Fairy Tale Knits: 32 Projects to Knit Happily Ever After

I'm not a knitter. For some reason, I've never had a family member or friend who knitted. I am adept with other crafty type skills, especially beading and cross-stitch. I've got some fairy tale theme cross stitch patterns I will share someday. But knitting has never captured my immediate interest until the last few years after reading other blogs like that of Jane Brockett and others. Then there's the majority of free time spent on SurLaLune that keeps me from taking up new hobbies. My priorities always head back to this passion first. Still, there are times when the idea of picking up yarn and needles, playing with color and texture and having something to do with my hands while watching a tv or movie, well, that appeals to me. Then I see books and patterns like these and I'm tempted even more.

Fairy Tale Knits: 32 Projects to Knit Happily Ever After by A. Stewart-Guinee was released in August this year.

The book is available on Amazon where two of the patterns for the designs pictured below are currently available for free. I think they are two of the best designs in the book, but all of them are great. There are also patterns for boys' items, like pirates. And the crown is unisex despite being labeled as a princess crown.

Here's the publisher's description:

32 whimsical patterns for children twelve months to eight years.

Two timeless traditions-fairy tales and knitting-come together magically in the season's most original knitting book. You'll get patterns to knit pieces that are reminiscent of the world's most beloved fabled characters, including Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Robin Hood, Hansel and Gretel, knights, pirates, and many more. From a fanciful capelet and muff to a playful baby jumper and hat, these are the children's knitting patterns dreams are made of.

Richly wrapped in the look and feel of a real storybook, Fairy Tale Knits is saturated with lush photography and a beautiful full-color design. Whether you're a beginner or experienced knitter, these 32 imaginative projects truly make for knitting happily ever after. You'll get

32 patterns for innovative projects kids will love to wear
Designs that are wearable for everyday school and play
A full-color design featuring lush photography
Fairy Tale Knits is a sophisticated and enchanting knitting book you and your children will turn to again and again.

The author, Alison, has a blog and a Flickr album picturing several more completed projects. There is a Little Red Riding Hood cape and a Cinderella dress, for example. I love the chain mail sweater. Be sure too see the Ladybug jacket, not in the book, but a new design for fall by the author. I love the Ladybug jacket for which the pattern is also provided for free.

All of these wonderful gifts of patterns. Do buy the book if you have someone in your life to coax into making and someone else to wear these fun things. Folks who generously share their talents have to make a little money, too.


Snowflake Queen Sweater Coat Pattern


Princess Crown

And maybe someday I will learn how to knit. I won't have the time to develop this level of exquisite skill, but I am rather determined to have a fun pair of hand-knit striped socks made by me or someone else...

Spend Your Holidays with Hans Christian Andersen

A few weeks ago I found this lovely article about traveling in Odense and Denmark with an emphasis on seeing Hans Christian Andersen related sites: Follow Hans Christian Andersen in Odense.

It's really a great article to save if you plan to ever visit Denmark and see some of the Andersen related sites. The recommended sites aren't limited to Odense despite the article title. I've seen many articles of a similar vein, but this is one of the most comprehensive I've seen. I learned a thing or two!

And traveling to Denmark is one of the trips I plan to make one day. The Fairy Tale Road in Germany will come first, but this is on the list.

On the Slant: Jacob Grimm

Most of us know Jacob Grimm as one half of the Grimms, collectors of fairy tales, the editors of arguably the most famous collection of fairy tales ever, the ones that brought fairy tales to the masses, or at least returned them to the masses in print.

We often forget just how profound Jacob's work was, despite controversies over the brothers' collection methods and the creative license his brother Wilhelm later took when editing the tales.

I found this short homage to him in this week's Watered Down Etymologies by Anatoly Liberman, a column on language and etymology published online by Oxford University Press.

I will take the liberty to finish this post with a personal remark about Jacob Grimm. Linguistics, literature, and history are unlike mathematics, physics, or music. One should beware of calling a language historian a genius. Yet at least three language students deserve this appellation. One of them is Jacob Grimm. The public knows him only because of the fairytales, but he was the founder of comparative Germanic philology and of several other areas of study. More important is the fact how often, though armed only with his prodigious memory and unerring intuition, rather than our dictionaries, manuals, and computers, he offered correct solutions. Every time I have a bright idea about the origin of a word, an old custom, or belief, I look up the relevant passage in the volumes of Jacob Grimm’s works. In most cases, it turns out that he anticipated my guess by at least 150 years. So I think his view of the derivation of the word soul (saiwala) is right, and I find some confirmation of it in the Greeks’ treatment of the Ocean. No doubt, Grimm knew all of it long before I was born.

