Grimm's Fairy Tales (Illustrated)

Instead of being your usual text-based Kindle book, this book is image-based. So you cannot select text, and this prevents you from being able to highlight text, look up a definition, search Wikipedia, etc. Each page seems to be made of two images, and on a regular e-ink Kindle, these do not align well. One image is an ornate border around the text, and the other image is the text. On my Kindle Touch, these run into each other on the right side, obscuring the text on the right end of each line. Since you cannot change or resize the font, there is no way to fix this. But they do align well on my tablet, and the description above mentions that it is optimized for Kindle Fire HD.On my tablet, this book looks very beautiful. The font used is a lovely one with an archaic flavor to it, making it suitable for fairy tales. The text is surrounded by an ornate border, and the story will begin with a large decorative letter. It is illustrated with beautiful artwork from both Walter Crane and Arthur Rackham, and by reading on my tablet, I get to see the artwork in color.The translation seems to be based on that of Margaret Hunt. In comparing it with another ebook version of Hunt's translation, the main difference is that the text in this version is broken into more paragraphs. This makes it more readable, because it gives each speaker in a conversation a separate paragraph instead of including multiple speakers in the same paragraph. I also own a printed version with a modern update of Hunt's translation, which changes thee, thou, and thy to you and your. I have no trouble understanding the more archaic language, and I find that modernizing the language takes some of the charm away from the story. So I appreciate that this version sticks with Hunt's more archaic language.Because of its beauty, its inclusion of artwork from two great illustrators of these tales, and how it improves Hunt's paragraphing without modernizing her language, I prefer reading this version despite not being able to look up words. If it had everything I like about it, and it also let me select and look up words, I would give it five stars.

Well, to start with it's Grimms' Tales, plural. The two Grimm brothers Jakob and Wilhelm were genuine philologists and folklorists during the early decades of the nineteenth century, and both received professorships in Berlin in 1841. They set the bar high for any who followed, gathering and then re-telling (mostly) authentic tales obtained from their peasant informants and associates. The English term Fairy Tales has always been a misleading translation for Maerchen, but not to worry.And yes, grisly is a good adjective for the frequent cruelty depicted in the tales. It is perhaps our century which prefers to sanitise material which is aimed mainly at children. There are of course the caricatures which still live in our cultures (awful mothers-in-law, other outcasts and infighting within families).The online Kindle edition in English presents the whole text in robust language with no attempt to update it into modern street idiom. We have here some beautiful illustrations by the great Arthur Rackham (1867-1939) from before 1910, but my favorites will always remain the imagery by Ruth Koser-Michaels in the 1937 German edition.

It is a joy to read these stories that I have known since childhood. The wonderful illustrations enhance them and reminds me of many happy hours I used to spend reading these tales of poor folk and royal folk and the way they overcame tests of their wits and strength. However, it is sad to see the formatting deteriorate so that most stories are one long paragraph instead of having paragraph breaks for a change in character who is speaking or a change in action or setting. After my eye tired from trying to keep up with which line I was reading on a page with no paragraph breaks, I found myself having to stop reading sooner than I wished. Perhaps the people who edit these print versions for use as ebooks could take a bit more time and correct this before posting the books for sale. Even the editing, especially for comma errors, became tedious to read past, sometimes to the point of being humorous. Please, Please, Amazon folks--learn the rules of the trade.

I read and reread Grimm's Fairy Tales as a child. They are extraordinary. This book helped me grow up to be wise of the ways of the world, fiercely independent and unafraid of my shadow. Due to the fact that these "fairy tales" can be harsh, they give children perspective. I'm tickled to get this free and illustrated.In this day of children all being "chosen" for a team and not having the experience of not making the team, of there being no scores kept making the games noncompetitive, of not being taught how to lose gracious and how to win graciously, these "fairy tales" can make the difference between a child who grows into an adult ready to face the world or an adult who is afraid of their shadow and has to "retire" from the work force because they did not learn how to "work and play well" with others.If you want your children to be stronger adults, or if you are an adult who wants some perspective, I highly recommend this book.

The cover of this book is very beautiful. But no color inside. As a fairytale lover, this book is just like a print on demand quality or a bound book used in classrooms.But at least it has beautiful layout design of Walter Crane. This book is seemingly a coloring book with huge story collection, but I bought this at very reasonable price.

Good book full of nostalgia. However i bought this thinking there would be many nice illustrations. However many are slightly blurry and poor quality. And one story may have different styles of pictures. Some being plain linear, others full blown. What irked me most were the drawings originally in beautiful color, were devalued because they were printed in black and white, with no contrast adjustments. I felt they could have done a better job with this one.

Whata classic. Bought as a gift. I cherish my old falling apart book from my childhood

I bought this thinking I would show my child the original fairy tales some day. I know the originals can be so gruesome, but I stopped reading after about 5 stories. Most involved casual or horrific animal abuse, which really sheds a light on how society felt about animals back then. Very upsetting. Art was lovely.

I bought this version specifically for the Arthum Rackham illustrations. It is a beautiful edition! Wonderfully designed. 70 stories in all - some familiar, some not; some long, some short. I'm halfway through the book and have enjoyed each story, particularly some of the ones I'd never read before. Some of the stories I have in other fairy tale collections and I've found the versions in this book are better worded so they create a clearer picture.Lots of great stories, tons of gorgeous illustrations - all black and white - by Mr. Rackham, nice borders on each page. Just about every story has at least one illustration, whether it's a header or a full-page image.A great buy!

love it love it, this book is perfect for anyone that wants to use it for junk journalling it looks Gothic, great illustrations in black & white, designs bordering on sides of pages I bought this in order to tea dye & rip the pages for my project but I couldn't do it, so I solved the problem by ordering another one I think it's ok for kids to read also The question asked below about age I bought I bout it for "me" & I'm 80 yrs. young lol

She did mention that the material quality of the book is good, and the pictures are good. She enjoyed reading it. That's all I have.

Its a good book of the original stories. I found the illustrations beautiful. The book cover overall is simple. Grimms fairytales are a classic and a must have for any tales fanatic. It was worth the money