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East of the Sun and West of the Moon
This retelling of a classic Scandinavian fairy tale is rich with mysterious castles, ugly trolls, and heartwarming romance.
40 pages, Paperback
First published August 1, 1989
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Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
November 18, 2022
The artwork was unimpressive and basic at times, which was a surprise because Hague is usually an excellent illustrator. In this book, he went too much for profiles, too many times we see the girl (who his wife Kathleen chose to give a name here) in profile or semi-profile, which isn't good, it looks like she's avoiding showing her face and emotions to me.
And also, the trolls are caricatures. They look weirdly pig-like, which was so strange! That makes them look more like ogres than trolls, which aren't supposed to be like that. I don't think Hague had his heart in this book, his output is so disappointingly bad for his usual work. At least the adaptation of the text is fine and faithful enough, the name chosen for the heroine, Ingrid, is at least appropriately Nordic-sounding too.
And also, the trolls are caricatures. They look weirdly pig-like, which was so strange! That makes them look more like ogres than trolls, which aren't supposed to be like that. I don't think Hague had his heart in this book, his output is so disappointingly bad for his usual work. At least the adaptation of the text is fine and faithful enough, the name chosen for the heroine, Ingrid, is at least appropriately Nordic-sounding too.
May 3, 2017
Yo siempre recodaré este cuento así:
Cuando llega un oso blanco a tu casa, te pide a tu hija, y tú se la entregas sin rechistar
Al este de Sol y al Oeste de la Luna es un cuento noruego bastante bonito, algo cursi, pero servirá para contarselo a mis futuros hijos,eso sí tengo.
Me interesó el cuento porque está basado en el mito de Psique y Eros, y además porque estoy leyendo este libro East que no me gusta mucho porque la protagonista es demasiado perfecta; sin embargo al leer este cuento, veo que así está descrita la protagonista y le daré una segunda oportunidad al libro.
Cuando llega un oso blanco a tu casa, te pide a tu hija, y tú se la entregas sin rechistar
Al este de Sol y al Oeste de la Luna es un cuento noruego bastante bonito, algo cursi, pero servirá para contarselo a mis futuros hijos,eso sí tengo.
Me interesó el cuento porque está basado en el mito de Psique y Eros, y además porque estoy leyendo este libro East que no me gusta mucho porque la protagonista es demasiado perfecta; sin embargo al leer este cuento, veo que así está descrita la protagonista y le daré una segunda oportunidad al libro.
January 2, 2024
Review originally published on my blog,
Dragon Bite Books
.
East of the Sun and West of the Moon is based on a Norwegian fairy tale, collected by Peter Christen Asbjørnsen and Jørgen Engebretsen Moe, who published the tale sometime between 1841 and 1844. It was translated into English by Andrew Lang in The Blue Fairy Book, published in 1889.
I find the similarity between fairy tales across the world fascinating. I re-read Percy Jackson’s Greek Heroes, a collection of myths retold by Rick Riordan, this summer, and perhaps that is why I was so forcefully reminded of Eros (or Cupid) and Psyche’s story when reading East of the Sun and West of the Moon.
The basic tale type, Aarne-Thompson-Uther (ATU) 425A, “The Animal (Monster) as Bridegroom,” has, generally, a woman asked to wed an animal or monster. In East of the Sun and West of the Moon, the unnamed bride is traded away by her financially struggling family in exchange for great wealth. Psyche is abducted by the West Wind and brought to Eros’ palace.
The bride in this tale type is given the warning that she cannot see her bridegroom perhaps at all as in Psyche’s case or at night when he is in human form as in this story (by day the protagonist’s husband-to-be is an articulate, white bear). When the bride ultimately does sneak a look at her sleeping bridegroom, he awakens, in this and in Eros’ story being burned by the hot wax of her candle. He then tells her that she has broken their arrangement, and he now must leave her. The bride then goes on an epic quest to find and return to her bridegroom.
The unnamed young bride in this tale, like Psyche on course to complete Aphrodite’s challenges, meets helpful characters on her journey to the castle that is east of the sun and west of the moon, several old women (described as hags and crones) who gift her items made of gold and then all four winds.
When she arrives at the castle she is able to trade those items for a chance to spend the night with the prince. The princess now betrothed to the prince, though, drugs the prince before the meetings so that, sleeping, he does not recognize the girl that he desired to wed. After she trades her third and last golden item, some slaves (“good folk”) warn the prince, and he feigns drinking from the cup given him by the princess. That night he is able to share his plan with his chosen bride: He will announce that he will only marry the person able to clean his shirt of the wax that she inadvertently dripped on it. Only “one born of good folk” will be able to be remove the stains (the magic of this is not really explained), and so win his hand. None of the trolls are able, but his chosen bride easily cleans the shirt. When she does so, the troll godmother bursts apart in her rage, and it is presumed that the other trolls in the castle burst too. Presumably because the troll has burst, so has her spell, and the prince is able to be a man by day now, but the story does not clarify that point.
