Into the Forest discussion

Hello people... So I recently for myself into the fairytales and folklores and brought myself the original grimm's fairytales 1st edition... Loving it... I really wanted to read fairytales from various countries and found the pantheon library editions.. They r cheap and look huge.. But I wanted to know if I'll be getting all the fairytales and the original ones if I buy their editions.. Many editions didn't have all, but had the famous ones published.. Can anyone guide me on any editions...? I'm mostly interested in :

Russian
Norse
Japanese
Chinese

Thank you !!

I'm pretty sure I own most if not all of these versions. The Pantheon edition of Russian Fairy Tales by Alexander Afanasyev does not contain all the fairytales from his collection, but he collected more than 600, I believe, and published them in several volumes. I think you'd be hard-pressed to find any edition that collects all of them, and, if so, they'll probably be in multiple books.

The Japanese and Chinese fairy tales are collected from a current editor, so not from a single classic fairytale author, so they're naturally selective. They chose which tales to include from multiple older texts. Clearly, they couldn't include every single fairy tale from each country. But they are translations of those older tales.

Actually, I don't have the Norse Myths one, but I see it's written by Kevin Crossley Holland, who is a YA and middle grade writer. And since it only has 32 myths in it, these are selected too. It also says "retold" which means he's putting his own spin on the tales.

Pantheon is a solid fairytale publisher.

Thank you soo much for the detailed information.. Appreciate it very much.. Do u know of any other publishers better than these...?? I've heard of penguin publications too producing books in this aspect, but don't know how brief they are... If not, I'll go with these pantheon ones..

Also forgot to ask, does the pantheon library editions have any illustrations or photographs ?

My Pantheon books have small black and white illustrations. Nothing fancy like in Easton Press or the Folio Society books, but those are less for reading and more for collecting.

I think for looking at compilations from around the world, Pantheon is the best I know of. Penguin certainly has some good books. My Penguin collections are usually from a single author/well-known compiler, or books that haven't been collected elsewhere, like Tales of the Marvellous and News of the Strange: A Medieval Arab Fantasy Collection. Penguin books typically don't have any illustrations, unless specified that it's a special edition.

Thank you soo much...U helped me a lot regarding this.. I'm gonna start my collection with pantheon.. Much love, stay safe :) :)

Pixie wrote: "Thank you soo much...U helped me a lot regarding this.. I'm gonna start my collection with pantheon.. Much love, stay safe :) :)"

You're welcome! :)

Where would I be able to find Giambattista Basile's fairy tales in the original, unrevised Pentamerone (but N.B. Penzer's English translation)? Does that exist anywhere?

This is the version I have: https://www.amazon.com/Giambattista-B...

A quick Amazon search didn't give me the translator you want. You might try ABE Books or Ebay.

I randomly picked my version. It came into the used bookstore I worked at several years ago, and I nabbed it. It is complete. I only read a couple of tales from it, and enjoyed them.