Makes you appreciate the Grimms all over again, doesn't it? Especially Jacob this time.


And if suddenly you have a greater interest in these men, I recommend The Brothers Grimm: From Enchanted Forests to the Modern World by Jack Zipes. Or for younger students, try The Brothers Grimm: Two Lives, One Legacy by Donald R. Hettinga.

More about La barbe bleu

Following up on today's earlier post...

From: Breillat’s “Bluebeard” Coming to America

The U.S. rights to Catherine Breillat’s “Bluebeard” have been acquired by Strand Releasing for a spring 2010 release.

The film will also be shown at the New York Film Festival this weekend for those in the vicinity.

Bluebeard / La barbe-bleue
Catherine Breillat, 2009, France, 78m

Boudoir philosopher Catherine Breillat’s bloody chamber piece takes an outrageously deadpan approach to Charles Perrault’s grisly bedtime story about the aristocratic ogre who marries and murders a series of wives. Her Bluebeard is a middle-aged behemoth, easily four times the size of his child bride. The fairytale is acted out in a 16th century setting and explicated, often hilariously, by a contemporary pair of young sisters. The more sexually curious of the two is named Catherine and the movie’s double ending, while not exactly Perrault’s, is pure Breillat. The French director’s idiosyncratic follow-up to her sensuously carnal, literary period piece, The Last Mistress (NYFF 2007), is a perversely chaste and highly personal adaptation of Perrault’s classic fairytale.

Playmobil Fairy Tale Sets

Deal alerts included....


Magical Queen Fairy Tale Set

So this is ending up to be a fairy tale toys week for me. I was shopping online at Barnes and Noble for something unrelated and discovered that the Playmobil Fairy Tale sets are on sale, cheaper than I've ever seen them online. So I thought I would share with any of you looking for holiday shopping ideas for little ones, or not so little ones. They are an additional $5 off the lowest listed price on the site through a special toy sale. (The terms are unclear, but each set was reduced an extra $5 in my cart, so buying more than one at the discounted price is possible in one order.)


Fairy Tale Set Lost Boy and Girl

For those of you who don't know, Playmobil has an entire series of fairies and castle toys for children, including three specific Marchen (fairy tale) sets. The sets are named with the German titles--Schneewittchen, Hansel und Gretel and Aschenputtel--which are Snow White, Hansel and Gretel and Cinderella, of course. They are given more prosaic and rather unhelpful English names, however, so they often don't come up in straight searches for toys.


Princess Fairy Tale Set

Anyway, I once again adore these because they aren't branded with licensed character names. The sets are also more gender neutral, especially Hansel and Gretel. How often do you see Hansel and Gretel toys, anyway?


Magic Castle with Princess Crown

So I thought I'd share while the sale is still on. I don't know the ending date, but I always assume sooner than later on these. [Edit: I believe the sale ends at 11:59 PM on Sunday, Oct. 11th, time zone unknown.)


Royal Carriage

There are more castles and fairy sets, but I'm not going to link to them all. I just chose my favorites to share here, but be sure to explore to see them all if your interest is peaked. Not all are available on BN. Amazon has more sets, but with higher prices right now. You can also explore the Playmobil website. (It's funny that the dwarfs are sold in sets of five, not seven.)

Barnes and Noble also has some coupons right now--these don't work on the toys, but could be applied to other items, such as books or calendars. BN always has one of the best selections of calendars and they have the Rackham 2010 Calendar I'm debating for myself.

Save an additional 10% off one item with coupon code: H8J3U7N.
Dates: Ends 10/18

Attention B&N Members! Save an additional 15% off one item with coupon code: P3W3U8W.
Dates: Ends 10/18


Rackham's Fairy Tales 2010 Calendar

The links in this post are affiliate links so SurLaLune will also receive a small percentage of any purchase you make after using the links, if you are so inclined to shop. Not my primary reason for sharing, but helpful all the same.

Granny O’Grimm

Okay, this one made me laugh. And then I wanted more and started trying to figure out how to get more...

The best place to learn about Granny O'Grimm is on her newly launched website at Granny O'Grimm. Here are some explanations of what all of this is about, namely a short film that's winning prizes at film festivals and is now being made into a series.

