#les contes de grimm

[lepetitdragonvert]

Froschkoenig

1898

Artist : Franz Kozics

[dixvinsblog]

Contes et légendes : Hansel et gretel d'après le conte de Jacob Grimm et Wilhelm Grimm

Un bûcheron, sa femme et ses deux enfants vivaient à l’orée d’une forêt. Le garçon s’appelait Hansel et la fille Grethel. La famille était très pauvre. Une année, la famine régna dans le pays et le bûcheron, durant une de ses nuits sans sommeil où il ruminait des idées noires et remâchait ses soucis, dit à sa femme :« Qu’allons-nous devenir ? Comment nourrir nos pauvres enfants ? Nous n’avons…

[adarkrainbow]

A class on fairy tales (1)

As you might know (since I have been telling it for quite some times), I had a class at university which was about fairy tales, their history and evolution. But from a literary point of view - I am doing literary studies at university, it was a class of “Literature and Human sciences”, and this year’s topic was fairy tales, or rather “contes” as we call them in France. It was twelve seances, and I decided, why not share the things I learned and noted down here? (The titles of the different parts of this post are actually from me. The original notes are just a non-stop stream, so I broke them down for an easier read)

I) Book lists

The class relied on a main corpus which consisted of the various fairytales we studied - texts published up to the “first modernity” and through which the literary genre of the fairytale established itself. In chronological order they were: The Metamorphoses of Apuleius, Lo cunto de li cunti by Giambattista Basile, Le Piacevoli Notti by Giovan Francesco Straparola, the various fairytales of Charles Perrault, the fairytales of Marie-Catherine d’Aulnoy, and finally the Kinder-und Hausmärchen of Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm. There is also a minor mention for the fables of Faerno, not because they played an important historical role like the others, but due to them being used in comparison to Perrault’s fairytales ; there is also a mention of the fairytales of Leprince de Beaumont if I remember well. 

After giving us this main corpus, we were given a second bibliography containing the most famous and the most noteworthy theorical tools when it came to fairytales - the key books that served to theorize the genre itself. The teacher who did this class deliberatly gave us a “mixed list”, with works that went in completely opposite directions when it came to fairytale, to better undersant the various differences among “fairytale critics” - said differences making all the vitality of the genre of the fairytale, and of the thoughts on fairytales. Fairytales are a very complex matter. 

For example, to list the English-written works we were given, you find, in chronological order: Bruno Bettelheim’s The Uses of Enchantment ; Jack David Zipes’ Fairy Tales and the Art of Subversion ; Robert Bly’s Iron John: A Book about Men ; Marie-Louise von Franz, Interpretation of Fairy Tales ; Lewis C. Seifert, Fairy Tales, Sexuality and Gender in France (1670-1715) ; and Cristina Bacchilega’s Postmodern Fairy Tales: Gender and Narrative Strategies. If you know the French language, there are two books here: Jacques Barchilon’s Le conte merveilleux français de 1690 à 1790 ; and Jean-Michel Adam and Ute Heidmann’s Textualité et intertextualité des contes. We were also given quite a few German works, such as Märchenforschung und Tiefenpsychologie by Wilhelm Laiblin, Nachwort zu Deutsche Volksmärchen von arm und reich, by Waltraud Woeller ; or Märchen, Träume, Schicksale by Otto Graf Wittgenstein. And of course, the bibliography did not forget the most famous theory-tools for fairytales: Vladimir Propp’s Morfologija skazki + Poetika, Vremennik Otdela Slovesnykh Iskusstv ; as well as the famous Classification of Aarne Anti, Stith Thompson and Hans-Jörg Uther (the Aarne-Thompson-Uther Classification, aka the ATU). 

By compiling these works together, one will be able to identify the two main “families” that are rivals, if not enemies, in the world of the fairytale criticism. Today it is considered that, roughly, if we simplify things, there are two families of scholars who work and study the fairy tales. One family take back the thesis and the theories of folklorists - they follow the path of those who, starting in the 19th century, put forward the hypothesis that a “folklore” existed, that is to say a “poetry of the people”, an oral and popular literature. On the other side, you have those that consider that fairytales are inscribed in the history of literature, and that like other objects of literature (be it oral or written), they have intertextual relationships with other texts and other forms of stories. So they hold that fairytales are not “pure, spontaneous emanations”. (And given this is a literary class, given by a literary teacher, to literary students, the teacher did admit their bias for the “literary family” and this was the main focus of the class).

Which notably led us to a third bibliography, this time collecting works that massively changed or influenced the fairytale critics - but this time books that exclusively focused on the works of Perrault and Grimm, and here again we find the same divide folklore VS textuality and intertextuality. It is Marc Soriano’s Les contes de Perrault: culture savante et traditions populaires, it is Ernest Tonnelat’s Les Contes des frères Grimm: étude sur la composition et le style du recueil des Kinder-und-Hausmärchen ; it is Jérémie Benoit’s Les Origines mythologiques des contes de Grimm ; it is Wilhelm Solms’ Die Moral von Grimms Märchen ; it is Dominqiue Leborgne-Peyrache’s Vies et métamorphoses des contes de Grimm ; it is Jens E. Sennewald’ Das Buch, das wir sind: zur Poetik der Kinder und-Hausmärchen ; it is Heinz Rölleke’s Die Märchen der Brüder Grimm: eine Einführung. No English book this time, sorry.

II) The Germans were French, and the French Italians

The actual main topic of this class was to consider the “fairytale” in relationship to the notions of “intertextuality” and “rewrites”. Most notably there was an opening at the very end towards modern rewrites of fairytales, such as Angela Carter’s The Bloody Chamber, “Le petit chaperon vert” (Little Green Riding Hood) or “La princesse qui n’aimait pas les princes” (The princess who didn’t like princes). But the main subject of the class was to see how the “main corpus” of classic fairytales, the Perrault, the Grimm, the Basile and Straparola fairytales, were actually entirely created out of rewrites. Each text was rewriting, or taking back, or answering previous texts - the history of fairytales is one of constant rewrite and intertextuality. 

For example, if we take the most major example, the fairytales of the brothers Grimm. What are the sources of the brothers? We could believe, like most people, that they merely collected their tale. This is what they called, especially in the last edition of their book: they claimed to have collected their tales in regions of Germany. It was the intention of the authors, it was their project, and since it was the will and desire of the author, it must be put first. When somebody does a critical edition of a text, one of the main concerns is to find the way the author intended their text to pass on to posterity. So yes, the brothers Grimm claimed that their tales came from the German countryside, and were manifestations of the German folklore. 

But... in truth, if we look at the first editions of their book, if we look at the preface of their first editions, we discover very different indications, indications which were checked and studied by several critics, such as Ernest Tomelas. In truth, one of their biggest sources was... Charles Perrault. While today the concept of the “tales of the little peasant house, told by the fireside” is the most prevalent one, in their first edition the brothers Grimm explained that their sources for these tales were not actually old peasant women, far from it: they were ladies, of a certain social standing, they were young women, born of exiled French families (because they were Protestants, and thus after the revocation of the édit de Nantes in France which allowed a peaceful coexistance of Catholics and Protestants, they had to flee to a country more welcoming of their religion, aka Germany). They were young women of the upper society, girls of the nobility, they were educated, they were quite scholarly - in fact, they worked as tutors/teachers and governess/nursemaids for German children. For children of the German nobility to be exact. And these young French women kept alive the memory of the French literature of the previous century - which included the fairytales of Perrault.

So, through these women born of the French emigration, one of the main sources of the Grimm turns out to be Perrault. And in a similar way, Perrault’s fairytales actually have roots and intertextuality with older tales, Italian fairytales. And from these Italian fairytales we can come back to roots into Antiquity itself - we are talking Apuleius, and Virgil before him, and Homer before him, this whole classical, Latin-Greek literature. This entire genealogy has been forgotten for a long time due to the enormous surge, the enormous hype, the enormous fascination for the study of folklore at the end of the 19th century and throughout all of the 20th. 

