#422 of 1001 · September 26, 2021

Let’s have another theme week, shall we? It’s time to begin exploring an ancient tale of magic and marvels: Sleeping Beauty. To begin, here is an adaptation retold and illustrated by Trina Schart Hyman. The language sings with a clear and elegant phrasing. The illustrations flow with a delicate movement, particularly in strands of hair, folds of fabric, and wisps of candle smoke. The fairies are an ethereal bunch, adorned with head scarves, wreaths, and butterfly wings. The oldest fairy, however, sports a sinister hooded cloak, a snarl of occult necklaces, and a tall wooden cane. The book’s most frightening tableau is surely the briar hedge surrounding the sleeping castle, filled with the countless skeletons of would-be heroes who have become ensnared and starved to death. A note for folklore enthusiasts: Hyman mixes and matches details from versions of “Dornröschen” (“Little Thorn-Rose”) appearing in multiple editions of the Grimms’ Kinder- und Hausmärchen. The magical invitees to the royal feast are “fairies”, a translation of the German “Feen”, a word that only appears in the original 1812 publication (in the second edition the Grimms replaced it with “weisen Frauen”, or “wise women”, in an effort to remove perceived French influence from their stories). However, the animal that predicts the queen’s coming pregnancy in Hyman’s book is a frog, which did not appear until the third edition of 1837 (in the first two editions the clairvoyant creature is a crab). #sleepingbeauty #sleeping #beauty #fairy #fairies #queen #king #princess #prince #book #books #childrensbooks #picturebook #picturebooks #picturebookillustration #picturebookart #childrensbookillustration #childrensliterature #illustration #kidlit #kidsbooks #bookworm #booklover #booklovers #bibliophile #bookstagram #bookstagrammer #bookstagrammers #instabook #instabooks