Folklore & Fairytales discussion

Of course, almost everyone knows about the Brothers Grimm, but there are other, lesser known German folk and fairy tale collectors (collections).

Ludwig Bechstein was one such collector/writer, and his fairy tales were actually more popular than the Grimms when they originally were published in the 19th century (his tales were specifically published for children, while the Grimms collection was, at least originally, not specifically meant for children). Sämtliche Märchen contains all of Bechstein's fairy tales (in German) and while I really loved the tales themselves, I only rated this edition with two stars, as it is simply not very user friendly. For English translations of Bechstein's fairy tales, there are unfortunately only very few, and none of them are complete. Most of them are picture books, but the following Fairy Tales of Ludwig Bechstein, translated by Anthea Bell, has a decent selection, is well-translated and contains some wonderful illustrations.

For those who read German, over 500 previously unknown (stuck in archives) fairy and folktales of the Upper Palatinate (Oberpfalz), collected in the 19th century by Franz Xaver Von Schönwerth have recently been rediscovered by Erika Eichenseer. In 2010 she published about 130 of these tales in the following book, which I am currently reading and absolutely loving (both for the tales and for academic research), Prinz Roßzwifl und andere Märchen. Many of the tales have correspondences to Grimms collection, but many of them were/are preserved in a more down-to-earth, original form. Whereas the Grimms changed most of the tales, made them more literary and "stylish" Franz Xaver Von Schönwerth kept many in the original forms they were collected, some even in dialect. A great find, and hopefully more of the tales will be published, and perhaps some academic comparisons between these tales and the Grimms tales (or European folktales in general).