We talk of “types of fairytales”, if we talk of Vladimir Propp, if we talk of Aarne Thompson, we are speaking of the “morphology of fairytales”, a name which comes from the Russian theorician that is Propp. Most people place the beginning of the “structuralism” movement in the 70s, because it is in 1970 that the works of Propp became well-known in France, but again there is a big discrepancy between what people think and what actually is. It is true that starting with the 70s there was a massive wave, during which Germans, Italians and English scholars worked on Propp’s books, but Propp had written his studies much earlier than that, at the beginning of the 20th century. The first edition of his Morphology of fairytales was released in 1928. While it was reprinted and rewriten several times in Russia, it would have to wait for roughly fifty years before actually reaching Western Europe, where it would become the fundamental block of the “structuralist grammar”. This is quite interesting because... when France (and Western Europe as a whole) adopted structuralism, when they started to read fairytales under a morphological and structuralist angle, they had the feeling and belief, they were convinced that they were doing a “modern” criticism of fairytales, a “new” criticism. But in truth... they were just repeating old theories and conceptions, snatched away from the original socio-historical context in which Propp had created them - aka the Soviet Union and a communist regime. People often forget too quickly that contextualizing the texts isn’t only good for the studied works, we must also contextualize the works of critics and the analysis of scholars. Criticism has its own history, and so unlike the common belief, Propp’s Morphology of fairytales isn’t a text of structuralist theoricians from the 70s. It was a text of the Soviet Union, during the Interwar Period. 

So the two main questions of this class are. 1) We will do a double exploration to understand the intertextual relationships between fairytales. And 2) We will wonder about the definition of a “fairytale” (or rather of a “conte” as it is called in French) - if the fairytale is indeed a literary genre, then it must have a definition, key elements. And from this poetical point of view, other questions come forward: how does one analyze a fairytale? What does a fairytale mean?

III) Feuding families

Before going further, we will pause to return to a subject talked about above: the great debate among scholars and critics that lasted for decades now, forming the two branches of the fairytale study. One is the “folklorist” branch, the one that most people actually know without realizing it. When one works on fairytale, one does folklorism without knowing it, because we got used to the idea that fairytale are oral products, popular products, that are present everywhere on Earth, we are used to the concept of the universality of motives and structures of fairytales. In the “folklorist” school of thought, there is an universalism, and not only are fairytales present everywhere, but one can identify a common core for them. It can be a categorization of characters, it can be narrative functions, it can be roles in a story, but there is always a structure or a core. As a result, the work of critics who follow this branch is to collect the greatest number of “versions” of a same tale they can find, and compare them to find the smallest common denominator. From this, they will create or reconstruct the “core fairytale”, the “type” or the “source” from which the various variations come from.

Before jumping onto the other family, we will take a brief time to look at the history of the “folklorist branch” of the critic. (Though, to summarize the main differences, the other family of critics basically claims that we do not actually know the origin of these stories, but what we know are rather the texts of these stories, the written archives or the oral records). 

So the first family here (that is called “folklorist” for the sake of simplicity, but it is not an official or true appelation) had been extremely influenced by the works of a famous and talented scholar of the early 20th century: Aarne Antti, a scholar of Elsinki who collected a large number of fairytales and produced out of them a classification, a typology based on this theory that there is an “original fairytale type” that existed at the beginning, and from which variants appeared. His work was then continued by two other scholars: Stith Thompson, and Hans-Jörg Uther. This continuation gave birth to the “Aarne-Thompson” classification, a classification and bibliography of folkloric fairytales from around the world, which is very often used in journals and articles studying fairytales. Through them, the idea of “types” of fairytales and “variants” imposed itself in people’s minds, where each tale corresponds to a numbered category, depending on the subjects treated and the ways the story unfolds (for example an entire category of tale collects the “animal-husbands”. This classification imposed itself on the Western way of thinking at the end of the first third of the 20th century.

The next step in the history of this type of fairytale study was Vladimir Propp. With his Morphology of fairytales, we find the same theory, the same principle of classification: one must collect the fairytales from all around the world, and compare them to find the common denominator. Propp thought Aarne-Thompson’s work was interesting, but he did complain about the way their criteria mixed heterogenous elements, or how the duo doubled criterias that could be unified into one. Propp noted that, by the Aarne-Thompson system, a same tale could have two different numbers - he concluded that one shouldn’t classify tales by their subject or motif. He claimed that dividing the fairytales by “types” was actually impossible, that this whole theory was more of a fiction than an actual reality. So, he proposed an alternate way of doing things, by not relying on the motifs of fairytales: Propp rather relied on their structure. Propp doesn’t deny the existence of fairytales, he doesn’t put in question the categorization of fairytales, or the universality of fairytales, on all that he joins Aarne-Thompson. But what he does is change the typology, basing it on “functions”: for him, the constituve parts of fairytales are “functions”, which exist in limited numbers and follow each other per determined orders (even if they are not all “activated”). He identified 31 functions, that can be grouped into three groups forming the canonical schema of the fairytale according to Propp. These three groups are an initial situation with seven functions, followed by a first sequence going from the misdeed (a bad action, a misfortune, a lack) to its reparation, and finally there is a second sequence which goes from the return of the hero to its reward. From these seven “preparatory functions”, forming the initial situation, Propp identified seven character profiles, defined by their functions in the narrative and not by their unique characteristics. These seven profiles are the Aggressor (the villain), the Donor (or provider), the Auxiliary (or adjuvant), the Princess, the Princess’ Father, the Mandator, the Hero, and the False Hero. This system will be taken back and turned into a system by Greimas, with the notion of “actants”: Greimas will create three divisions, between the subject and the object, between the giver and the gifted, and between the adjuvant and the opposant.

With his work, Vladimir Propp had identified the “structure of the tale”, according to his own work, hence the name of the movement that Propp inspired: structuralism. A structure and a morphology - but Propp did mention in his texts that said morphology could only be applied to fairytales taken from the folklore (that is to say, fairytales collected through oral means), and did not work at all for literary fairytales (such as those of Perrault). And indeed, while this method of study is interesting for folkloric fairytales, it becomes disappointing with literary fairytales - and it works even less for novels. Because, trying to find the smallest denominator between works is actually the opposite of literary criticism, where what is interesting is the difference between various authors. It is interesting to note what is common, indeed, but it is even more interesting to note the singularities and differences. Anyway, the apparition of the structuralist study of fairytales caused a true schism among the field of literary critics, between those that believe all tales must be treated on a same way, with the same tools (such as those of Propp), and those that are not satisfied with this “universalisation” that places everything on the same level. 

This second branch is the second family we will be talking about: those that are more interested by the singularity of each tale, than by their common denominators and shared structures. This second branch of analysis is mostly illustrated today by the works of Ute Heidmann, a German/Swiss researcher who published alongside Jean Michel Adam (a specialist of linguistic, stylistic and speech-analysis) a fundamental work in French: Textualité et intertextualité des contes: Perrault, Apulée, La Fontaine, Lhéritier... (Textuality and intertextuality of fairytales). A lot of this class was inspired by Heidmann and Adam’s work, which was released in 2010. Now, this book is actually surrounded by various articles posted before and after, and Ute Heidmann also directed a collective about the intertextuality of the brothers Grimm fairytales. Heidmann did not invent on her own the theories of textuality and intertextuality - she relies on older researches, such as those of the Ernest Tonnelat, who in 1912 published a study of the brothers Grimm fairytales focusing on the first edition of their book and its preface. This was where the Grimm named the sources of their fairytales: girls of the upper class, not at all small peasants, descendants of the protestant (huguenots) noblemen of France who fled to Germany. Tonnelat managed to reconstruct, through these sources, the various element that the Grimm took from Perrault’s fairytales. This work actually weakened the folklorist school of thought, because for the “folklorist critics”, when a similarity is noted between two fairytales, it is a proof of “an universal fairytale type”, an original fairytale that must be reconstructed. But what Tonnelat and other “intertextuality critics” pushed forward was rather the idea that “If the story of the Grimm is similar but not identical to the one of Perrault, it is because they heard a modified version of Perrault’s tale, a version modified either by the Grimms or by the woman that told them the tale, who tried to make the story more or less horrible depending on the situation”. This all fragilized the idea of an “original, source-fairytale”, and encouraged other researchers to dig this way.

