Classic Fairy Tales of Charles Perrault

by Charles Perrault

  Contents

  Cover

  Title page

  INTRODUCTION

  LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD

  THE FAIRY

  BLUE BEARD

  THE SLEEPING BEAUTY

  PUSS IN BOOTS

  CINDERELLA

  RIQUET WITH THE TUFT

  TOM THUMB

  THE RIDICULOUS WISHES

  DONKEY SKIN

  THE LIFE OF CHARLES PERRAULT

  Acknowledgements

  Copyright page

  About Gill & Macmillan

  Harry Clarke’s work as an illustrator and stained-glass artist

  Henry (Harry) Patrick Clarke, prolific and award-winning stained-glass artist and master illustrator, was born in Dublin on St Patrick’s Day, 1889, to an English father and an Irish mother. He went to school at Belvedere College in Dublin, leaving in 1903 to work in his father’s church decoration and supply business, where he learned the techniques of his trade. He augmented his practical experience with studies at the Dublin Metropolitan School of Art, where he later taught illustration.

  Described by the art critic Brian Fallon in 1983 as ‘Ireland’s only great Symbolist’,1 a label that has frequently been attached to him, Harry Clarke was lauded in his lifetime by Æ as ‘one of the strongest geniuses of his time’.2 Although the style he evolved was completely his own, his influences were many and varied, ranging from Art Nouveau, the Arts and Crafts Movement, Aubrey Beardsley, Gustav Klimt, the dazzling costumes and choreography of Serge Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes and the stained-glass windows at Chartres Cathedral and Sainte-Chapelle, Paris. His incredibly detailed and intricate work, which drew heavily on Irish legend and mythology, was in tune with the Celtic Revival movement of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. His favourite colour, blue, is used liberally in both his stained glass and his illustrations, echoing the stained glass of Chartres and the windows and vaulted ceilings of Sainte-Chapelle. Much is made of his ‘dualism’, and it is true that good (in the guise of beauty) and evil appear alongside each other in much of his work, particularly his illustrations.

  The Song of the Mad Prince, 1917, stained-glass panel, © National Gallery of Ireland

  In 1914 Clarke visited the cathedral at Chartres. The stained-glass windows there inspired him to use the deep, rich colours that would become such a characteristic of his glasswork and illustration. His predilection for a wonderful rich blue recalls the expensive lapis lazuli pigment traditionally used by medieval and Renaissance painters for the Virgin’s cloak. One of the exceptions to his bold use of colour is the series of quite restrained stained-glass windows in Bewley’s Oriental Café, Grafton Street, executed in 1928, towards the end of his life, and as much a part of Dublin’s urban landscape as its more obvious sculptural and architectural landmarks.

  From an early stage in his career Clarke was getting small commissions for the design of theatre programmes, posters and the like. His first commission for book illustration was for Alexander Pope’s ‘The Rape of the Lock’, followed by a commission for Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’. When he had a significant portfolio of literary illustrations he brought it to 12 London publishers in turn, and was rejected by each of them. In the winter of 1913, however, he was commissioned by George C. Harrap & Co. to illustrate the fairy tales of Hans Christian Andersen, to be published in a limited, signed edition. Harrap’s decision was probably influenced by the success of an edition of Andersen illustrated by Edmund Dulac, and a popular retelling of the stories by Arthur Quiller-Couch, with illustrations by the young Danish artist, Kay Nielsen. There were to be 40 full-page illustrations in all, 16 of them in colour.

  Illustration by Harry Clarke from Fairy Tales by Hans Christian Andersen. Photo © NGI

  Illustration by Harry Clarke from Tales of Mystery & Imagination by Edgar Allan Poe

  The illustrations were completed in April 1915 and Fairy Tales by Hans Christian Andersen was published in October 1916 in three editions, with 16 full-page colour plates, 24 full-page black and white drawings and numerous decorations. An unsigned review in The Studio dismissed Clarke as just another of Beardsley’s disciples, but the volume was generally well received.

