PREFACE

Some anthropologists maintained that no human art is older than the art of story-telling. Long before people began to draw or write, they told tales to one another. From the ancient heritage we can read a vast number of traditional tales which express the feelings and aspirations of primitive tribes and races. Great works of children’s literature came into being from about 1700 to 1920, according to G. Griffith and C. Frey, writers of children’s literature. Various regions and nations of the world have their own folk tales and each tale carries with it the characteristics of the society from which it has come, such as the way of thinking, the customs and the beliefs. However, similar stories are frequently found in different places. These fascinating parallels show that there exists a basic cultural kinship between nations and races of the world. For instance, there are obvious similarities between the English story “The Black Bull of Norroway”and the Hungarian story “The Speaking Grapes, the Smiling Apple and the Tinkling Apricot”. You can find some other examples of this kind in the book. It has been estimated that more than three hundred versions of the story of Cinderella have been discovered.

As mentioned above, tales were passed down orally through the years and they travelled far and wide before they took shape in the form of written languages. Later, great masters of children’s tales, such as Charles Perrault, the Grimm Brothers, Hans C. Andersen and Peter C. Asbjornsen and many others, emerged and left the world a rich repository of children’s literature.

Children’s stories are entertaining. What is more important, they are instructive, yet they never preach. They are like the gentle breeze, the soft drizzle and the sweet morning dew, moistening and nourishing the hearts of generation after generation. They teach us to learn to be good and true. In these tales the good, the beautiful and the true always defeat the evil, the ugly and the false in the end. So they fulfil the functions of cheering up the defeated,strengthening the timid and giving comfort to those who suffer. They purify and sublimate the soul. Don’t you see that the Little Mermaid “would give all my three hundred years to be a human being for one day”and gain an immortal soul? How enlightening this is! No one who has finished the story and closed the book can help sinking into deep meditation. All of a sudden he may become aware that in order to gain the right of being a human the Little Mermaid has bravely struggled, suffered and endured; then what should we who are fortunately born human beings do to be worthy of that name? And, what attitude should we adopt in dealing with our fellow human beings?

Though children’s tales are full of imagination and the impossible, they do not turn us away from the reality, but kindle our hope for a better future. Some of them may have a tragic ending, such as “The Happy Prince”, “The Red Shoes”and so on. Still, they are always optimistic and have their own positive meanings. The fact that many innocent children, after reading “The Little Match Girl”, have begged their parents to send their favourite clothes, books and toys to the poor little girl may serve as a convincing evidence of such positivity.

In this collection, we have chosen mostly works from European countries and the U. S. that are of lasting appeal.Others are less well known, but they have their own distinctive features, giving the readers a taste of different cultures. For example, in “Carried off by the Moon”, we learn that certain Eskimo tribes believe the sun is female and the moon male, contrary to our traditional belief. Moreover,stories of this kind are always written in a simple and pleasant style, full of wit and humour.

This collection covers more than one thousand years,from as early as the fifth century down to the modern times.It includes stories by some fifty authors from France,Germany, England, Ireland, Italy, Spain, Greece and Switzerland (in Western Europe); Russia, Poland, Hungary and the Bukovina region (in Eastern Europe); Finland,Norway, Denmark, Iceland (in Northern Europe); the United States and Mexico (in the Americas); Babylon, India, China,Japan, Turkey and Israel (in Asia); Australia; Africa; as well as from the Eskimo race, the Red Indians and North American Indians, representing all together twenty-seven countries,regions and races on six continents. We have arranged the tales roughly in the chronological order of the birth dates of their authors and grouped them according to the authors’nationalities.

We regret that a number of the stories here have to be abridged because of the limited printing space we have been allowed. Great care, though, has been taken to preserve the spirit, style and special features of the original. We have provided explanatory notes wherever they may aid the readers in understanding the texts.

This anthology is bilingual. We hope it will prove valuable as supplementary reading material to students and their teachers in or outside the classroom.

Shi Youshan

Xie Shan

December, 1998