Fairy Tales and Fables from Weimar Days

by Jack D. Zipes (Editor)

A collection of literary fairy tales written during the Weimar Republic in Germany, intended to serve as utopian tales for raising the political consciousness of the young people of that period, includes a scholarly introduction giving the social and cultural background of the tales

Genres: Folklore, Fairy Tales, Fiction

221 pages, Hardcover

First published December 1, 1989

About the author

Jack David Zipes is a retired Professor of German at the University of Minnesota. He has published and lectured extensively on the subject of fairy tales, their linguistic roots, and argued that they have a "socialization function". According to Zipes, fairy tales "serve a meaningful social function, not just for compensation but for revelation: the worlds projected by the best of our fairy tales reveal the gaps between truth and falsehood in our immediate society." His arguments are avowedly based on the neo-Marxist critical theory of the Frankfurt School.

Zipes enjoys using droll titles for his works like Don't Bet on the Prince and The Trials and Tribulations of Little Red Ridinghood.

He completed a PhD in comparative literature at Columbia University. Zipes taught at various institutions before heading German language studies at the University of Minnesota. He has retranslation of the complete fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm.

Reviews

[Kevin Richards · Rating 4 out of 5]

As Zipes points out, these are a variety of tales - while some are satirical (very funny), but most are politically didactic geared towards uplifting the working class and the destitute, who are not typically shopping for collections of fairy tales in the local bookstore, so the genre was economically doomed. The new strategy shifted towards oral storytelling with these tales eventually were found and inspired a new wave of socially-aware fairy tales in the 70s.

[Eric · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting look at the attempt by desperate writers in the Weimar Republic to recast fairy tales to teach kids how to be communists and socialists. They're well-written and interesting, but I doubt they would have done much to make a child acceptable to the party line. Worth reading as a time capsule of a promising, but failed, time in world history.

[Nat B · Rating 4 out of 5]

these were so interesting!!! really liked the intro too