  Just as he was finishing the Andersen illustrations, Clarke started work on his first big stained glass commission, for five windows in the Honan Chapel at University College Cork, completed in 1918. Reviewing them in The Studio, Clarke’s friend Thomas Bodkin, who was later appointed director of the National Gallery of Ireland, wrote that the windows’ ‘sustained magnificence of colour, their beautiful and most intricate drawing, their lavish and mysterious symbolism, combine to produce an effect of splendour which is overpowering’.3 The Honan windows, together with the Hans Andersen illustrations, established Clarke’s reputation as a stained-glass artist and book illustrator.

  While he was working on the Harrap commission Clarke was reading Edgar Allan Poe’s Tales of Mystery & Imagination, and in 1919 he was commissioned by Harrap to execute pen-and-ink and watercolour illustrations for the stories. Earlier comparisons to Beardsley may have contributed to the development of his unique, brooding style for these. The first edition was published in October 1919 in four editions, including a de luxe limited, signed edition of 170 copies. It was heavily marketed by Harrap, was very favourably received by the critics and achieved record-breaking sales. Shortly afterwards Clarke was commissioned by Harrap to produce 12 line drawings, 12 watercolours and 22 decorative drawings for The Year’s at the Spring, a collection of contemporary poetry selected by Lettice d’Oyly Walters, which was published in September 1920 – again, the illustrations were greatly admired. His success must have given him the confidence to approach Harrap in November 1920 with a proposal to publish a translation by Thomas Bodkin of Charles Perrault’s Mother Goose fairy tales. He included a sample illustration, but Harrap reacted unenthusiastically, turning down the proposal for reasons of expense. Bodkin suggested approaching Hodder & Stoughton instead. Sir Ernest Hodder Williams was interested, although he wasn’t convinced that Clarke’s illustrations would be right for them. He asked him to produce two more specimen illustrations, suggesting satisfactory terms if the project went ahead. However, having worked solidly for two weeks working up three (rather than the two requested) samples, Clarke received a rejection from Hodder on the ground that although the illustrations were beautiful they were unlikely to appeal to their important children’s market. The project was dropped until the end of 1921, when Clarke approached Harrap once again. This time they agreed to publish.

  The Fairy Tales of Perrault, published in August 1922 in several different editions with an introduction by Thomas Bodkin, had 12 colour plates, 12 black and white drawings, and numerous decorations. Of these, it seems that only one colour plate survives, ‘He Saw, Upon a Bed, the Finest Sight Was Ever Beheld’, bought in 2010 by the National Gallery of Ireland.

  It is immediately clear that the colours have changed since the publication of the Hans Christian Andersen volume and the palette is now much more subtle. Silhouettes (see ‘Tom Thumb’) are used to good effect, and there is even an overtly erotic element to some of the illustrations (see ‘Donkey Skin’ and ‘The Sleeping Beauty’). Some of the characters are caricatures of Clarke’s contemporaries, although this is of little significance to today’s reader. This was a book for adults rather than children. Perrault’s tales, predating Andersen’s by about 150 years, are not the soft-focus sanitised versions with which later generations have become familiar. In ‘Little Red Riding Hood’, for example, there is no happy resurrection of the child and her grandmother at the end of the story – they are eaten
by the wolf and that’s the last we see of them. In these often gently witty stories actions have consequences; characters are certainly rewarded for being good or beautiful or clever, but stupidity, even if well intended, and even if allied with goodness and beauty, results in disaster. Perrault even appended a little moral verse (or two) to the end of each story, just to drive home his point.