Inspired by a character in Irish writer Kathleen O'Rourke's stand-up comedy show, Granny O'Grimm's Sleeping Beauty first came to the screen in a 5min short film directed by Nicky Phelan and produced by Brown Bag Films in 2008. Currently zimmer-framing her way around the international film festival circuit, 'Granny O'Grimm's Sleeping Beauty' has already collected a number of audience awards at film festivals in Ireland, America and Australia. The short film will have an Irish theatrical release through Paramount Pictures this year and will receive its television debut on Ireland's public service broadcaster, RTE.

You can watch the beginning of the film on the website at The Film.
Alas, it's not the entire film, so be prepared to be tortured as you wish for more..

Here's more about the series, too.

We all know the Grimm fairytales. Granny's are grimmer...
Once upon a time there was a granny who dreamed of being the best granny in the whole world. Unfortunately, this granny was tormented by a lifetime of rage against the world and everyone in it. Luckily, nobody noticed what an angry old woman she had become because they took no notice of her one way or another. But there's only so much anger one old woman can repress before it BURSTS OUT FROM THE DEPTHS OF HER SOUL IN A SCREAMING FIREBALL OF BITTERNESS AND RESENTMENT!

...or a bedtime story, as Granny herself likes to call it.

Granny O'Grimm is a 26 x 11 min animated series. Each episode features Granny O'Grimm's desperate attempts to be the perfect granny to her three grandchildren, before the fairytales unleash her demons. Produced by Brown Bag Films and directed by Nicky Phelan, the series will be created in 3D & 2D computer animation.

And here are some of Granny's thoughts on a few fairy tales:

She doesn’t think much of them as it turns out: “That Little Mermaid fancied herself too much by half. Turning her nose up at the local merboys to chase a human Prince. It was far from princes she was reared let me tell you. And where did the Gingerbread Man’s notions of escaping to a better life get him? Dead inside in a fox, that’s where”.

These are produced by Brown Bag Films which is celebrating a great year and a fifteen year anniversary. You can read more about that at Brown Bag’s Darragh O’Connell Talks 15 Years of Animation. They also have an informative article to announce the launching of the site at Granny O'Grimm launches her very own website and a little bit of history behind the development.

I can't wait for DVDs of this one. I will preorder them as soon as I learn about them. Oh, please oh please oh please put them on DVD sooner rather than later...

Here's a slightly different clip:

La barbe bleu [Bluebeard] directed by Catherine Breillat (2009)

Earlier this week, I saw this small item listed on the New Statesman website for the London Film Festival.

Bluebeard (dir: Catherine Breillat)

Famously retold by Angela Carter in her story collection The Bloody Chamber, this fairy-tale gets a low-budget treatment from the provocative Breillat.

I saved it and decided to research further when I had more time. Then a great review showed up in the news for today at Bluebeard: 'A Minor Masterpiece' by Howard Schumann. He explains the plot and gives a glowing review. Here's part of his plot summary:

The film operates on parallel levels, both involving two sisters. In the first story, two young sisters play in the attic of their home in France in the present. Catherine, who according to Breillat's autobiographical material, represents the director, plays power games with her older but more withdrawn sister Marie-Anne by tormenting her with readings of the classic horror story "Bluebeard."

The review is much longer, so click on through to read more. I am impressed with the photography considering this was classed as low budget.



You can of course read more about it at IMDB, too. The viewer ratings aren't as glowing, but they are pretty high for IMDB ratings. (It's all relative with this stuff.)


It's refreshing to see this tale get a new treatment. It's so often avoided in film these days and not well-recognized by the general public. The average person on the street always confuses him with Blackbeard and wants to talk about pirates with me. :) Not that this is a high profile film, but anything is a boon. Older literature implies everyone used to understand Bluebeard as a stereotype, but not so anymore.

Hopefully this one will make it to DVD stateside someday...

And if you want to refresh your memory and read the original again, try The Annotated Bluebeard (the one that started SurLaLune).

Edit: I added more about U.S. screenings and releases in another post.

Catalogue for the Wonderland Exhibit

Last week I posted information and links about the Wonderland exhibit currently at the V&A.

At the time, the East London Printmakers website had a link to a PDF of the exhibit catalogue that wasn't working. I emailed them about it and received a timely response that passed through three women's hands quickly but got lost in my stacks for a few days. But here I am letting you know that they fixed it!

And it is lovely...

You can see it for yourself at Wonderland Catalogue. It is a massive PDF file with 76 pages of text and images, but if your computer can handle it, I recommend it. Just give it a little while to download and you should be fine.

After perusing this generous gift, I'm not so bummed that I'm stuck in Nashville instead of traveling this year.

I was tickled to see an interpretation of The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Gilman Perkins which I just included in the Rapunzel and Other Maiden in the Tower Tales From Around the World collection as a modern type of Rapunzel tale.

