The Pink Fairy Book

The Pink Fairy Book

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Title: The Pink Fairy Book
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The Pink Fairy Book
Edited by Andrew Lang

Preface

All people in the world tell nursery tales to their children. The Japanese
tell them, the Chinese, the Red Indians by their camp fires, the Eskimo
in their dark dirty winter huts. The Kaffirs of South Africa tell them,
and the modern Greeks, just as the old Egyptians did, when Moses had
not been many years rescued out of the bulrushes. The Germans,
French, Spanish, Italians, Danes, Highlanders tell them also, and the
stories are apt to be like each other everywhere. A child who has read
the Blue and Red and Yellow Fairy Books will find some old friends
with new faces in the Pink Fairy Book, if he examines and compares.
But the Japanese tales will probably be new to the young student; the
Tanuki is a creature whose acquaintance he may not have made before.
He may remark that Andersen wants to 'point a moral,' as well as to
'adorn a tale; ' that he is trying to make fun of the follies of mankind, as
they exist in civilised countries. The Danish story of 'The Princess in
the Chest' need not be read to a very nervous child, as it rather borders
on a ghost story. It has been altered, and is really much more horrid in
the language of the Danes, who, as history tells us, were not a nervous
or timid people. I am quite sure that this story is not true. The other
Danish and Swedish stories are not alarming. They are translated by Mr.
W. A. Craigie. Those from the Sicilian (through the German) are
translated, like the African tales (through the French) and the Catalan
tales, and the Japanese stories (the latter through the German), and an
old French story, by Mrs. Lang. Miss Alma Alleyne did the stories

from Andersen, out of the German. Mr. Ford, as usual, has drawn the
monsters and mermaids, the princes and giants, and the beautiful
princesses, who, the Editor thinks, are, if possible, prettier than ever.
Here, then, are fancies brought from all quarters: we see that black,
white, and yellow peoples are fond of just the same kinds of adventures.
Courage, youth, beauty, kindness, have many trials, but they always
win the battle; while witches, giants, unfriendly cruel people, are on the
losing hand. So it ought to be, and so, on the whole, it is and will be;
and that is all the moral of fairy tales. We cannot all be young, alas !
and pretty, and strong; but nothing prevents us from being kind, and no
kind man, woman, or beast or bird, ever comes to anything but good in
these oldest fables of the world. So far all the tales are true, and no
further.

Contents

The Cat's Elopement. How the Dragon was Tricked The Goblin and the
Grocer The House in the Wood Uraschimataro and the Turtle The
Slaying of the Tanuki The Flying Trunk The Snow Man. The
Shirt-Collar The Princess in the Chest The Three Brothers The
Snow-queen The Fir-Tree Hans, the Mermaid's Son Peter Bull The
Bird 'Grip' Snowflake I know what I have learned The Cunning
Shoemaker The King who would have a Beautiful Wife Catherine and
her Destiny How the Hermit helped to win the King's Daughter The
Water of Life The Wounded Lion The Man without a Heart The Two
Brothers