Picture Book Illustrated by Henry Thiriet This colorful picture book was published by B. Sirven in Paris. It's a bit different than the most popular version, so we will take time to explore the fairy tale with the abundant help of illustrations signed by Henry Thiriet, one of the leading poster artists of his time. The book is printed in two different techniques, like many similar books in the first half of the 20th century. While everybody wanted color books, colors were still expensive and many publishers tried to save a dime or two by combining full color with two- or three-color printing. In this case, we have exactly one half full-color pictures out of 16 (cover, back, and the double spread in the middle are four of them) and the other half in a combination of orange (color of life) with blue or purple (both colors are associated with other worlds) what is perfectly in tune with the story where death or at least threat of death plays so important part but life eventually wins. You can explore the symbolic meanings of colors but don't forget to come back! The story starts without the usual introduction about the king and queen yearning for the child and throwing a party when finally the baby girl is born. Poor kid is cursed right at the beginning - on the book cover! While the wicked fairy gave the baby the gift of death, another fairy promised the worried royal couple everything would be all right. The girl will not die after pricking her finger with the spindle. She will only fall asleep. A very deep sleep that can last for a one hundred years. The king was obviously not satisfied with the prediction and took some action on his own. If the girl dies or falls to sleep only after hurting herself with a spindle, the situation could be avoided if she never gets in contact with a spindle, right? So he banned all spindles in the kingdom. What's the point of being the king if you can't ban something so dangerous as spindles? Like it or not, life doesn't take orders from anybody and kings are no exception. When her time came, the princess found a lady who was spinning. The girl was obviously curious. She had never seen a spindle before and she wanted to try some spinning. Yes, she instantly pricked her finger. Just like the prophecy said, she fell down and fell asleep. The old lady yelled for help and people came right away. Too late, of course. All the best doctors of the kingdom came and none of them could find a solution. The princess was asleep and nothing could wake her up. The verdict was unanimous. There is nothing to do. Desperate times call for desperate measures. Or at least some magic, in our case. The nice fairy from the beginning of the story came in her spectacular carriage, drawn by a pair of dragons. She came to fulfill her promise about a one-hundred-year sleep. With one small modification - everybody in court should sleep too, so when the girl awakes, her world would be pretty much the same. The fairy went through the castle and with her magic wand made everybody asleep. Everybody but the king and the queen. They will stay awake but not here. They won't see their daughter awake anymore. The king and the queen are leaving the sleepy castle symbolically passing their legacy to the next generation. This is an interesting twist to the best-known versions where parents fall asleep as well, so they can rejoin their daughter after the centennial siesta. While there is no author credited for this picture book (only the illustrator), we can presume that the Perrault version with a lesser number of fairies (brothers Grimm use twelve fairies plus the wicked one) served as the base of the story. Yet in none of both versions, do the parents leave the castle and the daughter. If we want to find such a version, we should go way back in time to Gianbattista Basile's Pentamerone with Sun, Moon, and Talia. So this is a conglomerate of at least three older versions of Sleeping Beauty. There is also much more about the Sleeping Beauty messages if you are in the mood for historical and psychological journeys. The word about the princess in the castle sleeping for many many years evolved into a legend. Many brave men tried to find her but none succeeded. One day a prince tries his luck and we can see him inquiring about the beautiful girl waiting to be rescued. He has to make his way through the thorns (they are present only in Grimm's version) to reach the legendary castle. And he made it! Everybody around the castle was still sleeping. Everybody in the castle was sleeping too. All the people and even the animals were asleep. Finally, the prince finds the princess and awakes her. It was love at first sight, of course. Everybody else in the castles woke up as well. A splendid wedding follows and everybody lives happily ever after. It looks like this book is part of a series but I couldn't find more about it. I just managed to find a few illustrations also made by Henri Thiriet for a similar picture book titled Cinderella (Cendrillon). I hope I can deliver more in the future. In the meantime enjoy the pictures from this book and share them with everybody who might be interested.
By the way, the same author also illustrated a book wit all Perrault's fairy tales and you can look at it right here.
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Who Was Charles Perrault?He wrote only eight fairy tales in prose and three in verse, yet he is rightfully called the father of modern fairy tale. Archives
October 2023
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