As a child I must have read every Grimm's fairy tale a thousand and one times. I loved them. I loved the people who lived in the woods. I loved the animals that came out at night and scared everyone in the woods. The forests were always really deep. The noises were always creaky and sometimes a bat flew by. Okay, I am mixing it up with Edgar Allan Poe or Vincent Price.
The girls had such interesting friendships with elves, or dwarfs or little men. The horses always tossed their manes and galloped through forests or over fences with little people riding them with no saddles.....and there were princes with lots of wealth.
There was magic and mysticism and scary enough events at times but not so much as to stop reading.
On a rainy afternoon I'd close myself off into my room and the whole day would pass. Or I'd take my things outdoors and find a nice spot in the yard on a summer's day.
Thumbing through this book made me remember lots of wonderful times from childhood.
But this is not just any copy. It is an annotated copy from Norton and Company. Evidently they have a series of annotated copies of books and wouldn't it be lovely to have all of them. Only kidding.
The illustrations are big and in colour. Some are in black and white line drawings. Some are small and in the corner of pages as one reads.
I hope to reread these tales and see if I enjoy them as much as I once did. I am sure I will look at them with a different eye because the last time I read them was 55 years ago. Wow, now that is hard to believe. But I know I am going to treasure this book and I also know it will have its own space on the bookshelf.
I'll let you know how I go with some of these stories. It might be a lovely thing to write for a Sunday post.What experiences do you have of the fairy tales you read as a child?
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