  ‘HE SAW UPON A BED, THE FINEST SIGHT WAS EVER BEHELD’ Photo © NGI

  Clarke seems to have tapped into the darker aspect of the stories – The English Review drew attention to the ‘unearthliness’ of the images – and there is a menacing quality to many of the illustrations, playful and caricaturing though some of them are. By the time he was working on Perrault, Tales of Mystery & Imagination had been published in two editions; perhaps Clarke thought the Perrault stories lent themselves to the approach he had employed in that series of illustrations. Unfortunately, The Fairy Tales of Perrault failed to achieve the critical acclaim that had greeted the publication of the Andersen volume and sales were poor. According to Nicola Gordon Bowe, the ‘idiosyncratic and fantastic detail’ of the illustrations ‘were perhaps too weird for a generation attuned to the illustrations of Rackham, Dulac and the Robinsons’.4 However, children today, inured to the weird and fantastic by television, film and computer games, may find the Perrault illustrations less disturbing than their predecessors might have done in the 1920s.

  When he died in 1931, Clarke bequeathed a wealth of stained glass, both religious and secular, and a substantial list of illustrated publications. His windows live on, but many of his original book illustrations were held at the Harrap offices in London and were burned during the Blitz. Others were destroyed during the 1916 Easter Rising in Dublin. Happily, the National Gallery of Ireland holds one of his original Perrault illustrations and a number of the illustrations for Hans Christian Andersen.

  Notes

  1 ‘The Irish Symbolist’, The Irish Times, 10 December 1983.

  2 George Russell, The Irish Statesman, 21 December 1929.

  3 ‘The Art of Mr Harry Clarke’, The Studio, November 1919, p.46.

  4 Nicola Gordon Bowe, The Life and Work of Harry Clarke (Irish Academic Press, Dublin, 1989), p.145.

  Drawing by Clarke, thought to be a self-portrait.

  LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD

  Once upon a time, in a country village, there lived the prettiest little girl you have ever seen. Her mother loved her very much, and her grandmother doted on her even more. The old woman had a little red cape with a hood made for the child; this suited her so well that people in the neighbourhood began to call her Little Red Riding Hood.

  One day, her mother had been making some bread. She said to Little Red Riding Hood, “Why don’t you go to see how your grandmother is, for I hear that she has been very ill. Take her one of my loaves of bread and this little pot of butter.”

  Little Red Riding Hood set out at once to visit her old grandmother, who lived in another village. As she was going through the woods she met a big wolf, who would have liked to eat her up, but didn’t dare, because there were some woodmen at work in the forest nearby.

  The wolf asked Little Red Riding Hood where she was going. The poor child, who didn’t know that it was dangerous to stop and talk to a wolf, said, “I am going to see my grandmother, and am taking her a loaf of bread and some butter, from my mother.”

  “Does she live far away?” asked the wolf

  “Oh, yes,” answered Little Red Riding Hood, “she lives just beyond that mill, in the first house in the village.”

  “Well,” said the wolf, “I think I’ll go and see her, too. I’ll go this way and you go that, and we’ll see who gets there first.”

  The wolf began to run as fast as he could, taking the shortest way to the grandmother’s house; and the little girl went by the longest way, dawdling along the road and amusing herself by gathering nuts, running after butterflies and making posies of wild flowers. It wasn’t long before the wolf reached the old woman’s house. He knocked on the door, tap, tap.

  “Who’s there?”

  “Your granddaughter, Little Red Riding Hood,” replied the wolf, imitating the little girl’s voice. “I have brought you a loaf of bread and a little pot of butter, sent to you by my mother.”

  The good woman, who was in bed because she still wasn’t feeling very well, called out,

  “Pull the latch, and the door will open.”

  The wolf pulled the latch, and the door opened. He jumped on the good woman and ate her up in a moment, for it was more than three days since he had had anything to eat. He then shut the door and climbed into the grandmother’s bed to wait for Little Red Riding Hood, who came along some time afterwards and knocked on the door, tap, tap.

  “Who’s there?”

  Little Red Riding Hood, hearing the big voice of the wolf, was afraid; then, believing that her grandmother’s cold had made her hoarse, answered,

  “It’s your granddaughter, Little Red Riding Hood, who has brought you a loaf of bread and some butter, sent by my mother.”

  The wolf called out to her, softening his voice as much as he could,

  “Pull the latch, and the door will open.”

  Little Red Riding Hood pulled the latch, and the door opened. When the wolf saw her come in, he hid himself under the bedclothes and said to her,

  “Put the bread and the little pot of butter on the bread bin, and come and lie down with me.”

  Little Red Riding Hood undressed herself and got into bed. She was very surprised to see how her grandmother looked in her nightdress and said to her, “Grandma, what big arms you’ve got!”

  “All the better to hug you with, my dear.”

  “Grandma, what big legs you’ve got!”

  “All the better to run with, my child.”

  “Grandma, what big ears you’ve got!”

  “All the better to hear with, my child!”

  “Grandma, what big eyes you’ve got!”

  “All the better to see with, my child.”

  “Grandma, what great teeth you’ve got!”

  “All the better to eat you up.”

  And, saying these words, the wicked wolf fell on poor Little Red Riding Hood and ate her all up.

  “THE WOLF ASKED LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD WHERE SHE WAS GOING”

  THE MORAL

  From this short story we discern

  What conduct all young people ought to learn.

  But above all, young, growing misses fair,

  Whose orient rosy blooms begin t’appear:

  Who, beauties in the fragrant spring of age,

  With pretty airs young hearts are apt t’engage.

  Ill do they listen to all sorts of tongues,

  Since some enchant and lure like Syrens’ songs.

  No wonder therefore ‘tis, if over-power’d,

  So many of them has the Wolf devour’d.

  The Wolf, I say, for Wolves too sure there are

  Of every sort, and every character.

  Some of them mild and gentle-humour’d be,

  Of noise and gall, and rancour wholly free;

  Who tame, familiar, full of complaisance

  Ogle and leer, languish, cajole and glance;

  With luring tongues and language wond’rous sweet,

  Follow young ladies as they walk the street,

  Ev’n to their very houses, nay, bedside,

  And, artful, tho’ their true designs they hide;

  Yet ah! These simpering Wolves! Who does not see

  Most dangerous of Wolves indeed they be?

  THE FAIRY

  Once upon a time there was a widow who had two daughters. The eldest daughter was so much like her mother in appearance and temperament that anyone who looked at the daughter saw the mother. They were both so unpleasant and snobbish that there was no living with them. The youngest daughter, on the other hand, had inherited her father’s courtesy and sweet nature, and, as well as that, was one of the most beautiful girls ev
er seen. As people naturally love themselves, this mother doted on her eldest daughter, and had a dreadful dislike of the youngest. She made her eat in the kitchen and work all the time.

  Among other things, this poor child had to walk over a mile and a half twice a day to draw water from the well and bring home a pitcher full of it. One day, when she was at the well, a poor woman came to her, begging her to let her have a drink.

  “Why yes, with all my heart,” said the pretty girl. She rinsed the pitcher, took up some water from the clearest part of the well and gave it to the woman, holding up the pitcher so that she would be able to drink more easily.

  The woman, having drunk the water, said to her, “You are so very pretty, my dear, so good and so well mannered, that I cannot help giving you a gift.” (For this was a fairy, who had taken the form of a poor peasant woman to see how far the kindness and good manners of this pretty girl would go.) “I will give you this as a gift,” continued the fairy, “that at every word you speak, either a flower or a jewel will come out of your mouth.”

  When the girl got home, her mother scolded her for staying so long at the fountain.

  “I beg your pardon,” said the poor girl, “for being so slow.” When she spoke these words, out of her mouth came two roses, two pearls and two diamonds.

  “What is this I see?” asked her mother, quite astonished, “I think I see pearls and diamonds coming out of the girl’s mouth! How is this happening, child?” (You should know that this was the first time she had ever called her child.)

  The poor child told her everything that had happened, not without dropping infinite numbers of diamonds out of her mouth.

  “Oh my goodness,” cried the mother, “I must send my child there. Come here, Fanny, look at what comes out of your sister’s mouth when she speaks! Would you not be glad, my dear, to have the same gift given to you? You have only to go and draw water out from the well, and when a certain poor woman asks you to let her drink, to give it to her very politely.”