For example, the case was taken up by Heinz Rölleke, in 1985: he systematized the study of the sources of the Grimm, especially the sources that tied them to the fairytales of Perrault. Now, all the works of this branch of critics does not try to deny or reject the existence of fairytales all over the world. And it does not forget that all over the world, human people are similar and have the same preoccupations (life, love, death, war, peace). So, of course, there is an universality of the themes, of the motives, of the intentions of the texts. Because they are human texts, so there is an universality of human fiction. But there is here the rejection of a topic, a theory, a question that can actually become VERY dangerous. (For example, in post World War II Germany, all researches about fairytales were forbidden, because during their reign the Nazis had turned the fairytales the Grimm into an abject ideological tool). This other family, vein, branch of critics, rather focuses on the specificity of each writing style, of each rewrite of a fairytale, but also on the various receptions and interpretations of fairytales depending on the context of their writing and the context of their reading. So the idea behind this “intertextuality study” is to study the fairytales like the rest of literature, be it oral or written, and to analyze them with the same philological tools used by history studies, by sociology study, by speech analysis and narrative analysis - all of that to understand what were the conditions of creation, of publication, of reading and spreading of these tales, and how they impacted culture.

[fleurdusoir]

L’Europe est le nom de notre tradition, un murmure des temps anciens et du futur. Notre tradition est une façon de se conduire et de conduire notre vie qui n’appartient qu’à nous. Elle nous est révélée par les poèmes d’Homère et par nos grandes légendes, celles de la Table Ronde ou des Nibelungen. Elle nous est révélée aussi par le trésor des contes. Sous des apparences différentes, nos contes tissent la trame d’un même héritage de part et d’autre du Rhin, des Alpes et des Pyrénées. Retrouvés en Allemagne par les frères Grimm et en France par Charles Perrault, sans avoir l’air de rien, ils sont l’un de nos biens les plus précieux. Ils ne se voilent d’obscurité que si l’on ne fait pas l’effort de les découvrir. Jadis, leur transmission se faisait à la veillée, par le récit des Anciens. Se jouant du temps qui passe, ils continuent de dire le retrait salvateur dans la forêt, les forces de la nature, la solitude et la communauté, les rites de passage de l’enfance à l’âge adulte, la rencontre de la jeune fille et du chevalier, l’ordre du monde. Les contes sont le grand livre de notre tradition. Leur fonction est de léguer la sagesse ancestrale de la communauté. Même quand on y rencontre des elfes ou des fées auprès des sources et au coin des bois, ils sont le contraire des « contes de fées ». Sous l’apparence du divertissement, ils enseignent des leçons de vie. Ils disent les secrets qui feront que les demoiselles deviendront femmes et les garçons des hommes. Les contes disent les menaces à surmonter (le Chat botté), les limites à ne pas franchir (Barbe bleue), la ruse terrassant la force brutale (le Petit Poucet), la rançon de l’étourderie (le Petit Chaperon Rouge), le prix du serment (Grisélidis), l’effort soutenu triomphant d’une nature ingrate (Riquet à la houppe), les périls courus par la jeune fille et la virilité dévoyée (Peau d’âne). Les contes disent encore le courage, l’espoir et la constance des jeunes filles triomphant des épreuves (Cendrillon). Ils disent aussi la vigueur, l’audace, la vaillance et les ruptures par quoi les garçons sont ce qu’ils sont (Perceval). Les contes montrent qu’en s’appuyant sur les forces de la nature, la femme maintient ou restaure l’ordre du monde et de la communauté (Blanche Neige). Ces secrets sont nôtres, on pourrait parfois les croire perdus alors qu’ils ne sont qu’assoupis. Comme dans le conte de la Belle au bois dormant, ils se réveilleront. Ils se réveilleront sous l’ardeur de l’amour que nous leur porterons.

Dominique Venner, Histoire et tradition des Européens

[lapluieellepleut]

Once upon a translation

Since I have completed my ritual/annual rereading of The Sisters Grimm I would like to comment on one very particular title translation in french. But before that let's talk about the others titles.

The titles of the first two books were a literal translation, book 1 went from "The Fairy Tale Detectives" " to "Détectives de contes de fées" and book 2 "The Unusual Suspects" to "Drôles de suspects", nothing more to add. From there the titles will try to incorporate a fairy tale character in it. The only exception will be book 4 with "Once Upon A Crime" becoming "Crime au pays des fées" (crime in fairyland), which is funny because the Netflix movie also named "Once Upon A Crime", adapting the story of Red Riding Hood solving a murder(since she doesn't try to kill anyone in this adaptation) is literally translated "Il était une fois un crime".

So books 3, 5 and 6 include a character in their titles, like book 6 with "Tales from The Hood" becoming "Le procès du grand méchant loup" (The Trial of the Big Bad Wolf). Book 3 "The Problem Child" was translated in "Le petit chaperon louche" which in itself works well as a title(at least in french because in english it's something like "the shady red riding hood"). But I like the double meaning of the original title. Who is truly the problem child in the third book, Red playing with her adorable pet or an uncle who has just appeared? And I really like the original cover which puts these two characters on the same level of importance unlike the new one were the focus is on Red (the og edition vs the 10th anniversary edition is a different tale).

Which brings us to Book 5. And that title actually confused me so much as a kid. So "Magic and Other Misdemeanors" was translated in "Le retour de cendrillon" (Cinderella the return). Understand my confusion when Cinderella is introduced in the first chapters of the book and it's never mentioned that she left town. So where she returns from? And she wasn't mentioned prior book 5 (and she isn't after book 5, at least where I'm at). Additionally, during my recent re-reading, I saw another problem with this translation : before volume 5, a past lover of the girls dad is mentioned so with a title like Cinderella the return....At least she is introduced early in the book. Cindy is an important character for this book and probably during the translation they wanted to highlight a character from a very well-known story in order to attract more readers. But the question remains : from where Cinderella returns?

But I only talk about six books they are nine in total. So there are three more books, so what about their titles ? Oh what books? They have never been translated in french... (It certainly didn’t stop me from reading the books and be obsessed with them). It's funny that the traduction stop before book 7 when we finally learn the identity of the master of the scarlet hand...

To end this post on a more positive note : Puck with his "I EAT PEOPLE" shirt french version "Mmm, ça sent la chair fraîche" .

[homomenhommes]

Denis Gordeev est un illustrateur russe de contes populaires et de récits historiques. Des contes des Frères Grimm en passant par le Seigneur des Anneaux, il a également mis en images le célèbre roman d'Alexandre Dumas : "Les Trois mousquetaires"

[detournementsmineurs]

Clip "Pomme de Pain" en serti mystérieux navette de la collection "Quatre Contes de Grimm" de Van Cleef & Arpels (2018) présenté à la conférence “Le Diamant : Du Brut au Brillant” par Olivier Segura - Gemmologue et Directeur Scientifique - et Diren Ramsamy - Diamantaire chez Rubel & Ménasché - de L’École des Arts Joailliers, juillet 2022.

[claudehenrion]

Nos enfants sont-ils encore ‘’nos enfants ?’’

  J'admirais l'autre jour, dans un silence proche d'une action de grâce, quelques uns de mes petits enfants (NB : à ''15 ''petits'', tous grands + les pièces rapportées + les ''arrière--'', les réunir est une quadrature du cercle, hélas : ils sont partis coloniser le monde ! Tant pis pour nous !) : penchés sur l'écran de leur smartphone (chacun le sien, comme les vôtres), leur cou gracile faisait penser à des cols de cygnes, de ravissants cygnes comme figés dans la glace indifférenciée de la technologie. Ils étaient ensemble, mais seuls... ou seuls ‘’et-ou-mais’’ ensemble, qui peut le dire....

