The Way Back » Home » Posts tagged 'Grimm'

  • Posted on November 14, 2012

Lisbeth Zwerger and the Brothers Grimm

In my world, a new publication from Lisbeth Zwerger is an event. At the risk of veering into hyperbole, she is the Arthur Rackham of her generation and will be remembered well beyond her time on earth. Zwerger’s latest is Tales From the Brothers Grimm, a collection of previously published stories and a few new yarns, including The Frog King or Iron Henry, The Brave Little Tailor, Briar Rose, The Poor Millers’ Boy and the Little Cat, and Hans My Hedgehog. The stories chosen by Lisbeth Zwerger to illustrate and include in this book speak to her quirky sensibilities and unparalleled talent for visual storytelling. From beginning to end, Tales From the Brothers Grimm is an impressive and extraordinarily beautiful overview of an astonishing career.

Although Lisbeth Zwerger has a recognizable style, her work continues to evolve. Early in her career, she favoured the sepias and high contrast hues of her predecessors, in particular the aforementioned Arthur Rackham with whom she “…landed in a Rackham-vortex.”* His influence can be seen in Hansel and Gretel and The Seven Ravens, which are included in Tales From the Brothers Grimm. Although these stories and others from this period are lovely and possess the seeds of what was to come, they fall within the continuum of classic children’s illustration, rarely transcending it. As her colours brightened, so did her playfulness. The true genius of Lisbeth Zwerger emerged alongside a deeper, richer palette fully integrated with a wit and visual complexity well suited to the peculiar world and work of the Brothers Grimm.

One of the best examples of Zwerger’s mature style is The Frog King or Iron Henry. In the first illustration, the King’s youngest daughter moves swiftly down a hedgerow in an attempt to outrun the amorous frog. The hedge appears to be a slice of plant tissue as viewed from under a microscope. Beautiful of course, but unusual and strikingly inventive. Who would have thought to do this but her? The frog is persistent, and when he asks to join the young lady in bed (‘I want to sleep in as much comfort as you’), she responds by throwing him against the wall, where he turns into a handsome prince. If only it were that easy.

Read More

  • Posted on October 22, 2011

The Grimm Reader

There is no dearth of Grimm tales in children’s literature. In fact, Grimm was children’s literature for many years in the 19th century. What is fascinating is not the pervasiveness of the Brothers Grimm, but in the countless adaptations of their tales. Even the brothers themselves modifed the text in many instances, publishing mulitple versions of the same story within their lifetimes. As scholars, linguists, and archivists, their original intended audience was not primarily children but adults; they wished to chronicle the local, and in many cases oral storytelling of the German republic, and if a frog prince got hurled against a wall (instead of kissed) to break a spell, who would raise an eyebrow? Nevertheless, even their ‘PG’ versions were surprisingly and rather inventively violent, especially if you had the misfortune of being a stepsister, or stepmother. Apparently, blended families were the ticket to severe bodily injury, and occasionally a very painful death, which puts a whole new spin to the Brady Bunch when you think about it.

Now comes this new translation by Matthew Price, The Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm, a compendium of familiar and not so familiar stories in their original 1857 form: warts, revenge and all. Noel Daniel, the editor of this impressive tome does something quite unusual by casting the spotlight on the illustrators who helped to bring these fairy tales into the collective consciousness. Each of the 27 tales, in the order of when they originally appeared, are paired with some of the most influential illustrators of the 1820’s to the 1950’s. It would have been nice to see a few contemporary artists, like Lisbeth Zwerger, who is surely the most gifted visual interpreter of Grimm in the last fifty years, included alongside the roster of ‘famous’ illustrators, but this is a minor quibble. The Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm is beautiful, wicked fun.

Read More