There are also interpretations ranging from The Girl Without Hands to The Ugly Duckling, some obvious and some delightfully less so.

Christine Ethier also shared a link to a BBC program about the exhibit that's been converted into a podcast here. Thanks, Christine!

My husband studied screenprinting in college and took a few classes before we were married. I find the process interesting and can't wait to share this with him...

When Cinderella Went to the Ball: Five Hundred Years of Fairy Tales

Toronto Public Library has a new exhibit, When Cinderella Went to the Ball: Five Hundred Years of Fairy Tales, until Dec. 12 at the library's Lillian H. Smith branch, near University of Toronto.

From the website:

This virtual exhibit presents a small selection of items taken from the Osborne Collection’s sixtieth anniversary exhibit, When Cinderella Went to the Ball: Five Hundred Years of Fairy Tales, held from September 12 to December 12, 2009. Celebrating one of children’s literature’s most enduringly popular genres, the exhibit progresses from a fifteenth-century Venetian wonder tale (Historia di Lionbruno, 1476), through “classic” stories and collections by Charles Perrault, the Brothers Grimm and others, to today’s spin-offs, spoofs and “post-modern” interpretations.

And, bless the TPL, they have also built a nice website featuring some of the art that will long outlast the exhibit and gives those of us from far away a small taste.

Here's an article with a little more about the exhibit, too: Toronto Library - 500 years of fairy tales.

Now I wish I was somewhere near Toronto, too...

And another treat from a previous exhibit of pop-up books: Cinderella and Jack and the Beanstalk.

The Mermaid's Madness by Jim C. Hines

October is filled with new fairy tale related releases, so today I offer another new book that was officially released yesterday, The Mermaid's Madness by Jim C. Hines.


This novel is the second in Jim C. Hines's Princess series following The Stepsister Scheme released in January 2009. There will be at least two more in the series: Red Hood's Revenge (2010) and Secret of the Snow Queen (2011).

Here's is Jim's synopsis for the new book:

There is an old story — you might have heard it — about a young mermaid, the daughter of a king, who saved the life of a human prince and fell in love.

So innocent was her love, so pure her devotion, that she would pay any price for the chance to be with her prince. She gave up her voice, her family, and the sea, and became human. But the prince had fallen in love with another woman.

The tales say the little mermaid sacrificed her own life so that her beloved prince could find happiness with his bride.

The tales lie.

The first chapter is online for previewing here. (This is a PDF file, not an HTML, so be aware if that is an issue on your computer.) He also answers some reader questions on his release day post: Happy Mermaid Day.

These books are humorous and fun, rather Charlie's Angels meets fairy tales, with creative twists on the original tales. I've not read Mermaid's Madness yet. I'm still debating whether to buy the paper or Kindle version, I admit. My reading is also lacking as my writing has demanded the majority of my time the last few weeks.

(If we waited for me to read all the releases, much of this blog would be woefully outdated. My job is to spread the news, not critically review each new offering in the fairy tale realm. My purse also hinders acquiring everything for review, too. The library doesn't acquire most of these books despite my sweetest dreams, at least not in a timely manner.)

Anyway, I enjoy Jim's blog and his website. For examples of Jim's humor, see 20 Neil Gaiman Facts (spoofing all the Chuck Norris jokes out there) and Slush Reading, Seuss Style. (The Gaiman one has become an internet sensation in less than a month.)

If you are looking for light reading with fairy tales thrown in, look this one up. We all need some frivolity in our lives...

Topsy Turvy Dolls

On this list of things I don't need but admit I always wanted: Fairy Tale Topsy Turvy Dolls.

I didn't play with many dolls as a child--once I learned to read, toys were mostly history--but I had a few favorites. One of the dolls I always wanted was a topsy turvy doll which for some reason I'm starting to see around again.


I didn't go searching for them, but they came up on a related Amazon search. I had to find all of the variations out of curiosity. I really appreciate that none of these are obvious offshoots of the Disney princess images. Sleeping Beauty comes closest, but more out of chance than design from the looks of it.


The only ones I remember as a kid are Cinderella and Little Red Riding Hood, obvious choices since they are arguably the most popular tales.


I probably would have put up a bigger campaign for one if I had ever seen the Beauty and the Beast version. I can't explain the fascination because I really AM NOT a doll person. (Puppets, on the other hand, don't get me started on puppets.) I know part of it is the magical element of transforming the dolls. Really, these are a clever way of rendering the characters from fairy tales.