C'est en 1923, au sortir des horreurs de la Grande Guerre, que le grand Khalil Gibran écrivait, dans ''le Prophète'' : ''Vos enfants ne sont pas vos enfants. Ils sont fils et filles du désir de Vie en lui-même. Ils viennent par vous mais non de vous, et bien qu'ils soient avec vous, ce n'est pas à vous qu'ils appartiennent. Vous pouvez leur donner votre amour mais non vos pensées, car ils ont leurs propres pensées''. Qu'aurait-il pensé, cent ans plus tard, s'il avait connu l'actuel assujettissement à ces téléphones que l'on dit ''smart'' parce qu'ils savent nous enchaîner avec plein de gadgets dont, en réalité, nous pourrions nous passer sans qu'il y ait mort d'homme 

Jour et nuit, ces soi-disant ‘’téléphones’’ s’imposent, remplis jusqu'à la gueule de messageries, ''d'applis'', de jeux,  de vidéos, de notifications, d'imprécations, de faux bruits, de films, d'injonctions comminatoires, d'appels et de rappels, de réseaux dits sociaux (en vérité, ils sont totalement dé-socialisants !), de chaînes (c'est le mot exact : ''qui enchaîne''), voire de sexfies ou sextagrames --i.e. des photos d'eux-mêmes et / ou de leur sweet-heart du jour, plus ''à poil'' que moins, qui vont circuler sur le Net (nous en reparlerons a / s de la pornographie). En gros, nos enfants se réveillent avec Instagram, ils se couchent (''à pas d'heure'' !) avec Tik-tok, ils s'endorment après une ''série''. Ils marchent, déjeunent, dînent, mangent, le portable à la main --même en classe, ''en scred'' ou ''en vrai''. Ils ouvrent, regardent, consultent, ''scrollent'' à longueur de temps, et ''se visualisent'' dans des décors trop clinquants, somptueux mais improbables. Au vrai sens, c’est une addiction... à rien.

Le philosophe et penseur Michel Serre, dans son ''Eloge de la modernité'' (publié en 2012), avait étudié ces ''petites poucettes'' dont il parlait avec grande tendresse, en plaidant l'indulgence : il voyait en elles l’annonce des réjouissances technologiques à venir, car ces petites filles modèles tenaient le devenir du monde au bout de leur doigt interagissant --temps révolus !-- avec un cadran téléphonique du modèle circulaire 746 Rotary, inchangé depuis 1970 (NB : il s'agissait de leur index, pas encore de ces pouces virtuoses de l'alphabet ''Azerti'' qui battent sans cesse leurs propres records de vitesse). Cette génération, disait-on alors, allait inventer de nouvelles manières de vivre, de nouvelles interactions entre les âges, et établir (enfin !) des ''ponts'' entre parents et enfants. Comme on s'est trompé ! Tout faux ! 

Sauf sur un point : nos enfants de 2022 sont bien des ''petits Poucets'', mais dans le sens que les frères Grimm avaient donné à ce nom dans leurs ''Contes'' , où des parents pauvres et frustes étaient contraints d'abandonner leurs enfants dans la forêt. Une astuce du plus jeune, qui semait des cailloux, les ramenait. Mais un jour.. pas de cailloux, qu’il a fallu remplacer par des miettes de pain que les oiseaux ont mangées, livrant ainsi les enfants au méchant ogre. Ce conte cruel peut être lu ou plutôt relu comme une métaphore de notre époque : des parents sans ressources et désarmés devant le raz-de-marée des progrès informatiques sont contraints d'abandonner leur couvée dans la forêt du Net où l'ogre ''technologie'' s'apprête à les dévorer... D'un autre côté, comment faire lorsqu'on sait les désespoirs et les colères lorsqu'on les prive, 5 petites minutes, de leur drogue réputée douce ?

La vérité, c'est qu'ils ne peuvent plus s'en passer. Mais nous autres, les adultes, dans le fond, ne sommes-nous pas en train de les suivre, sans oser le reconnaître, dans ce labyrinthe aux mille tentations ? Ne sommes-nous pas tous en train de devenir de vieux cygnes, la tête penchée sur notre petite lucarne, position qui rend presque impossible de faire attention aux autres, d'être à l'écoute du monde hors du ''prêt-à-penser-de-traviole'' qui nous est fourni ‘’H24′’ sans effort de recherche ou de réflexion, d'avoir des activités sportives, artistiques, religieuses ou autres, ou, tout simplement de ne rien faire --je veux dire RIEN, même ne pas consulter son portable pour savoir si un truc ou quelqu'un n'a pas cherché à vous tirer de cette minute loin du néant ! C'est un comble : le néant nous empêche de faire... rien !

Et pourtant, comme c'est important de ne rien faire ! Les plus belles œuvres, les plus grandes idées, les plus beaux livres, sont nés de longues heures de réflexion, pas du tumulte permanent et de l'occupation du cerveau en activités superficielles : les belles et les grandes choses sont les enfants du ''temps libre''. Des chercheurs viennent de découvrir (''pas trop tôt'' !) que l'Art, comme l'Amour, naît de l'ennui et meurt de la technologie... ce que l'on voit bien : ce n'est pas dans cet océan de soi-disant informations-qui-n'en-sont-pas que nous trouverons jamais le courage, la force ... et le temps de sortir de nous-mêmes. En rythme avec nos portables, nous nous ''allumons'' le matin, et nous nous ''éteignons'' le soir. Mais nous, adultes, nous avons (encore) la chance de n'avoir pas été dévorés par l'ogre... Jusqu'à quand ?

A nous de trouver en nous la force, la constance, les moyens, l'intelligence, les ruses, voire les contournements pour maintenir nos enfants dans la sphère des humains, faute de quoi c'en est fini d'eux... et de toute humanité : de proche en proche, la jeunesse du monde entier, contaminée et comme fascinée par la facilité et l'attrait du vide, basculera comme la nôtre, (puisque l'Europe et l'Occident ont encore, quoi qu'en disent les faux prophètes, encore une longueur d'avance sur le reste du monde. Sauf que cette fois, c'est ''la fois de trop'' !) vers une longue nuit dont personne ne peut dire dans quel gouffre sans fond elle va nous entraîner...

H-Cl.

[phytine]

Perrault’s “Cendrillon”

So, why do I want to speak about Cinderella on this website? Because I see way too much bullshit about it going around. Especially when it’s about Disney animated version. Because yeah, Disney indeed sanitized quite a bit the version they took inspiration from to make their own, for children. But not the way you think they had done it. They did not suppress violence. They did not need to: they took Perrault’s version of Cinderella, not the Brother Grimm’s one.

So, in this post, we are going to talk about Perrault’s version of Cinderella, or “Cendrillon ou la petite pantoufle de verre*”. Because I'm pretty sure you most likely do not have a complete reading of this tale.

*I want to clarify here that, verre = glass. The idea that it was in another fabric comes from XIXs century's authors who thought it did not make sense and thus said that it was a mistake and that it was “vair” (which is a type of fur) because you know, fairy tales had to be realistic… ANYWAY.

N.B.: English is not my first language so bear with me the mistakes.

1. Charles Perrault did not write tales for children (and without adding gore for that)

Yes, because before we talk about the tale, we have to do some context. It’s very important.

Okay, so repeat after me, “Charles Perrault did not write tales for children.”

I know, you are going to think that I think it’s because they were trash or something, thus not good for children. It’s not for this reason.

Charles Perrault wrote tales for the French high-society circle. He wrote his tales at the end of XVIIs century (“Cendrillon” was published in 1697). At this time, tales were not thought for children but for everyone (I'm not going to expand on the oral tradition of tales in France in the XVIIs century, sorry, but keep in mind it was oral, and not specific to old women).

Now, don’t get me wrong, Perrault did everything to make you believe it was for children. He called it “Contes de ma mère l’oye” at first, which is a way to create the idea that these tales were just stories he heard from old women. Yes, it’s the old storyteller cliché. I mean, he even put this frontispiece to really, really, be sure you understand:

He even went as far as telling it’s his own son who wrote them and put a dedication where his son (Pierre) was saying :

“On ne trouvera pas étrange qu’un Enfant ait pris plaisir à composer les Contes de ce Recueil […].”

“Nobody will find strange that a child took pleasure in composing this tales collection […].”

(At this time, Pierre was 19 and you have to take into account that childhood was not perceived the same way as today – and teenage years just did not exist. At the time, childhood was considered a lack. When you were a child, you were lacking something – something you would gain in adulthood. So, at 19, Pierre was not considered a child.)

So why I’m saying that it’s just a stratagem.

Because what Perrault did is called a "jeu mondain". People in literary circles were playing at this, composing poetry, little stories, and other texts to entertain each other. It's especially true in Perrault's epoch: numerous writers, especially women, were writing tales for this circle. For example, the first one who used the term “Conte de fees” (“Fairy Tale”) was Madame d’Aulnoy. And we also have several versions of the same stories from different people who were playing a game: with the same beginning, do your own story (Perrault did that with his niece and another woman, don’t remember who).

