Tale
Tales of Mother Goose
Histoires ou contes du temps passé
Charles Perrault · 1697
Synopsis
Eight prose tales, each followed by a moral in verse. We meet a princess struck by an evil spell, a little girl in a red hood, the young wife of Bluebeard, a cat who works to make his master's fortune, two sisters put to the test by a fairy, Cinderella, Riquet with the Tuft, and Hop-o'-My-Thumb, the last of seven brothers.
Context
The collection appeared in Paris in January 1697, from Claude Barbin, under the name of P. Darmancour, the author's son; historians debate the part played by each. A manuscript copy of five of these tales, entitled Contes de ma mère l'Oye, had been presented as early as 1695 to a niece of Louis XIV, Élisabeth-Charlotte d'Orléans; the printed edition adds three tales, including Cendrillon. The success was immediate: reissues and counterfeits followed one another before 1700, and the text was translated into English as early as 1729.
Who it is for
Eight short tales, to be read in the 1697 text, with the verse morals the author placed after each one.
Prizes and reception
Later translated into German, Dutch and Russian in the eighteenth century, they became a common stock of children's literature.
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