Buried Treasures : The Power of Political Fairy Tales

England, where he continued painting and writing in opposition to fascism.Béla Balázs was a highly versatile writer of poems, plays, and stories. After he participated in the failed Hungarian Revolution in 1919, he fled to Vienna, where he was hired at one point to create Chinese stories to match Mariette Lydis's Asian paintings. In the 1920s, he moved to Berlin, where he wrote his own tales and collaborated with Lisa Tetzner to write a play about a boy who travels throughout the world on the back of a magic rabbit to learn about injustice and re sis tance to dictators. Christian Bärmann wrote and illustrated three unusual books for children that celebrated friendship. Ernst Bloch, the pugnacious phi los o pher of hope, envisioned how fairy tales included possibilities for the creation of more humane relations among people of all kinds.Mariette Lydis, an Austrian Jew, left Vienna after World War I and became a celebrated experimental painter in France and later Argentina. Most of her paintings focused on people living in poverty, unconventional women and men, and the disastrous conflicts of her times.Paul Vaillant-Couturier, a Bohemian poet, fought in World War I for France, then rebelled against the French government and became one of the found ers of the Communist Party in France. His famous story for children, Johnny Breadless, reveals the horrors of war, but also the hope that they can be overcome. His novel formed the basis of Tetzner and Balázs's play Hans Urian: A Story about a Trip around the World.Hermynia Zur Mühlen was also a critic of war and de cided to abandon her aristocratic Austrian family to write numerous po litical fairy tales for children. She escaped the Nazis in 1933 and spent the 1940s in England, criticizing fascism and the Nazis through new stories and radio programs. Lisa Tetzner also published antifascist stories when she fled the Nazis and lived in Switzerland. After the war, she continued to write socially significant tales for German children.P r e fac e xv Felix Salten was an Austro-Hungarian Jew who became one of the foremost, prolific journalists and writers of his times in Austria and Germany. He is best known for his novel Bambi, a story about the killing of animals that anticipated the killing of Eu ro pean Jews. He published numerous other animal stories and works of fantasy after fleeing the Nazis in 1938. Though Salten proclaimed a great love for animals, the real defender of animal rights was the British artist Dorothy Burroughes, who wrote and illustrated more and much better animal stories for children during the 1930s and 1940s in Great Britain. Her books revealed that animals are more humane than humans.Emery Kelen, another Hungarian Jew, was a gifted caricaturist who worked for the League of Nations during the 1920s and 1930s. After he fled to Amer i ca in 1938, he worked for the United Nations and wrote and illustrated unusual po liti cal tales for children. Similar to Burroughes, Kelen drew extraordinary animals and poked fun at bureaucratic politicians. Yet it is clear that he was a passionate critic of war and fascism in all his fictional works. Romer Wilson's novels after World War I were among the first to show how shallow society had become. Her greatest contribution to lit er a ture, however, was her three anthologies of fairy tales, Green Magic (1928), Silver Magic (1929), and Red Magic (1930). It is clear from her dedication to children that Wilson intended the tales to create a better understanding among the young not only in the United Kingdom but also in other countries. The brilliant surrealist painter Rolf Brandt also had a great concern for the future of children, which can be seen in the fairy tales he illustrated and wrote in the 1940s.After World War II, Maurice Druon, a famous writer of historical novels, turned to children in his delightful fairy tale Tistou, the Boy with Green Thumbs of Peace and showed how they could upset the conservative world order. During World War II, Druon had been a member of the French Re sis tance and sought to bring about a more demo cratic France and Eu rope. His unique environmental xvi P r e fac e novel is one of the first to encourage young readers to protect the environment from destruction.Peace was also a key theme in the Italian Gianni Rodari's witing. A teacher until he took part in the re sis tance to Mussolini and Hitler, he joined the Communist Party and became a po liti cal journalist. Then he turned toward writing for children with the hope that he might help them change the world. Considered the most impor tant Italian writer for children in the twentieth century, his philosophical and comical tales, novels, and poetry are colorful and inspire young and old to think outside the box. In fact, it is from this radical utopian perspective that all the neglected and nonconformist writers and artists I have mentioned, including the phi los o pher Ernst Bloch, sought to change the world.The essays in this book only scratch the surface of forgotten books for young and old from the western world during the past two centuries. I am certain that other parts of the world have buried books that need to be unburied. "In this capstone book, fairy tale expert Jack Zipes has assembled what he describes as his last theoretical and critical study of fairy tales. His purpose is to create a coherent collection that pays tribute to a group of writers that he views as 'survivors with a mission' whose tales inspire readers to this day. The book begins with a substantial introduction in which Zipes discusses the history of his interest in fairy tales and the motivation for his scholarship in the field. In a world filled with conflict, he writes, 'fairy tales can be used for enlightenment by all of us or abused by small groups of powerful people who seek domination.' The main text includes thirteen essays on notable authors of fairy tales--Édouard Laboulaye, Kurt Schwitters, Béla Bálazs, Christian Bärmann, Charles Godfrey Leland, Mariette