I have talked before about another story that might belong to this tale type, a favorite of mine, The Dragon Prince: A Chinese Beauty & the Beast Tale by Laurence Yep and Kam Mak. In many ways, The Dragon Prince is bear as much similarity to Psyche’s story or East of the Sun and West of the Moon as to Beaumont’s “Beauty and the Beast” or Disney’s adaptation of the story. The quest in The Dragon Prince is taken up instead by the beastly bridegroom, who seeks his missing wife.
Leaving the prince, desired bride, princess, and godmother all nameless in East of the Sun and West of the Moon is an interesting choice. I suspect Hague meant to give the characters an everyman identity, but especially as I write this summary, it is a lot of characters to keep straight without names. In this and in Psyche’s story, the heroines have great agency. Their bridegrooms are the ones in need of saving, and the heroines venture out alone on their quests after first having broken their bridegroom’s rules.
I have become more accustomed to reading picture books where I am treated to having the page spread contain the text that supports the illustration and the illustration. East of the Sun and West of the Moon is in contrast a picture storybook. It is illustrated, but the illustrations are not vital to the story, and in several cases the formatting felt jarring when I turned the page to see an illustration of a scene that I had already passed and already imagined. This awkwardness I place fully on the shoulders of the book’s formatters. More white space may have been necessary to line up the text with the facing illustrations, but I think the trade would have been worth it.
I feel as though a true picture storybook for this age is rare in this era of publishing, but perhaps those books are just missing me. It is impressive in its way that the story is able to be held up by text alone.
Because the illustrations are not vital to the telling of the story, they are more easily forgotten or ignored, although they are richly, realistically detailed. At one point, the unnamed bride is depicted wearing a small cross on a necklace. That hint of Christianity poses questions in a story so full of magic. Is that a sign that she is “born of good folk”?
Though I obviously have lots to say about this retold tale, I am struggling to rate it. By that, I suppose it ought to get the median three stars. It is not a story that I dislike, but nor is it one that stood out to me—again obviously, as most of this review is comparing to another text.
East of the Sun and West of the Moon is based on a Norwegian fairy tale, collected by Peter Christen Asbjørnsen and Jørgen Engebretsen Moe, who published the tale sometime between 1841 and 1844. It was translated into English by Andrew Lang in The Blue Fairy Book, published in 1889.
I find the similarity between fairy tales across the world fascinating. I re-read Percy Jackson’s Greek Heroes, a collection of myths retold by Rick Riordan, this summer, and perhaps that is why I was so forcefully reminded of Eros (or Cupid) and Psyche’s story when reading East of the Sun and West of the Moon.
The basic tale type, Aarne-Thompson-Uther (ATU) 425A, “The Animal (Monster) as Bridegroom,” has, generally, a woman asked to wed an animal or monster. In East of the Sun and West of the Moon, the unnamed bride is traded away by her financially struggling family in exchange for great wealth. Psyche is abducted by the West Wind and brought to Eros’ palace.
The bride in this tale type is given the warning that she cannot see her bridegroom perhaps at all as in Psyche’s case or at night when he is in human form as in this story (by day the protagonist’s husband-to-be is an articulate, white bear). When the bride ultimately does sneak a look at her sleeping bridegroom, he awakens, in this and in Eros’ story being burned by the hot wax of her candle. He then tells her that she has broken their arrangement, and he now must leave her. The bride then goes on an epic quest to find and return to her bridegroom.
The unnamed young bride in this tale, like Psyche on course to complete Aphrodite’s challenges, meets helpful characters on her journey to the castle that is east of the sun and west of the moon, several old women (described as hags and crones) who gift her items made of gold and then all four winds.
When she arrives at the castle she is able to trade those items for a chance to spend the night with the prince. The princess now betrothed to the prince, though, drugs the prince before the meetings so that, sleeping, he does not recognize the girl that he desired to wed. After she trades her third and last golden item, some slaves (“good folk”) warn the prince, and he feigns drinking from the cup given him by the princess. That night he is able to share his plan with his chosen bride: He will announce that he will only marry the person able to clean his shirt of the wax that she inadvertently dripped on it. Only “one born of good folk” will be able to be remove the stains (the magic of this is not really explained), and so win his hand. None of the trolls are able, but his chosen bride easily cleans the shirt. When she does so, the troll godmother bursts apart in her rage, and it is presumed that the other trolls in the castle burst too. Presumably because the troll has burst, so has her spell, and the prince is able to be a man by day now, but the story does not clarify that point.
