Various Authors

The Swedish Fairy Book (Illustrated Edition)


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       Various Authors

      The Swedish Fairy Book (Illustrated Edition)

      Translator: Frederick H. Martens Illustrator: George W. Hood

      e-artnow, 2020

       Contact: [email protected]

      EAN: 4064066391850

      Table of Contents

       Preface

       I. Knös

       II. Lasse, My Thrall!

       III. Finn, The Giant, and The Minster of Lund

       IV. The Skalunda Giant

       V. Yuletide Specters

       VI. Silverwhite and Lillwacker

       VII. Stompe Pilt

       VIII. The Girl and the Snake

       IX. Faithful and Unfaithful

       X. Starkad and Bale

       XI. The Werewolf

       XII. First Born, First Wed

       XIII. The Lame Dog

       XIV. The Mount of the Golden Queen

       XV. Old Hopgiant

       XVI. The Princess and the Glass Mountain

       XVII. Queen Crane

       XVIII. Tales of the Trolls

       XIX. Charcoal Nils and the Troll-Woman

       XX. The Three Dogs

       XXI. The Poor Devil

       XXII. How Smaland and Schonen Came To Be

       XXIII. The Evil One and Kitta Grau

       XXIV. The Lady of Pintorp

       XXV. The Spectre in Fjelkinge

       XXVI. The Rooster, The Hand-mill and The Swarm of Hornets

       XXVII. Torre Jeppe

       XXVIII. The Man Who Died on Holy Innocents' Day

      PREFACE

       Table of Contents

      The following volume of Swedish fairy-tales represents a careful choice, after the best original sources, of those examples of their kind which not only appeared most colorful and entertaining, but also most racially Swedish in their flavor. For the fairy-tales of each of the three Scandinavian countries, Sweden, Denmark and Norway, have a distinct local color of their own. The wealth of material available has made it possible to give due representation to most types of fairy-tales, from the stories of older origin, the tales of giant, troll, and werewolf, to such delightful tales as "Lasse, My Thrall", and "The Princess and the Glass Mountain," colored with the rich and ornate stylistic garb of medieval chivalric poesy. There has been no attempt to "rewrite" these charming folk-and fairy-tales in the translation. They have been faithfully narrated in the simple, naive manner which their traditional rendering demands. And this is one reason, perhaps, why they should appeal to young American readers—for young America by instinct takes kindly to that which is straightforward and sincere, in the realm of fairy-tale as in life itself.

      Frederick H. Martens

      I

       KNÖS

       Table of Contents

      Once upon a time there was a poor widow, who found an egg under a pile of brush as she was gathering kindlings in the forest. She took it and placed it under a goose, and when the goose had hatched it, a little boy slipped out of the shell. The widow had him baptized Knös, and such a lad was a rarity; for when no more than five years old he was grown, and taller than the tallest man. And he ate in proportion, for he would swallow a whole batch of bread at a single sitting, and at last the poor widow had to go to the commissioners for the relief of the poor in order to get food for him. But the town authorities said she must apprentice the boy at a trade, for he was big enough and strong enough to earn his own keep.

      So Knös was apprenticed to a smith for three years. For his pay he asked a suit of clothes and a sword each year: a sword of five hundredweights the first year, one of ten hundredweights the second year, and one of fifteen hundredweights the third year. But after he had been in the smithy only a few days, the smith was glad to give him all three suits and all three swords at once; for he smashed all his iron and steel to bits.

      Knös received his suits and swords, went to a knight's estate, and hired himself out as a serving-man. Once he was told to go to the forest to gather firewood with the rest of the men, but sat at the table eating long after the others had driven off and when he had at last satisfied his hunger and was ready to start, he saw the two young oxen he was to drive waiting for him. But he let them stand and went into the forest, seized the two largest trees growing there, tore them out by the roots, took one tree under each arm, and carried them back to the estate. And he got there long before the rest, for they had to chop down the trees, saw them up and load them on the carts.

      On the following day Knös had to thresh. First he hunted up the largest stone he could find, and rolled it around on the grain, so that all the corn was loosened from the ears. Then he had to separate the grain from the chaff. So