I have a new niece due to arrive in late January and now I wonder if I need one of these for her....


Is anyone else nostalgic for toys they had or didn't have but wanted, especially fairy tale related ones?


The images are all clickable and take you to the Amazon pages for the individual dolls. I have also seen these in "smart" kid toy stores as I call them and a few puppet stores. I don't shop for toys often since all of the children in my life usually receive books as gifts, so they might be available in other places, too.

Rapunzel and Other Maiden in the Tower Tales From Around the World

SurLaLune Fairy Tales presents a new collection of fairy tales: Rapunzel and Other Maiden in the Tower Tales From Around the World. For now, this book is only available for the Kindle, but the priority now is for paper versions and other eformats. I plan to have this title as well as the previous two, The Frog Prince and Other Frog Tales From Around the World and The Fairy Tale Fiction of Anne Isabella Thackeray Ritchie, available in at least paper and PDFs by the end of the October.

Here's the official description which is not posted on Amazon yet--that takes a few more days to appear after the book is launched:

RAPUNZEL. Just the name conjures up images of long golden hair and tall stone towers. She remains part of our popular culture thanks to countless children's books, as well as advertising, movies, and merchandise. Rapunzel, far from falling into historical obscurity, is very much a part of modern culture. However, she is far from the only maiden in the tower to be found in folklore. Her tale and those of other imprisoned women reach back hundreds of years and come from many cultures from around the world.

This anthology of tales offers several stories similar to Rapunzel. A few more resemble the tale of Maid Maleen, another imprisoned daughter. Most are tales of other imprisoned maidens, princesses, and wives from around the world. Not all of the women are kept in literal towers, some are entombed instead, but all are unwilling captives.

Maidens are imprisoned by their parents for their own safety, as punishment, or to guard their virtue. Wives are imprisoned by jealous husbands hoping to avoid cuckolding. A few women are political prisoners. A surprising number of the tales come from France where tower prisons were popular devices of the French salon authors, especially Madame d’Aulnoy.

While it is impossible for this collection to be comprehensive, it contains over fifty tales and stories--some well-known, some mostly forgotten--reaching back to ancient myths and moving forward to some stories just reaching their hundredth birthdays, such as those by Edith Nesbit.

Also included are two tales newly translated into English from the original French, "Persinette" and "Parsillette," the latter a rare variant of the tale with an unusual ending.

Whether you are a student of folklore or an armchair enthusiast, this anthology offers a diverse array of tales with a unifying theme that both entertains and educates, all gathered for the first time in one helpful collection.

I gathered a wide range of tales, some obvious and many not. Most are European this time, or directly influenced by European tales, but the appearance of imprisoned maidens is pervasive to folklore. I also found a few obscure variants of tales, such as Saint Demetra, that are well-known tales told slant from the usual versions.

I thought I was finished with this collection a few weeks ago and then realized I wanted to add two French tales, Persinette by Charlotte-Rose de Caumont de la Force, which is a direct ancestor of Rapunzel from France, and, Parsillette, an obscure tale that is quite surprising. I can translate French with painstaking care and time, so I did. I haven't found an English version of Parsillette anywhere else. Persinette is available in Jack Zipes' The Great Fairy Tale Tradition: From Straparola and Basile to the Brothers Grimm. (And if you don't own that book, it's one of the absolute "must owns.")

Table of Contents:

Introduction by Heidi Anne Heiner

Rapunzel Tales

Rapunzel Germany
Petrosinella Italy
The Fair Angiola Italy
Filagranata Italy
Prunella Italy
Persinette France
Fragolette France
Parsillette France
The Maid and the Negress Portugal
Uzembeni; or, Usikulumi’s Courtship South Africa

Maid Maleen Tales

Maid Maleen Germany
Princess Who Was Hidden Underground Germany
Girl Clad in Mouseskin Denmark

More Maiden in the Tower Tales

The Prison of Danae Greece
Perseus the Savior Greece
Demeter and Persephone Greece
The Story of Saint Demetra and Her Daughter Greece
Hero and Leander Greece
Saint Barbara Roman Catholic and Greek Orthodox Saint
Solomon’s Daughter Jewish Tradition
Princess of the Tower Jewish Tradition
The Three Enchanted Princes Italy
The Story of Hugdietrich and Hildeburg Germany
The Lay of Yonec France
The Blue Bird France
The Princess Mayblossom France
Princess Rosette France
The White Cat France
The White Doe France
The Satin Surgeon France
The Discreet Princess France
Long, Broad, and Quickeye Czech Republic / Bohemia
The Grateful Beasts Hungary
The Maiden’s Tower Azerbaijan
Legend of the Maiden Tower Turkey
The Tower of Las Infantas Spain
Legend of the Three Beautiful Princesses Spain
Legend of the Rose of the Alhambra Spain
The Slices of Fish Portugal
The Three Princes and the Maiden Portugal
Schmat-Razum Russia
The Tinder Box Denmark
The Flying Trunk Denmark
Punchkin India
Juan and Clotilde Philippines
The Three Brothers Philippines
An Impossible Enchantment Unknown
The Lady of Shalott by Alfred, Lord Tennyson England

Bonus Stories

“The Yellow Wall Paper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman United States
“Melisande or, Long and Short Division” by Edith Nesbit England
“The Princess and the Cat” by Edith Nesbit England
“The Imprisoned Princess” by Eleanor Farjeon England

So if you are interested in this title, please post or email with desired formats. I'm focusing on paper and PDF since they are the most popular, but I will consider others if I see a demand.

That said, I'm working on several other collections, too. Cinderella is a top priority since I am familiar with her popularity and know there is a higher demand for her stories. She's also high maintenance with all her variations and moods. I already have nearly 100 tales for a Cinderella collection and estimate the SurLaLune collection will be closer to 200. At some point I will just choose to abandon and publish since the possibilities of finding more of her tales are nearly infinite, it seems.

Dreams Come True: Art of the Classic Fairy Tales from the Walt Disney Studio

My post yesterday on the Snow White release was so long, but I wanted to share more from the interview from Lella Smith Takes Us Through the History of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. It's long and I know most of you will probably not follow the link, but near the end are a few pertinent questions for the many, many Disney researchers, be they fans or not, out there.

First, here's more about the Dreams Come True, Art of the Classic Fairy Tales from the Walt Disney Studio exhibit opening in New Orleans in November in conjunction with the release of The Princess and the Frog.

What does your work at the Animation Research Library consist of on a kind of regular basis?

Lella Smith: Ooh it's so much fun. I work with all the creative projects that come out of the library. For example we're opening an exhibition on November 15 in New Orleans called Dreams Come True, Art of the Classic Fairy Tales from the Walt Disney Studio. And that is an exhibition that celebrates fairy tales, talks about how Walt Disney Studio changed them, some of the reasons they did, the elements of animation are represented in the exhibition and there will be about 800 works.

Here's also Disney's official release information about the exhibit from Disney Animation:

Dreams Come True: Art of the Classic Fairy Tales from the Walt Disney Studio
New Orleans Museum of Art
November 15, 2009 – March 14, 2010
http://www.noma.org/dreamfacts.html

Dreams Come True: Art of the Classic Fairy Tales from The Walt Disney Studios is a major exhibition featuring more than 600 original artworks from the Walt Disney Animation Research Library. The exhibition will explore the world of fairy tales as told by the Walt Disney Company, and will include artwork from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast, as well as Walt Disney Animation Studios’ newest fairy tale, The Princess and the Frog.

And here's more about Disney's approach to adapting fairy tales to film and the reasoning behind some of the decisions that were made.

Can you talk about a few of the differences from the Brothers Grimm? We talked a bit about it from the Brothers Grimm telling to the Disney telling.

Lella Smith: Sure, one of my favorite subjects. Well, you know, Snow White was a story that had been around for decades and decades in an oral tradition. And in many different countries there were subtle changes and not so subtle changes. In one of the stories I remember I think it was in an Italian version the huntsman was supposed to cut off Snow White's toe and use it as a stopper in a bottle of her blood. You know, there were lots of changes in the story. And Snow White who was seven years old and the daughter of the queen, that was pretty frightening to think about. So when Walt began to decide about his Snow White although she is young, I've seen his story note that says look, she has to be old enough to be able to consider marriage. So, you know, and they thought out those differences. The huntsman depending on which fairy tale you read sometimes he had to bring back the liver, sometimes the heart. So that changed with different tellings. And in some tellings the queen was to dance in the hot - shoes that had been put in the hot coals until she dropped dead. So, you know, Walt Disney said wait a minute, let's get rid of the queen earlier so that we can celebrate the happiness of the story. So in fact he had the witch fall off the cliff so that the prince and Snow White could then celebrate their happiness together in the forest. So there were lots of subtle changes but they were all done with a purpose. Another change was that in the original version you remember that the queen came three times to try to kill Snow White and each time - the first two times the dwarfs arrived home in plenty of time to save her but the third time they didn't. And so, you know, Walt said well one poison apple is enough, let's get it over with so that change was made. But there were - they were changes that were not made without a lot of thought because to him, he was taking well known stories and transferring them to a different kind of medium, the screen. And so he had to in some ways expand the story to full length film. In some ways he had to simplify the story so that it wouldn't be overcomplicated on screen. And when you think about it, these were changes that were no different from changes made in one telling to the next telling. Often when tellers told these fairy tales they would make little changes depending on how, you know, they felt the story should go. So it was continuation of the idea that fairy tales are oral tradition and until, you know, they were written down by the Grimms Brothers, you know, they were just pretty much all over the place.

Can you talk about the European influences on the artwork?

Lella Smith: Sure. Walt Disney went to Europe in I believe it was 1934 and was astounded at what he saw. He wasn't a particularly well educated man in terms of formal schooling because he of course had to work to support his family. And he had not been exposed to a lot of literature. But when he went to Europe and discovered the books, the artists, the illustrators, people like Arthur Rackham and Kay Neilson, he began to open up to the possibility of using all of this information to develop fairy tale films. You know, he had already established a tradition of using well known stories whether they be fables or nursery rhymes or folk tales. He already knew that was a good to do because they were familiar stories, you didn't have to spend a lot of time on character development and all that. But when he discovered the great illustrators of Europe and he discovered European architecture, art, and literature, he brought home many items, many, many books, set up a library at the Disney Studios that the artists could go and study in so that they could be inspired by these influences. And he also hired many artists to come to the studio from Europe. I even read once that he offered a job to Arthur Rackham because at that time Rackham was retired and living happily in the English countryside and declined his offer. So, you know, he knew that these people could bring an artistry to the film which was something he really wanted.

So that's more for paper-writers or the merely interested....

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs on DVD & Blu-Ray

For a limited time, order one of the Snow White Blu-ray sets on Amazon.com, then use promotion code snowhite at checkout to receive a $10 instant discount. This makes the set $14.99 instead of $24.99. I don't know the expiration date on this but probably soon, very soon.

The one that started it all, at least for Disney, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is released again tomorrow on DVD and for the first time on Blu-ray, newly remastered with new extras.

This is not really news to anyone with any exposure to the medio--and it's rather frustrating in the world of "how many copies of any one movie does a person need?" (also called double-dipping by studios). So as you debate whether or not to buy another copy or one at all if you don't own it, I have links with reviews and one especially great article about the history of the film. Of course, this is the first Blu-ray edition for tech junkies.

First, I'm first to admit that Disney's Snow White is my least favorite of the Disney movies, partially because I've never been a fan of the original tale and partially because of personal annoyances with the film. And yet, I agree that it is an important part of film history and there are things I do enjoy, especially the dwarfs. And, no, this isn't about Disney bashing which I mostly refrain from. I enjoy the Disney movies for what they are and appreciate that they have kept fairy tales in the public consciousness. I don't like the way they dominate over all other versions, but that's the nature of a movie-watching public versus a reading one.

But then I read articles like Lella Smith Takes Us Through the History of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and I'm tempted to replace my copy of the DVD for the new one although I will watch it perhaps a few more times in my lifetime.

Walt Disney managed very early in the process to give a true believability - believable personality to the seven dwarfs which is the essence of Disney's art animation, personality. Can you tell me about that aspect of the creation of the seven dwarfs? So...the question is about the personality of the dwarfs and how that shaped the characters.

Yes, that was really determined by the name to start with. And in those story notes that I've read, and there's just - I can't believe how many hours the story men and artists sat around talking about well how would Dopey respond, how would Grumpy respond, how would they sit down, how would they move, how would they get up. All of those things were a matter of asking 'how would somebody who was sleepy for example get up from a chair or sit in a chair waiting for conversation to happen?' So they took a lot of the characteristics from the names and then they worked out how they felt that character would respond. And depending on who was talking, if it was for example Bill Tytla, one of the greatest animators who ever worked at the company, he would say 'well what was the character thinking?' ...and that will tell us what he's working on. If it was a technical cameraman, he would be talking about '...what does a sleepy character do?' So, they came at it with different angles but the whole thing was that the name helped define how the personality was developed. And without those individual personalities, the film just would not have been as charming.

And just to keep it more interesting, there are four different releases to choose from, all links go to Amazon:

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (Two-Disc Blu-ray/DVD Combo + BD Live w/ Blu-ray packaging) (This is also the one that comes in the collector's set listed below and the most promoted edition.)