I have talked before about another story that might belong to this tale type, a favorite of mine, The Dragon Prince: A Chinese Beauty & the Beast Tale by Laurence Yep and Kam Mak. In many ways, The Dragon Prince is bear as much similarity to Psyche’s story or East of the Sun and West of the Moon as to Beaumont’s “Beauty and the Beast” or Disney’s adaptation of the story. The quest in The Dragon Prince is taken up instead by the beastly bridegroom, who seeks his missing wife.
Leaving the prince, desired bride, princess, and godmother all nameless in East of the Sun and West of the Moon is an interesting choice. I suspect Hague meant to give the characters an everyman identity, but especially as I write this summary, it is a lot of characters to keep straight without names. In this and in Psyche’s story, the heroines have great agency. Their bridegrooms are the ones in need of saving, and the heroines venture out alone on their quests after first having broken their bridegroom’s rules.
I have become more accustomed to reading picture books where I am treated to having the page spread contain the text that supports the illustration and the illustration. East of the Sun and West of the Moon is in contrast a picture storybook. It is illustrated, but the illustrations are not vital to the story, and in several cases the formatting felt jarring when I turned the page to see an illustration of a scene that I had already passed and already imagined. This awkwardness I place fully on the shoulders of the book’s formatters. More white space may have been necessary to line up the text with the facing illustrations, but I think the trade would have been worth it.
I feel as though a true picture storybook for this age is rare in this era of publishing, but perhaps those books are just missing me. It is impressive in its way that the story is able to be held up by text alone.
Because the illustrations are not vital to the telling of the story, they are more easily forgotten or ignored, although they are richly, realistically detailed. At one point, the unnamed bride is depicted wearing a small cross on a necklace. That hint of Christianity poses questions in a story so full of magic. Is that a sign that she is “born of good folk”?
Though I obviously have lots to say about this retold tale, I am struggling to rate it. By that, I suppose it ought to get the median three stars. It is not a story that I dislike, but nor is it one that stood out to me—again obviously, as most of this review is comparing to another text.
January 6, 2026
3.5 stars
December 29, 2014
This is a beautiful retelling of a classic fairy tale. It would make a lovely gift for your little princess.
My only complaint, and it's quite minor, is that I was not as impressed by the illustrations as I had hoped I would be. Based on other reviews, this certainly puts me in a minority. For such a rich tale with lots of imagery, the illustrations are pretty bland and a few were downright creepy. Also, why does the prince appear to be wearing a woman's nightgown? Like I said, small complaint. Enjoy.
My only complaint, and it's quite minor, is that I was not as impressed by the illustrations as I had hoped I would be. Based on other reviews, this certainly puts me in a minority. For such a rich tale with lots of imagery, the illustrations are pretty bland and a few were downright creepy. Also, why does the prince appear to be wearing a woman's nightgown? Like I said, small complaint. Enjoy.
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October 31, 2013Classic Norse fairy tale of castles and trolls. This is different than the standard accepted fairy tale as the heroine must save the hero. She is not a weak female lead. The young girl is sent to a far awy kingdom to marry a prince. However the Prince's kingdom is under a spell. The girl must travel to other lands in order to break the spell and save the Prince's kingdom. The grade level is acceptable for Kindergarten - 3 and lexile measure is 920L.
July 23, 2008
This is one of my favorite books from childhood--important to have this version for the illustrations--and I read it again recently while thinking of Italo Calvino's take on compression and repetition in folktales. Also the object as a means to move the narrative forward through time. But now I can't stop thinking about Gretchen Mazur's lecture on Forbidden Looking...I'm cursed. Or enchanted.
May 19, 2008
Loved this book and AMAZING illustrations
April 10, 2009
Very nice.
April 13, 2011
A favorite from my childhood. Now it's time to share it with Harrison.
September 26, 2014
This was one of my favorite books as a child. My grandmother always gave me books illustrated by Michael Hague and this is one of his finest.
October 12, 2012
This is the first version I have ever read of this story.
May 3, 2013
Really cute fairytales that I am unfamiliar with (though they do bare some resemblance to French, Italian, and British ones). Fun for kids.
February 7, 2015
Didn't actually read this edition, but I read this story.
August 10, 2016
The text is wordy and awkwardly stripped of all mature content and the illustrations had great backgrounds but stiff figures with a bad CGI feel to them that are off putting.
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews