Customer Reviews

The Oxford Companion to Fairy Tales

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This is an excellent first edition of a resource book which has carefully limited its scope "Western", "literary" "fairy tale". Imagine my amusement, however, that I picked up at the same time as this volume The Fairy Tales of Hermann Hesse tranlated by Jack Zipes - and there is no entry for Hesse in the Companion.

This volume is especially strong. however, in that it recognizes the contributions of composers, artists and film directors and their work to the fairy tale tradition. The entries are fascinating and do not require any expertise in the field. Items are indexed in a manner that it is easy to find what you are looking for - "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" is under "Snow White" - that may seem self-evident but with the number of varients of fairy tales that is not always so simple.

There are longer articles on the various regions and the general flavor and history of fairy tales in the region. These provide a broad overview that is most useful.

Opening at random to give a flavor of the entries: Charles Kingsley for his The Water-Babies; Rudyard Kipling for Puck of Pook's Hill and Rewards and Fairies; Sarah Kirsch for her retelling of Grimm tales in prose and poetry; Kismet the musical; Edward Knatchbull-Hugessen author of 15 children's books; Janusz Korczah for a recent utopian fairy-tale novel.

This book is a significant contribution. I should hope for a second edition to close some of the holes. [Of course, I'd like a similar volume for the rest of the world AND a volume for animal fables ...]

This delightful, informative book will give great enjoyment to anyone who loves fairy tales. You'll find an in-depth entry on just about any fairy tale, old or new, you can think of. Among the profiles of authors, I was pleased to find excellent write-ups on three of my favorites, C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien and Diana Wynne Jones. Other writers from the past covered here include E. Nesbit, Hans Christian Andersen, Oscar Wilde, A.A. Milne, George MacDonald, Beatrix Potter and L. Frank Baum; others from the present include Robin McKinley, Lloyd Alexander, Vivian Vande Velde, Terry Pratchett, Astrid Lindgren and Patricia C. Wrede.

There are also entries on composers, opera, operetta, ballet, illustrators, film, television and science fiction. Generously scattered throughout are full-page (and smaller) illustrations by artists such as Gustav Dore, Kay Nielsen, Walter Crane, W.W. Denslow and Arthur Rackham. And special sections trace in detail the development of fairy tales in various countries.

This well-written, well-edited guide is a must for anyone with an interest in fairy tales.

This book should be in all moderately sized reference libraries and larger. With a focus on the European Fairy Tale tradition, this volume includes entries on authors, illustrators, playrights, critical movements, collectors, films, and countless others related to the fairy tale genre. The entries are well-researched and many are enhanced with rarely reproduced illustrations. The book makes a great reference tool, but also serves as a candy dish full of information about your favorite fairy tales. While some expected entries are missing, this is still the best reference volume in the field. It is highly recommended.

Supposedly comprehensive, The Oxford Companion to Fairy Tales has flaws stemming from a characteristic noticeable in other of Jack Zipes' books related to children's literature: a limited knowledge of the field that leads to coverage of topics that fall within two disparate areas, one rather esoteric and the other common knowledge. The former is Zipes' academic specialties and the latter is well-known by almost everyone: in this book, Bela Illes on the one hand and Maurice Sendak on the other. But look what's missing! In a random search through the Companion's many entries, one finds nothing about Jewish folklore, except for a brief statement about the very famous Isaac Bashevis Singer. Nothing about the Bible, the Golem, dybbuks, Chelm, the Israel Folk Archives, or the eminent folklorists Dov Noy, Dan Ben Amos, and Howard Schwartz. Nothing about authors of collections of Jewish folklore like Nina Jaffe or Pennina Schram. Moving from Jewish folklore to folklore in general, there are more surprising lacks: Lucy Boston and Iona and Peter Opie to name just two (or is it three?) The disclaimer in the Introduction that no reference book of this kind can include everything is not an excuse for overlooking such important folkloric subjects.

While some things are missing, this companion gives a lot of information in a form that is not overwhelming. It is a good companion to the volume by Humphrey Carpenter and Mari Prichard on Children's LIterature.