Grimms’ Tales Around the Globe: The Dynamics of Their International Reception ed. by Vanessa Joosen and Gillian Lathey (review)

Kinder-und Hausmarchen by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm—otherwise known as the “Brothers Grimm (1)”—“exerts enormous influence in many countries of the world” (130). Many of their fairy tales are regarded as classics, and are known and loved by adults and children all over the globe. In Vanessa Joosen and Gillian Lathey’s Grimms’ Tales Around the Globe: The Dynamics of Their International Reception, scholars explore how Grimm narratives, told in nurseries and schools, libraries and living rooms, through oral and textual means, through film and stage play, have been received. Chapters are devoted to discussion of the Grimms’ tales in Croatia to India, with two pieces devoted to Korea’s reaction to these stories in different time periods. While the Grimms are ranked within the “top ten most frequently translated author’s in the world,” this volume illustrates the great variability in the ways the stories are told, indicating that the function they have served varies from context to context (1).

The fourteen chapters of Grimms’ Tales Around the Globe are organized into two parts: Part One is essays on Cultural Resistance and Assimilation, while Part Two focuses on Reframings, Paratexts and Multimedia translations. Joosen and Lathey remark in their introduction that among the contributions emerges five themes, which become easily apparent through a reading of the book.

Malini Roy’s chapter “The Grimm Brother’s Kahaniyan: Hindi Resurrections of the Tales in Modern India by Harikrishna Devsare” provides an explanation of Devsare’s distinctive perspective on the tales he very closely recounts in a Hindi translation of Kinder-und Hausmarchen, which reflects “The Grimms As a Source of Inspiration for International Folklorism” (3). Grimms’ tales have often been adapted to suit the cultural context of particular nations, illustrating “Ambivalent Innovations as Children’s Literature.” Isabel Hernández and Nieves Martín-Rogero take on a study of the Grimms’ tales in Spain and conclude that translations of the Grimms’ fairy tales have been reflective of Spain’s “changing sociopolitical conditions” (73). When a “conservative ideology” has dominated the country’s landscape, it was much less important that translations maintain “literary” fidelity”; transmitting moral values has taken a back seat to providing “more accurate renditions of the original text” when “progressive ideological winds” have been victorious (73). The observations of Hernández and Martín-Rogero in their chapter on Spain underline the relationship the editor’s note between “innovation through translation and cultural context adaptation” (8). In a chapter titled “ Fairy-Tale Scripts and Intercultural Conceptual Blending in Modern Korean Film and Television Drama,” Lee utilizes a comparison of the “first kiss” to humorously illustrate conceptual blending (278), making it clear that the Grimms’ works have been mediated in a variety of ways, highlighting not only the “importance and difficulty of “Translation,” but also how “a spectrum of transformation now exists, from the mediator whose intention is to produce a faithful rendering that may nonetheless include degrees of domestication, censorship, and revision to the playful or subversive creator” (8-9). The fourth emerging theme from this collection is “The Visual” (10). Mayako Murai’s Chapter “Before and After the ‘Grimm Boom’: Reinterpretations of the Grimms’ tales in contemporary Japan” provides readers with actual images alongside her text, which has otherwise sparingly utilized visual references to assist the reader in discussions of the visual. Other chapters, such as Sara Hines’ “German Stories/British Illustrations: Production technologies, Reception, and the Visual Dialogue across Illustrations from ‘The Golden Bird’ in the Grimms’ Editions, 1823-1909,” would have been enhanced through the use of the art in discussion in the author’s piece. “Political and Ideological Issues”, as the fifth and final theme indicated by the editors, is evident throughout, an example of how children’s literature has always been recognized as a powerful influence in the life of a nation.

Alexandra Michaelis-Vultorius concludes...