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (DVD/Two-Disc Blu-ray + BD Live w/DVD packaging) (I understand that only the packaging is different from the one above, not the discs or the contents.)


Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (Limited Edition Collector's Set)

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs DVD Not to be released until November and cheaper but DVD only while you get both DVD and Blu-ray in the packages above.

Finally, the reviews for the DVD/Blu-rays are enthusiastic, such as these detailed Snow White reviews at High Disc Def News, Monsters and Critics, and Big Picture Sound.

And just in case you are interested in reading the original tale, too, here's an annotated version, courtesy of, well, SurLaLune!

Norsk Hstfest in North Dakota

My ancestry is a quarter Norwegian so this little news item caught my attention and held it long enough for me to share with you. (Also sort of fitting since today's other post about Sarah Beth Durst's Ice is based on a Norwegian fairy tale.)

From the article, Troll ‘beauty’ contest, parade, by Whitney Pandel-Eaton:

A troll 'beauty' contest, is there a more perfect oxymoron?

That was the name of the game Saturday evening at Norsk Hstfest, where a dozen local elementary and middle-school students donned grotesque masks, scary wigs and trashy threads as each vyed for such titles as "Longest nose", "Best horn", "Biggest wart", "Best eyebrows" and several other characteristics atypical of a traditional beauty contest.

I can imagine this was a blast of fun for all participants, especially in the grade school age group where this fits the humor perfectly.

Spanning elementary to high school, nearly 50 students participated in one of four camps where they learned about Scandinavian song and dance as well as the heritage and folklore of Norway and Sweden.

During the weekend-long camp, the Viking patrols, which consisted of fourth- through sixth-graders, made pouches, shields, chainmail and other crafts while the Troll camp, those in grades five through seven, created their troll costumes that they used in the Troll Beauty Contest and learned about troll folklore.

Then the entire event ended with the dramatization of a Scandinavian fairy tale, left unnamed in the article.

Norwegian fairy tales are available on SurLaLune, of course, with East O' the Sun and West O' the Moon by Gudrun Thorne-Thomsen and Popular Tales of the Norse by Peter Christen Asbjornsen and Jørgen Moe. (Both are really Asbjornsen and Moe collections since they were the "Grimms" of Norway.)


But some of the best illustrations of trolls are by John Bauer who illustrated Swedish Folk Tales. As lovely as trolls can be...

Ice by Sarah Beth Durst

I referenced Sarah Beth Durst's new book, Ice, a few months ago when highly recommending her fun commentaries on fairy tales available on her website at Obscure Fairy Tales.

Well, tomorrow is the official release date for Ice so now is the time to give it its own post. First of all, Ice is a retelling of East of the Sun, West of the Moon, a favorite fairy tale of many and very popular with authors since its length and content provides so much imagination fodder.

Unfortunately, I haven't read the book yet, although I am a big enough fan to have preordered it and it arrived late on Friday. My weekend did not accommodate getting a single book read despite my hopes otherwise. I have started it and can easily say this will be one of my favorite novelizations of the popular tale. (And, yes, there have been a few retellings of this tale in recent years.) The modern setting, the incorporation of science, the light touch of humor and a few other surprises along the way made the book highly readable.

Here's the official description from the publisher:

When Cassie was a little girl, her grandmother told her a fairy tale about her mother, who made a deal with the Polar Bear King and was swept away to the ends of the earth. Now that Cassie is older, she knows the story was a nice way of saying her mother had died. Cassie lives with her father at an Arctic research station, is determined to become a scientist, and has no time for make-believe.
Then, on her eighteenth birthday, Cassie comes face-to-face with a polar bear who speaks to her. He tells her that her mother is alive, imprisoned at the ends of the earth. And he can bring her back -- if Cassie will agree to be his bride.

That is the beginning of Cassie's own real-life fairy tale, one that sends her on an unbelievable journey across the brutal Arctic, through the Canadian boreal forest, and on the back of the North Wind to the land east of the sun and west of the moon. Before it is over, the world she knows will be swept away, and everything she holds dear will be taken from her -- until she discovers the true meaning of love and family in the magical realm of Ice.

Sarah has an excerpt for reading on her website.

The reviews from Booklist and Kirkus, as well as other authors and online reviewers, are positive. So what are you waiting for? Go find a copy to read.



Of course, if you haven't read them, I highly recommend Durst's clever and fun books, Into the Wild and Out of the Wild. Those use fairy tale tropes and storylines and star Rapunzel's daughter. (Out of the Wild is also temporarily bargain priced in hardcover for those wanting to try it.)