Tales of Wonder: Retelling Fairy Tales Through Picture Postcards

In the introduction to this hefty and colorful new book, Jack Zipes tells the tale of how, as a young academic in Paris fifty years ago, he came across a number of fairy tale postcards and took them home, setting off a life-long obsession that led to a personal collection of over 2,500. Unlike his usual monographs, Tales of Wonder is a lighthearted peek at a very personal part of Zipes’s fairy-tale life: a 500-or-so selection of this massive collection, organized by subject and tale.

Lost & Found: The Fairy Tale Book

One thing you can expect to become a regular feature on The Fairy Tale Collector is “Lost & Found” posts, in which I share fairy tale books that I’ve happened upon in used book sales, thrift stores, attics, antique shops, you name it. For this first Lost & Found post I’m truly excited to share this book–I found it back in May at Housing Works Bookstore in NYC, and I haven’t even found a place on my shelves for it yet because I keep it out on a table in my home office, always wanting to look through its gorgeous pages.

The Fairy Tale Book, first published in 1958 by good old Golden Books Publishing/Simon & Schuster, contains tales mainly from European fairy tale traditions, but a few eastern ones as well, all translated by Marie Ponsot. It’s a large format “Deluxe Golden Book,” which makes it feel like one of those animated storybooks that open at the start of an old-fashioned fairy tale film.

Ask Baba Yaga

Last week saw the release of Ask Baba Yaga, a new book I’ve been drooling over since it was announced. Author Taisia Kitaiskaia began channeling Baba Yaga in an advice column for The Hairpin, where the crone’s witchy advice soon became one of the site’s most popular features.

Welcome!

My name is Cate Fricke, and I’m a writer, reviewer, and collector of fairy tales. My short stories, plays, and reviews have been published with Stage Partners, Fairy Tale Review, Sycamore Review, The Masters Review, Slate, and more. On this blog I’ll post reviews and thoughts about fairy tales that cross my path of pins, from the latest blockbuster film adaptation to a magically perfect used book store find to the sneaky fairy tale allusion in an otherwise unassuming novel.