Perrault's writing might look simple. It's anything but. I'm not going to talk in detail about it but basically, he imitates oral and popular style. But at the same time, he did it with enough talent to make it okay for the high society to read. It’s a very elaborate fake popular style.

It’s a way for his readers to appreciate some “low” style with a bit of distance. They laugh but they understood Perrault’s mirth behind his tales. It’s not for children or the masses, far from it.  

That's also why it's for adults but you will not find gore or something: it would have been absolutely abhorrent for people of this circle. A few salacious jokes, okay. If you do it right. But more? Oh god, no. A lot of women around Perrault were part of the preciosity. Make your heroin having her eyes tear off and they would have judged you sooo much.

(On top of that, you have to notice that general, tales for children of this time are about children… most of Perrault's ones aren't. They are about young men, and especially young women… like the ones he meets in his social circle, and who are listening ?)

2. Perrault’s tales’ pretty messed up moralities (on purpose)

This leads us to this point: Perrault did not make moral tales. Or at least, not in the way we might perceive them today.

Oh, of course, like for the children thing, he went really hard to make you believe it in the paratext.

You have to understand that tale was a low genre in the French tradition (to make it short, Tragedy, Poetry, and Epic poems were the big YES because they came from Antiquities with noble subjects, when Tales, Novels, and Comedy were the big You're a joke of a writer). That's why Perrault used the same technic as La Fontaine to make it nobler: he used the didactic strategy.

I mean, if it’s here to make you learn something, it’s way better than just entertainment, right? Yes, things never changed. That’s why Perrault was selling it as a didactic thing.

However, he might sell it as much as he wants, he can’t hide the content he produces, right?

Have you ever read Perrault’s moralities at the end of the tales? They are WILD.

Sometimes there is one morality and it has nothing to do with the tale. Sometimes there are two of them and they contradict each other. Sometimes they are just mocking you and/or society. At no point was Perrault like "yes, that's the meaning of my text, FOLLOW IT TO THE LETTERS".

See this example from “La Barbe Bleue” (Blue Beard) :

« Moralité

La curiosité malgré tous ses attraits,

Coûte souvent bien des regrets ;

On en voit tous les jours mille exemples paraître.

C’est, n’en déplaise au sexe, un plaisir bien léger ;

Dès qu’on le prend il cesse d’être,

Et toujours il coûte trop cher. 

 Autre moralité

Pour peu qu’on ait l’esprit sensé,

Et que du Monde on sache le grimoire,

On voit bientôt que cette histoire

Est un conte du temps passé ;

Il n’est plus d’Epoux si terrible,

Ni qui demande l’impossible,

Fût-il malcontent et jaloux.

Près de sa femme on le voit filer doux ;

Et de quelque couleur que sa barbe puisse être,

On a peine à juger qui des deux est le maître. »

In the first one, Perrault is saying that women are very curious beings and that it's bad behavior. In the second one, Perrault is saying that fortunately, nobody is that bad of a husband today and that even if they were, men are submitting to their wives.

(You have to take into account that Perrault was… feminist might be anachronistic, but he fought for women's education, etc. He even wrote a treaty during a famous quarrel between two camps in French literature. The dude was here to stay.)

So which moral do you take into account? And more than that, the tale in itself does not give you the answer because it can be read as a wedding between nobility and the bourgeoisie (a big problem at the time). And that’s just an example.

In another one, he is going to say that you have to be intelligent to become something in life but then just after he will be like "well… I say that but better have a good heritage. It works better.”.

You can consider that tales have for goal to teach you something. Perrault’s ones do not. And it’s logic you know: it’s not for children. Whose aristocrats would like to entertain themselves by learning some morals when it is normally about trying to outsmart everyone?

3. “Cendrillon ou la petite pantoufle de verre” or “The strategy to find a good husband”

When you read “Cendrillon” for the first time, you can easily understand it as the following: be good and you will be rewarded. It’s a “nice things happen to nice people” situation, as a reward for being nice to everyone, Cendrillon marries the Prince.

That’s what you can understand from the first morality.

« Moralité

La beauté pour le sexe est un rare trésor,

De l’admirer jamais on ne se lasse ;

Mais ce qu’on nomme bonne grâce

Est sans prix, et vaut mieux encor.

C’est ce qu’à Cendrillon fit avoir sa Marraine,

En la dressant, en l’instruisant,

Tant et si bien qu’elle en fit une Reine :

(Car ainsi sur ce Conte on va moralisant.)

Belles, ce dont vaut mieux que d’être bien coiffées,

Pour engager un cœur, pour en venir à bout,

La bonne grâce est le vrai don des Fées ;

Sans elle on ne peut rien, avec elle, on peut tout. »

And on top of that, her short presentation emphasizes these characteristics :

« Le mari avait de son côté une jeune fille, mais d’une douceur et d’une bonté sans exemple ; elle tenait cela de sa Mère, qui était la meilleure personne du monde. »

« The husband had one young girl, whose gentleness and kindness were without equal; she was inheriting it from her Mother, who was the best person in the world.”

She is beautiful but most importantly, she is kind.

But there is another reading, of course. Another layer. There is always one in Perrault’s tale. Is Cendrillon just kind? Is it the only reason she is rewarded in the end? Kindness is not naivety.

The answer is linked to the second morality.

« Autre Moralité

C’est sans doute un grand avantage,

D’avoir de l’esprit, du courage,

De la naissance, du bon sens,

Et d’autres semblables talents,

Qu’on reçoit du Ciel en partage ;

Mais vous aurez beau les avoir,

Pour votre avancement ce seront choses vaines,

Si vous n’avez, pour les faire valoir,

Ou des parrains ou des marraines. »

So, it's saying that it's great to be good, intelligent, and beautiful but if you want something, better count on having someone to help you and be able to strategize for your social climbing, you know.

Yes, you can read Perrault’s Cendrillon as a girl who is not that honest but who is well aware of what she needs to do to live a good life.

That’s what I meant when I said that your “girl boss” Cendrillon may exist but not in the way you hoped for. Through the tale, you can interpret her behavior as a way to go to the ball to seduce the prince or at least find a good husband.

Yes, Cendrillon is good and nice. But she is also very aware of the situation she is in. For example, on one hand, this is the dialogue between Cendrillon and her sister:

« En les coiffant, elles lui disaient : "Cendrillon, serait-tu bien aise d’aller au Bal ? – Hélas, Mesdemoiselles, vous vous moquez de moi, ce n’est pas là ce qu’il me faut. – Tu as raison, on rirait bien si on voyait un Cucendron aller au Bal." »

“While doing their hair, they were saying: “Cendrillon, would you be pleased to go to the ball? – Alas, misses, you are making fun of me, it is not what I need. – You are right, we would laugh well if we were to see a Cucendron go to the ball.”

On the other hand, here is the conversation with her fairy godmother just after her half-sisters leave:

« Sa Marraine, qui la vit toute en pleurs, lui demande ce qu’elle avait. "Je voudrais bien… je voudrais bien…" Elle pleurait si fort qu’elle ne put achever. Sa Marraine, qui était Fée, lui dit : "Tu voudrais bien aller au Bal, n’est-ce pas ? – Hélas oui, dit Cendrillon en soupirant." »

“Her godmother, who saw her in tears, asked her what was happening. “I would like to… I would like to…” She was crying so hard that she could not finish. Her godmother, who was Fairy, said to her: “You would like to go to the ball, wouldn’t you? – Alas yes, said Cendrillon, sighing.””

Do you see the difference? She lies to her sisters by saying it's not what she “needs” (“ce qu’il me faut”) when it’s clearly what she wants. But she knows very well who she can tell and who she can't. This dissimulative behavior continues when she teases her sisters about the beautiful woman (her) they meet at the ball. At this point, Cendrillon asks one of them if she could lend her a dress to go with her. Of course, the sister refuses, and here is Cendrillon’s reaction:

« Cendrillon s’attendait bien à ce refus et elle en fut bien aise, car elle aurait été grandement embarrassée si sa sœur eût bien voulu lui prêter son habit. »

« Cendrillon expected well this refusal et she was pleased about it because she would have been greatly embarrassed if her sister had accepted to lend him her clothes.”

