by Anthony Browne
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by Michael Morpurgo
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by Michael Morpurgo
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Product Description
Amazon.co.uk Review
In Rumpelstiltskin, the acclaimed poet Carol Ann Duffy brings her wit and terrific conversational style to retelling a selection of the Grimm brothers' fairytales. Among old favourites like Hansel and Gretel, Snow White and Little Red Riding Hood, which appears here as Little Red-Cap, are many lesser known tales, which are given her refreshingly direct treatment, such as the wonderful Clever Hans and The Musicians of Bremen. Clever Hans, told almost completely in dialogue, tells the hilarious story of a young man who goes acourting following his mother's advice so literally that he loses his girl.
In some stories, Duffy adds rhyme, while in others, the language bristles with updated slang and humour. In Hansel and Gretel for instance, the wicked stepmother, with a voice "as fierce as a famine" refers to the two children as "lazy scraps", while the wicked witch, hoping to plump up Hansel for eating, calls him, "you lazy ingredient". Duffy's witches are unabashedly evil, smell disgusting when roasted and are unfettered by political correctness. The writer delights in unhindered gore. The end of Ashputtel, an earlier version of Cinderella is lavishly ghoulish: the two wicked sisters hack off a portion of their feet to fit the golden slipper, only to have their eyes pecked out by the birds who have helped Ashputtel. Snow White's stepmother meets a very grisly fate which has been censored from later renditions. Alliteration serves Duffy's purpose especially well in The Golden Goose in which those who touch it, hoping to pluck away a feather remain stuck, "glum, gormless and glued to the golden goose." Duffy's poetic language is unobtrusive and effective. In the delightful Musicians of Bremen, the night house is "as silent and dark as a closed piano lid", while there's a lovely touch when the seven dwarfs fail to rouse Snow White who "was dead and stayed dead". Fresh and vigorous, these highly enjoyable tales will work well for any parent weary of dull bedtime reading, which has been stripped of all wickedness and sweet revenge. The spindly graphite drawings by Marketa Prachaticka add greatly to the spooky mood. --Cherry Smyth
Product Description
A retelling of classic children's tales by The Brothers Grimm, including "Snow White", "Rumpelstiltskin", "Ashputtel" ("Cinderella") and "Little Red-cap". This interpretation by Carol Ann Duffy seeks to remove the sugariness of contemporary versions and return to the orginal, darker mould.
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