Fantasy Various: The Allies’ Fairy Book. v1. 26 May 2025

[GrannyGrump]

“The popular idea of a fairy is bound up with the image of a diminutive woman, dressed in wings and a ballet-skirt, who is small enough to sit among the petals of a full-blown rose, and light enough to be wafted through the air on a wild bird’s wing. … …The little human creatures, in wings and skirts, which Sir Herbert Tree has taught us to think of as all clothed in a delicate shimmer of sunset gold, are really not fairies, but fays. It is pleasant to be able to point to anything, however small, that Shakespeare did not know.

A fairy is, in fact, any supernatural creature of the imagination. It is a being evolved, contrary to the laws of nature, by enchantment. In the correct sense, a hobgoblin or a giant (if large enough) or a mermaid, or even a dragon, is a fairy, and there is no evidence whatever that ballet-skirts are worn in the recesses of the forests of fairyland.”
—Edmund Gosse, introduction to The Allies’ Fairy Book

This children's book contains a selection of thirteen tales from eleven allied nations in the First World War. Some allied forces are not represented as they joined after the time of publication.
The volume includes an introduction by Edmund Gosse (1849—1928) . It is illustrated with twelve full-page color images and more than thirty line drawings by the incomparable Arthur Rackham. Cover and end-paper images derived from first edition.

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Arthur Rackham RWS (1867 – 1939) was an English book illustrator. He is recognised as one of the leading figures during the Golden Age of British book illustration, which roughly encompassed the years from 1890 until the end of the First World War. His work is noted for its robust pen and ink drawings, which were combined with the use of watercolor.

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List of the tales:

Spoiler:

Jack The Giant-killer

English

The Battle Of The Birds

Scotch

Lludd And Llevelys

Welsh

Guleesh

Irish

The Sleeping Beauty

French

Cesarino And The Dragon

Italian

What Came Of Picking Flowers

Portuguese

The Adventures Of Little Peachling

Japanese

The Fox’s Wedding

Japanese

The Tongue-cut Sparrow

Japanese

Frost

Russian

The Golden Apple-tree And The Nine Peahens

Serbian

The Last Adventure Of Thyl Ulenspiegel

Belgian

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The Allies’ Fairy Book was first published in 1916.
This ebook is in the public domain where copyright is “Life+80” or less, and in the USA.
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