She knew pretty well and she is playing with her sisters. She is not naïve and she already has a plan for the following night, to meet again the prince. And she plays so well her game that she wins in the end: she marries the prince.

So yes, Cendrillon is good but she can also be scheming. Both are possible. You can see it, especially at the end. After being married, she forgives her mean half-sisters :

« Cendrillon, qui était aussi bonne que belle, fit loger ses deux sœurs au Palais, et les maria dès le jour même à deux grands Seigneurs de la Cour. »

« Cendrillon, who was as good as beautiful, made her two sisters stay in the Palace, and married them on the same day to two high lords of the Court.”

She knows that what is needed for women in her time is a good marriage. And that’s why she also gave it to her sisters after she has her own. Elle ne perd pas le nord.

And that’s why I like this character and tale. Well, Perrault’s version of it.

 It's funny because when everyone criticizes Cendrillon as this nice but naïve and quite dumb girl in the end, I’m like no? She isn’t? And no need to have gore for that. No need to add blood and torture. You just have to take into account the context she is living in and how she manipulates it to her own advantage while staying true to her goodness.

So maybe, before criticizing fairy tales, making them simpler and dumber than they are, just put them in their context. Especially when it comes to moralities.

Authors lie all the damn time and Perrault is very good at it. He is part of the wittiest circle of his country’s epoch, after all.

 And if you are interested (and you speak French, sorry), I would suggest you read the following books on the subject:

BRIERE-HAQUET Alice, Politique des contes – Il était une fois Perrault aujourd’hui…, Paris : Classiques Garnier, 2021, 168p.

ESCOLA Marc, Contes de Charles Perrault, Editions Gallimard, 2005, 235p.

SIMONSEN Michèle, Perrault – Contes, Paris : Presses Universitaires de France, 1992, 124p.

SORIANO Marc, Les Contes de Perrault – Culture savante et traditions populaires,  Gallimard, 1968, 525p.

[coppolesque]

Book list

Miss peregrine 5 / Let it snow / Histoire de Lisey / Le seigneur des anneaux 2 / + LSDA 3 / Twilight 1 / + Twilight 2 / + Twilight 3 / + Twilight 4 / Running man / Rêves et cauchemars / Le fléau / Insomnie /Différentes saisons / Orgeuil et préjugés / Emma / Raison et sentiments / Histoire de la Russie / Suzon / Claire / La Voleuse de Livres /Histoire de L'Europe / La Couleur des Sentiments / La servante écarlate / + Les Testaments / Alias Grace / Effacée / + Brisée / + Fracturée / Summerset Abbey / Olympe / Roméo et Juliette / Voyages de Gulliver / Anna Karénine / Le roi fantôme / La guerre et la paix I / + La guerre et la paix II / Dictionnaire de la mythologie / La mythologie Gréco-romain / W ou le souvenir d'enfance / Journal d'Anne Frank / Le monde de Sophie / Find me / Divergente 2 / + Divergente 3 / Carpe Diem / The Great Gatsby / The Virgin Suicides / Marlena / Girl, interrupted / The language of thorns / The Picture of Dorian Gray / Voyage au centre de la terre / Le Fantôme de l'opéra / Madame Bovary / Marie-Antoinette: femme réelle, femme mythique / La fille du train / The ballad of songbirds and snakes / Les contes des frères Grimm / Contes des particuliers / Les contes de Beedle le Barde / Traité sur la Tolérance / 20,000 Years of Fashion / Gravity Falls: Journal 3 / Oliver Twist / Tout savoir sur les vampires /Amour et Autres Enchantements /Atonement / Picnic at Hanging Rock / Macbeth / Hamlet / Lolita / Carrie / Frankenstein / L'histoire de l'art en BD / The Bell Jar / Valley of the Dolls / The Little Dictionary Of Fashion / Le monde de Charlie / The song of Achilles / Narnia 1 / + Narnia 2 / + Narnia 3 / + Narnia 4/ + Narnia 5 / + Narnia 6 / + Narnia 7 / A Series of Unfortunate Events 1 / + ASOUE 2 / + ASOUE 3 / + ASOUE 4 / + ASOUE 5 / + ASOUE 6 / + ASOUE 7 / + ASOUE 8 / + ASOUE 9 / + ASOUE 10 / + ASOUE 11 / + ASOUE 12 / + ASOUE 13 /The Secret Garden / Anne Of Green Gables / Black Beauty / Heidi / Percy Jackson 1 / + PJ 2 / + PJ 3 / + PJ 4 / + PJ 5 / Harry Potter 4 / + HP 5 / + HP 6 / + HP 7 / The Secret History / Le siècle des excès / Little Women / Histoire de l'extrême droite en France / L'Iliade / L'Odyssée / The Oxford Book Of Japanese Short Stories / D'une / Sense and Sensibility / The Complete Sherlock Holmes / Dracula / 1984 / Da Vinci Code / Don Quijote De La Mancha / Romancero Gitano / Le Monde selon Flaubert / La gauche en France / Histoire des États-Unis De 1492 à nos jours. /Manifeste du Parti communiste (Karl Marx) / Pensées pour moi-même (Marc Aurèle) / Le socialisme en France et en Europe: XIXe-XXe siècle / Sans raison (Mehdy Brunet) / L'Ami Prodigieuse 1 / + L'Ami Prodigieuse 2 / + L'Ami Prodigieuse 3 / + L'Ami Prodigieuse 4 /Middlemarch / I'm thinking of ending things / Bunny / Then She Was Gone / The Silent Patient / Evelina / Basic Writings on Politics and Philosophy /The Works of Lord Byron / The Four Fondamental Concepts of Psycho-Analysis / The Night Circus / Circe / All the light we cannot see / The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue / Turtles All The Way Down / Renegades / The Starless Sea / Legend Born / To Best The Boys / Stalking Jack The Ripper / The Betrayals / The furies / The woman in cabin 10 / Lovely War / Cruel Beauty /Luckiest Girl Alive / Some kind of happiness / Le diable s'habille en Prada / Vengeance en Prada / Sharp Objects/ Black Butler/ Valkyrie Apocalypse/ Les paradis perdus/ Le goût de Marie-Antoinette/ Coraline/ Rebecca/ Nevermoor 1/ N2/ N+7/ spirou et fantasio (55 tomes) / dents d'ours x 6/

[lepetitdragonvert]

Prince Grenouille d’après le conte des Frères Grimm Le Roi Grenouille

Éditions Les Livres du Dragon d’Or

1991

Artist : Alix Berenzy

[dixvinsblog]

Les contes de l'avent - Le petit âne - Les frères Grimm

Les contes de l’avent – Le petit âne – Les frères Grimm

Il était une fois un roi et sa femme qui souhaitaient désespérément un enfant, et jour et nuit ils priaient pour que le bon Dieu leur apporte un héritier. Et un jour le ciel exauça leur prière, et la reine mit au monde un garçon, mais le tout petit ne ressemblait en rien à un petit garçon : c’était un petit âne. Quand la mère vit l’enfant elle se mit à se lamenter de son sort : – J’aurais…

[adarkrainbow]

How Mother Goose's fairytales switched from adults to children

I have frequently talked about how printed fairy tales were always originally meant for adults, not children.

The fairytales of Charles Perrault and madame d'Aulnoy in France were for an adult audience and adult in tone and content (with illusions of "childishness" as a narrative convention), and only later became stories for children due to a mass-spreading, an access to popular culture and a misinformation about their purpose. Before them, the first "fairytale collections" of Basile and Straparola, the "Pentamerone" and "The Facetious Nights" are very obviously for adults due to their nature as NSFW dark comedy filled with sex, rape, gore, scatophilia and Punch-and-Judy humor. Even in the case of the brothers Grimm! The first edition of the brothers' fairytale collection was for a purely scientific, cultural, folkloric purpose - it was meant to be read for scholars and folklorists and other adults. It was only as they realized that their book turned out to be a huge best-sellers for families, and that it was most often used as a way to entertain children, that they decided to make their stories more "kid-friendly". Hence why each re-edition of their collection became more "SFW" and more edited (they even made a side-book, a mini-collection of fifty edited fairytales specifically selected for children!)

This is the long history of fairytales. Each time prepared by adults, for adults, and yet ending up in the hands of children and being treated as for kids... And since the cosmos loes balance, now that the fairytales are throoughly ingrained and defined as "for children", they always end up being reimagined and renvented for an adult audience... Anyway.

