Category Archives: Anthology

188B: Sleeping Beauty, bad faerie, marble-like wings

The only things I can remember from the fairytale book, were that the illustrations were amazing! But I can’t seem to find it through my searching. The specific illustrations I can remember were Cinderella, where the men were made from lizards, the horse were mice, or it might have been the other way round. I think there were other animals or maybe insects used too but I can’t remember. I remember that the men kind of looked like the animals they were transformed from, and the horses too. The dress was huge and ruffled and I remember her hair was huge too, like Marie Antoinette style. And I just remember the intricate details and lots of use of colour. Also, if I remember right I think it was a silk slipper not a glass slipper.

And my favourite and most memorable was the sleeping beauty illustrations. I remember being totally fascinated with the wings of the faeries, they are the most beautiful illustrations of wings I have ever seen. The bad faerie’s wings were kind of marbled, with lots of different colours, kind of like how petrol or oil on water looks if that makes sense? Or like the marbled colours of a bubble. I also think the good faeries wings might have been marbled like that too, but with lighter or softer colours maybe?

I had this book in the early 90’s but it could possibly have been older than that. I don’t remember the book cover or what other stories were in this book. But I do believe one of the stories was called something like ‘The tramp and his nail soup’ Which was a story about a tramp who convinces some woman to let him stay at her house for the night with the promise to make the most delicious soup she’s ever tasted from this nail he has in his pocket. He ends up tricking her by saying stuff like “this would be even better if you had some carrots?” Etc until he has lots of ingredients in the soup to make it delicious. However I am slightly nervous that, that story may have been from another fairytale book, so don’t necessarily rely on that info.

The illustrations are similar in style to Edmund Dulac or Arthur Rackham, but actually I think they’re a lot better.

It could also be possible that different stories are illustrated by different artists.

I’ve been trying to find it for years to no avail. I have just had a daughter and I desperately want to get this book for her. Please, please, PLEASE help!

188A: Children’s creepy poetry collection

The book is very large in size (dimensions). It is a children’s poetry collection that a friend of mine received as a gift and read when we were kids in the late 70’s and early 80’s, although at least a few of the poems were actually written long before. All of the poems were pretty creepy, and there were ink drawn(?) illustrations.

One poem in the collection was ‘Die Geschichte vom Daumenlutscher’ (The Story of the Thumb-Sucker) by Heinrich Hoffmann, although I don’t know if one of those exact titles were used in this collection. The title ‘Snip Snip’ may have been used. Apparently that poem has gone by a few similar sounding titles through the years? It was about a man in a top hat who showed up with scissors coming for a boy who sucked his thumb. Another poem in the collection was Antigonish (I Met a Man Who Wasn’t There) by Hughes Mearns, and again, I don’t know which title was actually used in this collection. A line from that poem was something like “As I was walking up the stair I met a man who wasn’t there. He wasn’t there again today. I wish I wish he’d go away.” The last poem I remember from the collection was about a father who gave his daughter a bath in gasoline because she was mean. (Yikes!)

I would love to find this book and buy it for my friend. Good luck!

184G: Judy Has a Tea Party with Her Dolls and/or Stuffed Animals

I am looking for a storybook collection and I can only remember bits and pieces of a few of the stories. My mom read it to me in the late 70s and early 80s (but I think it was from an earlier era, 50s or 60s perhaps) and I loved it more than anything. My favorite story was about a little girl named Judy who had tea parties (or some kind of party) with her dolls and/or stuffed animals. I think she spread out a blanket outside. I also remember a story about baking a pie and putting something in it. Maybe rocks. “Pip” is actually the word in my memory associated with the pie, although I have no idea what it means or if it’s right. There was also a story about a boy and girl who lost something (a gold necklace maybe?), and a fairy or angel or some kind of mythical creature told them to look somewhere to find it. I am almost positive the book was illustrated. Our copy was well worn, and the cover was missing.

183D: Old Collection of Children’s Stories and Fairy Tales

I am looking for a book my mother used to read to us in the late 70’s that was passed down from her German great, great grandmother. It was a collection of children’s stories and fairy tales with illustrations in English. One of the tales was Japanese (I think) about two sisters (or friends) that we remember being named O’Lotusan (sp?) and Miura (sp)? O’ Lotusan had a beautiful singing voice and a prince was in love with her. Miura became jealous and somehow turned O’ Lotusan into a very tiny fairy and tried to trick the prince into believing she was O’Lotusan. As a fairy O’Lotusan lived in a seashell or snail shell and collected dew drops that turned into diamonds. She would go and watch the prince who was very sad and sat at a fountain. One day, she had the courage to climb on his shoulder and sing in his ear and he knew it was her.

Two other stories in the same book that I remember are about a boy who was very sick and had to stay in bed (winter time) and fairies would paint pictures on his window pane with frost so he would see them when he woke up. The other involved a baby who lost its parents or had no parents and was found by the woodland fairies who built a bed out of a hollowed out tree limb and lined it with moss.

My sister and I have been searching for this beloved book for years. I am hoping it will ring a bell.

180D: A Childrens Treasury of Stories and Poems? (solved)

Unsure of exact title. A large childrens book of nursery rhymes, poems and stories. Hard covered, may have been blue. Published in the 1950’s. Included;

Poems
-I saw a ship a sailing
-Mud(Polly Chase Boyden)
-The Goops
-Father Williams(Lewis Carroll)
-The Fairies(William Allingham)
-The Brownie Yearbook(Palmer Cox)
-Winkin, Blinkin, and Nod
– The naughty soap song

Stories
-The Little Match Girl
-The Tinderbox
-The Fisherman and his Wife
-The Emperors New Clothes
-Rumpelstiltskin
-Penrod
-Why the Bear has a Stumpy Tail
-Black Beauty
-Puss in Boots
-Henny Penny
– The Pied Piper
-Puss in Boots
-The Princess and the Pea
-The Bremmontown Musicians

These are a few of what I can remember. The book started with classic nursery rhymes (little boy blue, Hickory Dickory Dock, Humpty Dumpty, ect.) and then went to poems and then stories.

 

179B: Fairy Tales from Around the World including Lapland

This book was probably late 40’s or early 50’s and was a collection of fairy tales from around the world. It did have Bluebeard and Puss in Boots and some of the traditional stories, but it also had a story about children in “Lapland”. It was probably fourteen inches or so in height and maybe and inch and a quarter to an inch and a half thick. It had some illustrations. I can’t remember much more but I would recognize it instantly. Please help me identify it!

178G: magic old stamps (solved)

When I was a kid in the 1970s, I had book of wonderful/magical tales – the one short story that I loved (and have been looking for) is about a boy who finds these old, strange postage stamps in some box in his house – they have pictures on them that depict beautiful, exotic places that he’s never heard of.
He puts one on an envelope and it gets whisked away through the air, only to return a little while later, roughed up and postmarked. He puts a stamp on a package and it too gets whisked off – only to return, appearing well-travelled and postmarked. Then he puts his old pet cat in a box and puts stamps on it – the box is whisked away to this magical land, only to return with the cat seemingly younger and rejuvenated. I think it may have ended when he sent himself off on the same journey.
I don’t recall the name of the book or this particular story – but I suspect it had “stamps” in it.