The World's Best Fairy Tales, Volume 2

The World's Best Fairy Tales #2

by Belle Becker Sideman (editor)

Volume 2 of a two-volume fairy tale anthology. All the best loved and remembered tales. Includes: Jorinda and Joringel, Puss in Boots, The Emperor's New Clothes, Billy Beg and His Bull, Little One Eye, Little Two Eyes and Little Three Eyes, The Red Shoes, The Steadfast Tin Soldier, Snegourka, the Snow Maiden, The Three Little Pigs, The Shoemaker and the Elves, Doctor Know-It-All, The Six Swans, Dick Whittington and His Cat, Rapunzel, Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp, The Three Bears, Rumpelstiltzkin, The Golden-Headed Fish, Hansel and Gretel, The Brave Little Tailor, The Gingerbread Man, A Horned Goat, Seven Simons, The Little Match Girl, East of the Sun and West of the Moon, The Musicians of Bremen, Blue Beard, The Princess on Glass Hill, The Half-Chick, Sleeping Beauty, The Magic Carpet, Jack the Giant Killer, Twelve Dancing Princesses, Little Claus and Big Claus, The Colony of Cats, Sinbad the Sailor.

Genres: Childrens, Fiction, Fairy Tales, Fantasy, Folklore, Short Stories

448 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1970

Reviews

[Erman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read this to my kids while riding to school on the train every day. Some pretty fun stories. They liked it. Some of the fairy tales are pretty bonkers. But still fun.

[Ancestral Gaidheal · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have owned this book now for night on 40 years. It was gifted to my parents when I was born. I read it, re-read it, and read it again many times as a child and I still enjoy the tales, even if they have been modified to make them more palatable. Even so, my favourite tale is "The Goose-Girl" mostly because of the sentence passed on the servant girl; it was gruesome to this child's mind, but I relished it and though she deserved it. The magic in the tale also captured my imagination, as it did in all the tales.

I doubt I will ever release this book and now that it has been retrieved from solitary confinement in storage, I hope to find a bookbinder to repair its sorry, leather-bound spine and restore it somewhat to its glory days.

[BRNTerri · Rating 5 out of 5]

See all images from inside the book here.

This is the second volume to the one I reviewed previously. Each story, some are common fairy tales, some are just stories, has a full color, full page illustration. This volume had a few more stories and weighs slightly less than the first volume. Like I said of the previous one, the stories in here are hit or miss. I'm disappointed in myself for skipping three of the longer stories. They didn't hold my interest and I didn't want to waste time on them. My favorites are: Jorinda and Joringle, Hansel and Gretel, The Gingerbread Man, Bluebeard, which has no business being in a children's book, The Little Match Girl, The Red Shoes, and The Steadfast Tin Soldier. The most morbid ones are Bluebeard and Little Claus and Big Claus with The Red Shoes runner-up.

[Taylor Carson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fun book of the best fairytales!
All are fairly short.
I would read them aloud to my husband while driving on road trips. Our favorite was The Golden-Headed Fish. It was quite unique; we had never heard of it before and liked the moral!

[Lorrie Newmister · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collection of fairy tales is delightful. Not too gruesome for young readers, yet suspenseful. I love the jargon of the old fairy tales. These were collected by Andrew Lang, Joseph Jacobs, Perrault, Asbjornsen and Arabian Nights.

[behsforensics]

Cutting is for The Musicians of Bremen
By Wilhelm and Jakob Grimm

[Lindsey · Rating 5 out of 5]

This and the matching Volume I are among my top favorite books of childhood. The pages are a shiny gold at the edges, and they contain every fairy tale you could ever possibly want. I believe the imagery, plot and morals of fairly tales shaped my desire to be a writer. When I look back now, it amazes me how violent and frightening some of the tales are - Red Riding Hood's hungry wolf, and the sheer sadness and horror of Hansel and Gretel, for example.
I still don't feel as if reading these tales corrupted or traumatized me as a youth. Compare them to video games and laugh. Even the most disturbing of the fairly tales are like fables. If I had a child, I would definitely buy them these or a similar collection, so vivid and thought-provoking are they.

[Ashley C · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this book because i really like fiction fantasy stories over nonfiction because sometimes it is just fun to explore to imaginative world of fairytales. But this book was very long with details on each fairy tale. this book was almost 830 pages!

I really liked all the different stories and a break from reality. Like Tom thumb,the frog prince, cinderella, the princess and the pea to name a few. So cute!!!

[Mark Dickson]

My grandmother bought this set for my daughter when she was very young. My daughter left them behind when she grew up and moved out, but she will get it back someday. I hope she will read them and give them to her child in the future

[Sarah Kelleher · Rating 2 out of 5]

I've been reading these to my stepson at night, and we both enjoy them. But I think we are both expecting a little bit more from every story, like twist endings or something. Hollywood has ruined us.

[A book away from an episode of hoarders · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can't tell you how many times I read this book growing up. All I can say is that I read my hardcover book so many times that the pages fell out of it.

Now, as an adult and a mother, I am getting another copy so that I can read it again. Maybe I'll even let my boys read it. :)

[♠ TABI⁷ ♠ · Rating 5 out of 5]

I think this was my first introduction to "real" fairytales, not the watered-down ones in children's story books or Disney. And I loved it, as I love all fairytales. Quite the book to add to your shelves if you are a fairytale lover like myself.

[Julie]

Two volumes

[Cindy · Rating 5 out of 5]

It was very interesting to read the fairy tales that you grow up thinking you know the story and finding out that some of them are not how you remember them.

[Damon Steine · Rating 5 out of 5]

the book that kept me sane when i was 6 years old, while enduring mumps.

[S · Rating 4 out of 5]

Outstanding - more than I anticipated.