The reason I bring back this entire topic is because I recently stumbled upon an article about Martine Hennard Dutheil de la Rochère, about the adaptations of Perrault's "Les Fées" (The Fairies, better known today as "Toads and Diamonds") for England. It was quite an interesting read so I will share some of its content below, rearranged a bit with additional info (such as the one above).

First off, it should be noted that, from the get go, when fairytales of France were first translated in England, the idea that they were for adults was still around. For example the very first literary fairytale of France, L'île de la félicité, by madame d'Aulnoy, was translated as early as 1691 - because the novel which contained it was translated, "The History of Adolphus", and since it stayed within its original context, it stayed an "adult read" (since the novel was a story for adults). [For more information about it, check M.D. Palmer's text "The History of Adolphus, the first French Conte de fée in English")

This doesn't come from the article I talked about, but in another paper about the European fame of madame d'Aulnoy's fairytales in the 18th and 19th centuries, there was this precision that the same way in England Charles Perrault's name was overshadowed by the one of the fictional "Mother Goose", madame d'Aulnoy's own name was erased for a nickname seemingly coming out of nowhere: "Mother Bunch". Just a desire to match the other famous "fairytale mother"? Not quite... Because the name "Mother Bunch" was associated in England with a specific type of woman - the type of woman who knew more private, romantic, erotic secrets, the kind of woman teenagers would go to to ask advice on how to seduce other people, and young couples would question about how things were meant to go in bed. A kind of Nanny Ogg, if you know your Discworld. A saucier "Mother Goose". It was probably not because the English audience perceived the subversive, erotic and bawdy elements within madame d'Aulnoy's fairytales, unfortunately ; but it was mostly due to England being aware of the various scandals and extravagant adventures madame d'Aulnoy lived, which gave her a reputation of a quite unconventional woman.

The real "turn", the true switch within a general perception of these fairytales was probably the first real translation in English of Charles Perrault's fairytales: Robert Samber published in 1729 "Histories, or Tales of Past Times... with Morals by M. Perrault". This was the original sin, so to speak. Because you see... Robert Samber meant this book to be for children and he did not hide it.

As I repeatedly said before, Charles Perrault's fairytales were not meant for children. He did imitate a simplistic story-style associated with children stories ; he did include morals at the end of each of his tales... But his intended audience (and test audience, and those he dedicated the stories to) was made of adults, his morals were all ironic and subversive, and his stories were filled with puns and references only an adult person (and more so an adult person of a certain social condition living by or near the royal court) would understand. But Robert Samber? He made a huge effort to highlight how Perrault's fairytales were moral - like, literaly, he took every Moral of Perrault at first-degree, as praising virtue and denouncing vice, completely missing the jokes and incoherences within it - and were "educational". And perfect for children. In fact, Robert Samber dedicated his translation to the children of a certain lord Carteret. Bear this in mind, it will come back later.

A clear and obvious proof of Samber literaly falsifying the text to fit his personal perception is the preface of his translation. He did translate most of Perrault's own preface for his fairy tales... But he included in it extracts from another preface. The preface of Jean de la Fontaine's Fables. An extract about how Plato praised the fables of Aesop when it came to teaching children about wisdom and virtue, and how he advised people to prefer them to the "poetry of Homer" (the Iliad, the Odyssey, etc). Not only did Samber literaly took the words of a different author for a different work and grafted them here... But when you are aware of the context, it becomes even more extravagant.

I spoke regularly about this, but the fairytales of France took place within a cultural battle known as "La Querelle des Anciens et des Modernes". On one side, the "Ancients", people then in charge of the dominating cultural institutes, and who held the long tradition that any cultural piece worth anything had to come from the classical and "perfect" era of the Greek and the Romans. On the other side, the "Modern", a new generation of culture-makers who claimed that other sources and other influences could be used rather than Antiquity - more "modern" resources such as the various romances and epics of the Middle-Ages. La Fontaine and Perrault were not bitter enemies at all - in fact, Perrault greatly admired La Fontaine and references his Fables within his own fairytales... But they stood on opposite sides of the schism. La Fontaine was part of the Ancients - hence why his most famous work was the Fables, a French adaptation of Aesop's own fables and other Antique stories "recreated" for Renaissance France. Perrault, meanwhile, was the unofficial leader of the Moderns - hence why he created his fairytales, inspired by French folklore rather than any Greek epic or Roman tragedy. As such, to confuse the explanation-texts of these two authors isn't just falsifying a translation - it is literaly fusing and reinventing two conflicting and contradicting opinions about the use and format of culture. And it completely falsifies Perrault's own initial project and intentions. (Plus it perpetuates a confusion between "fables" and "fairy tales")

Not only that, but Samber also removed several key sentences from Perrault's preface. Including those that explicitely said that his fairy tales could be read differently depending on the age and the level of experience of the reader... A subtle way to point out the obvious: under an apparently simplistic and childish folk-story was hidden an adult literary work. But again, for a Samber taking literaly every one of Perrault's Morals and aiming a book for children and only children, such sentences had to be removed.

Another fascinating element... In his preface, Robert Sambre points out that the fairytales within his book are organized in a pedagogical way, from the most childish to the most mature. Another "proof", according to him, of why this book was made for children. Problem... Robert Sambre used a Dutch print of the fairytales, a 1721 Amsterdam edition which completely changed the order of the fairytales. Perrault's original order, in the 1697 edition, was: Sleeping Beauty - Little Red Riding Hood - Bluebeard - Puss in Boots - Toads and Diamonds - Cinderella - Riquet with the tuft - Little Thumbling. But in Samber's edition? Little Red Riding Hood - Diamonds and Toads - Bluebard - Sleeping Beauty - Puss in Boots - Cinderella - Riquet with the tuft - Little Thumbling. And... one more fairytale. "L'adroite princesse, ou les aventures de Finette" (translated as "The Discreet Princess"). This fairytale was actually not part of Perrault's texts - it was written by Perrault's niece, and one of the famous French fairytale authors, mademoiselle Lhéritier. But ever since this Dutch printing (and then its English translation, and then ever before since the first mistake was made in 1716), there is a common habit of identifying this fairytale as being Perrault's... a mistake which still appears sometimes today. But all of that to say, Samber's edition was complete randomness.

A few more reads disponible in English: "The Authentic Mother Goose Fairy Tales and Nursery Rhymes", 1960, by Barchilon and Petit + Jones' "Mother Goose's French Birth and British Afterlife" (this article is disponible on publicdomainreview.com)

Dutheil de la Rochère highlighted several key differences between Perrault's original French text, and Samber's translations, about the "Diamonds and Toads" fairytale. First, Samber's translation of the title as "The Fairy" - which isn't what Perrault wrote (he titled his stories "The Fairies", for subtle reasons since there is only one fairy in his story but who poses as two different women ; Samber probably meant to "correct" the title). Then there is the fact that Samber removed a certain "rustic", "peasant" tone and vocabulary within the dialogues, which Perrault precisely included to make the reader feel like in the French countryside and among common folks. There is also Samber's "moral" removing of a specific sentence - Perrault wrote that if the mother prefered one sister over the next, it was because she looked more like her and "people like more what is like them". It was part of Perrault's satire of human nature - Samber simply removed it all together. Finally, there is a distinctive "childish" selection of words to make the story seem more... "kiddy" let's say. Where Perrault wrote "a beautiful girl", Samber writes "a pretty little girl". Where Perrault wrote "my mother", Samber writes "mamma".

Random trivia: The nasty sister's name is translated as Fanny, a name derived from Frances and quite common in England at the time, soon to be associated with John Cleveland's scandalous "Fanny Hill, or Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure". Perrault's name was merely "Fanchon", which is a rural diminutive of "Françoise" and was one of those stereotypical names for a young peasant girl.

Mind you, the "infantilization" of fairytales was not all due to England. It happened within France itself. Perrault, d'Aulnoy, Lhéritier and others were the first wave of fairytales, end of the 17th century. id 18th century there was a revival of the traditional French literary fairytale, a "second generation" so to speak - and a part of this generation grew the idea of writing fairytales for children. Chief in this school of thought was madame Leprince de Beaumont, the woman behind the most famous version of "Beauty and the Beast". She was a governess for the aristocracy, and part of what was then a progressive movement: teaching girls! Arg! The progress! As such, she personaly read fairytales as the perfect tool to teach children in a pleasant and educative way, and she was one of the first fairytale authors in France to have like straightforward manichean, moral and religious Morals at the end of her tales. Heck, her fairytale collection is called "Le magasin des enfants, "The children store", precisely because it was a children book.

