarly close to the actual content of this book. If you want a book on deconstructing fairy tales in general, this is a decent resource, if somewhat dry. If you want a book on the grim realities of the Grimms' tales, look elsewhere.

~ Ana Mardoll