Lydis, Ernst Bloch, Paul Vaillant-Couturier, Hermynia zur Mühlen, Lisa Teztner, Felix Salten, Emery Kelen, and Gianni Rodari--many of whom lived through revolutions and world wars or were otherwise compelled to confront political oppression during their lives. Zipes considers their cultural significance and their contributions to fairy tale literature, arguing that each deserves greater attention and appreciation. Some of the chapters have been adapted from previously published introductions Zipes wrote for the Oddly Modern Fairy Tales series, which he edits, and others are adapted from scholarly volumes that Zipes has published over his long career as a self-identified 'scholarly scavenger' of largely forgotten tales. Together, they create a portrait of the political stakes that have animated Zipes's lifelong fascination with the fairy tale, and explain why readers and writers alike continue to return to this narrative form"-- Provided by publisher "In this capstone book, fairy tale expert Jack Zipes has assembled what he describes as his last theoretical and critical study of fairy tales. His purpose is to create a coherent collection that pays tribute to a group of writers that he views as "survivors with a mission" whose tales inspire readers to this day. The book begins with a substantial introduction in which Zipes discusses the history of his interest in fairy tales and the motivation for his scholarship in the field. In a world filled with conflict, he writes, "fairy tales can be used for enlightenment by all of us or abused by small groups of powerful people who seek domination." The main text includes thirteen essays on notable authors of fairy tales-Édouard Laboulaye, Kurt Schwitters, Bela Bálazs, Christian Bärmann, Charles Godfrey Leland, Mariette Lydis, Ernst Bloch, Paul Vaillant-Couturier, Hermynia zur Mühlen, Lisa Teztner, Felix Salten, Emery Kelen, and Gianni Rodari-many of whom lived through revolutions and world wars or were otherwise compelled to confront political oppression during their lives. Zipes considers their cultural significance and their contributions to fairy tale literature, arguing that each deserves greater attention and appreciation. Some of the chapters have been adapted from previously published introductions Zipes wrote for the Oddly Modern Fairy Tales series, which he edits, and others are adapted from scholarly volumes that Zipes has published over his long career as a self-identified "scholarly scavenger" of largely forgotten tales. Together, they create a portrait of the political stakes that have animated Zipes's lifelong fascination with the fairy tale, and explain why readers and writers alike continue to return to this narrative form"-- Provided by publisher Fascinating profiles of modern writers and artists who tapped the political potential of fairy talesJack Zipes has spent decades as a “scholarly scavenger,” discovering forgotten fairy tales in libraries, flea markets, used bookstores, and internet searches, and he has introduced countless readers to these remarkable works and their authors. In Buried Treasures, Zipes describes his special passion for uncovering political fairy tales of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, offers fascinating profiles of more than a dozen of their writers and illustrators, and shows why they deserve greater attention and appreciation.These writers and artists used their remarkable talents to confront political oppression and economic exploitation by creating alternative, imaginative worlds that test the ethics and morals of the real world and expose hidden truths. Among the figures we meet here are Édouard Laboulaye, a jurist who wrote acute fairy tales about justice; Charles Godfrey Leland, a folklorist who found other worlds in tales of Native Americans, witches, and Roma; Kurt Schwitters, an artist who wrote satirical, antiauthoritarian stories; Mariette Lydis, a painter who depicted lost-and-found souls; Lisa Tetzner, who dramatized exploitation by elites; Felix Salten, who unveiled the real meaning of Bambi's dangerous life in the forest; and Gianni Rodari, whose work showed just how political and insightful fantasy stories can be.Demonstrating the uncanny power of political fairy tales, Buried Treasures also shows how their fictional realities not only enrich our understanding of the world but even give us tools to help us survive. Fascinating profiles of modern writers and artists who tapped the political potential of fairy tales Jack Zipes has spent decades as a scholarly scavenger, discovering forgotten fairy tales in libraries, flea markets, used bookstores, and internet searches, and he has introduced countless readers to these remarkable works and their authors. In Buried Treasures , Zipes describes his special passion for uncovering political fairy tales of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, offers fascinating profiles of more than a dozen of their writers and illustrators, and shows why they deserve greater attention and appreciation. These writers and artists used their remarkable talents to confront political oppression and economic exploitation by creating alternative, imaginative worlds that test the ethics and morals of the real world and expose hidden truths. Among the figures we meet here are douard Laboulaye, a jurist who wrote acute fairy tales about justice; Charles Godfrey Leland, a folklorist who found other worlds in tales of Native Americans, witches, and Roma; Kurt Schwitters, an artist who wrote satirical, antiauthoritarian stories; Mariette Lydis, a painter who depicted lost-and-found souls; Lisa Tetzner, who dramatized exploitation by elites; Felix Salten, who unveiled the real meaning of Bambis dangerous life in the forest; and Gianni Rodari, whose work showed just how political and insightful fantasy stories can be. Demonstrating the uncanny power of political fairy tales, Buried Treasures also shows how their fictional realities not only enrich our understanding of the world but even give us tools to help us survive.