But where am I going with this? Remember when I said Samber dedicated his work to the children of Lord Carteret? Well, Leprince de Beaumont also dedicated her work to children... To one child specifically. Sophia Carteret, youngest daughter of Lord Carteret (a character in the book was even based upon her). Indeed, while Madame Leprince de Beaumont was French and wrote in French, she had emigrated to London in 1748 and had worked there for British aristocracy. Given she created her own fairytales after Samber did his translation of Perrault's, and she herself described in her texts Perrault's story as "puerile but perfect for children" (*cough cough*), it is very likely she was influenced in her fairytale writing by Samber's complete reinterpretation and flasification of Perrault's tales. And since Leprince de Beaumont's work came to be spread and known throughout Western Europe... Began the misconception that fairytales had been written for kids.

Trivia: Madame Leprince de Beaumont wrote her own variant of "Toads and Diamonds" - but she wrote it as a fable. "The fable of the widow and her two daughters", in the line of other French fables for children such as those of Fénelon.

Last reading recs: Shefrin's "Governess to their Children: Royal and Aristocratic Mothers Educating Daughters in the reign of George III" (in "Childhood and Children's Books in Early Modern Europe" by Immel and Witmore) + Seifert's "Madame Leprince de Beaumont and the Infantilization of the Fairy Tale" (in "The Child in French and Francophone Literature".

[toutmontbeliard-com]

Conservatoire du Pays de Montbéliard : programme d'avril 2024

En avril 2024, le Conservatoire du Pays de Montbéliard vous propose : Vendredi 5 avril 2024 20h00 SOCHAUX La MALS : OPÉRA DE POCHE "Un rêve d’opéra", G. Tailleferre / J.P Rameau Coordination : Annie Corrado et Isabelle Jost Mise en scène : François Costagliola Chorégraphies : Cédric Godefroid Chef de chant : Annie Corrado Chef d’orchestre : Vincent Nommay Clavecin : Nicolas Aubin Chanteurs, danseurs, acteurs et instrumentistes élèves du Conservatoire vont créer sur scène « La Fille d’Opéra » de Germaine Tailleferre, opéra de poche radiophonique. Écrit dans le style de Jean-Philippe Rameau, il sera enrichi d’œuvres pour clavecin de l’illustre musicien, composant ainsi un véritable opéra-ballet. Dans le cadre des Couleurs de l’agglo et du Festival Fernand Léger en musique, en collaboration avec la section mode du lycée Les Huisselets de Montbéliard, l’entreprise FRIP’VIE de Grand-Charmont, l’association Engrenages artistiques, le concours du service Animation du Patrimoine de PMA. Avec le soutien de la commune de Sochaux. Soutenu par Capitale Française de la Culture. Entrée libre, sans inscription, dans la limite des places disponibles Dimanche 7 avril 2024 à partir de 10h00 MONTBÉLIARD Musée Beurnier-Rossel : VISITE / CONCERT "L’Instant baroque, un bijou d’architecture" 10h00 – Visite Un bijou d’architecture à la française dans une cité princière allemande ? C’est en construisant leur hôtel particulier que les époux Rossel, issus de la grande société bourgeoise du 18e siècle, assoient leur statut social. Découvrez l’histoire de cet édifice aux somptueux décors et la contribution de quelques protagonistes. 11h00 – Concert Tout comme l'architecture, l'art de la musique baroque est tissé de multiples influences esthétiques et culturelles. Dans ce programme dédié au clavecin au violon et au chant, les œuvres de J.C.F. Fischer, J.S. Bach, et L.N. Clérambault seront présentées sous cet angle. En collaboration avec les Musées de Montbéliard. Entrée libre, dans la limite des places disponibles. Réservation indispensable au 03 81 99 22 57 ou musees@montbeliard.com Lundi 8 avril 2024 18h00 MONTBÉLIARD, Auditorium du Conservatoire : "Conférence avec l’Université Ouverte" par Denis Morrier, professeur de culture musicale Le Conservatoire du Pays de Montbéliard et l’Université Ouverte poursuivent ce cycle de conférences et d’ateliers de Culture musicale. Au programme cette année : un an à Venise…. Cette conférence est dédiée à l’âge d’Or de la musique vénitienne (XVIIème - XVIIIème siècle). Entrée libre, sans inscription, dans la limite des places disponibles. Mardi 9 avril 2024 20h00 BART, Salle des fêtes : MUSIQUE DE CHAMBRE "Le chant de l’âme" Le quintette pour clarinette et cordes de Johannes Brahms peut, sans conteste, être qualifié d’œuvre maîtresse. Porté par le timbre d’un instrument qu’il aima entre tous, Brahms y délivre un chant, tout intérieur, libéré des tentations d’une vaine virtuosité, un « chant de l’âme » en somme… En prélude à cette pièce magistrale, et dans le plus complet contraste, le quintette pour clarinette et cordes de Laurent Riou, donné ici en création, tâchera lui aussi de ne dire que le plus « authentique ». Avec : Jean-Luc Bouveret et Andrea Pujado, violon ; Françoise Temperman, alto ; Rachel Cottin-Gleize, violoncelle ; Christian Georgy, clarinette. Programme : Quintette pour clarinette et cordes de J. Brahms ; Quintette pour clarinette et cordes de L. Riou (création). Avec le soutien de la commune de Bart. Entrée libre, sans inscription, dans la limite des places disponibles. Vendredi 12 avril 2024 20h00 MONTBÉLIARD, Auditorium du Conservatoire : CONTE MUSICAL (JEUNE PUBLIC) "Hänsel et Gretel" Pour quatuor de cors et récitant. Entrez dans l’univers des contes de Grimm pour faire vivre aux petits comme aux grands enfants un moment enchanté et enchanteur… Il était une fois, Hänsel et Gretel, deux enfants, partis dans la forêt sur ordre de leurs parents, cueillir des fruits pour le dîner… Mais voilà, dans cette forêt vit une sorcière, et les deux enfants vont bientôt faire sa rencontre. L’opéra d’Humperdinck (1854-1921), ici arrangé pour quatre cors et un récitant nous propulse dans une ambiance mystérieuse, feutrée et chaleureuse. Avec Quatucor : Sylvain Guillon, Martin Angster, Emma Cottet, Grégoire Nenert, cor et Baptiste Masson, récitant… Dans le cadre du projet « Des cors de printemps » en partenariat avec le Conservatoire du Grand Belfort, l’École de musique du Pays d’Héricourt et l’Harmonie d’Héricourt. Soutenu par Capitale Française de la Culture. Entrée libre, sans inscription, dans la limite des places disponibles. Et aussi : - interventions d’Emma Cottet sur l’histoire du cor : jeudi 4 avril 2024 à 17h00, vendredi 5 avril 2024 à 12h00 et mardi 9 avril 2024 à 18h30, Bibliothèque du Conservatoire, Montbéliard - Master-class d’Hervé Joulain : samedi 13 avril 2024 de 9h30 à 12h30 (travail individuel) et de 14h00 à 17h00 (ensembles de cors), Auditorium du Conservatoire, Montbéliard. infos > 03 81 94 77 80 ou www.agglo-montbeliard.fr Read the full article

[preparfa-2024-algernon-42]

POST N°107 _ 5 Février 2024

Gub, un mollusque extraplanaire ayant pris les Contes De Grimm comme coquille

Format A5, feutre et acrylique

[yanncavell]

À bien des égards, l'on peut comparer le célèbre roman pour enfants "Le Magicien d'Oz" (1900) au conte de fées des Frères Grimm beaucoup moins connu et intitulé "Les Six Compagnons qui viennent à bout de tout", (un récit datant du XIXème siècle), car dans ces deux histoires, un petit groupe de personnages aux talents complémentaires triomphe de grands périls (vastes champs de fleurs dangereusement soporifiques, sorcière maléfique, et cætera) en s'entraidant.