The Annotated Brothers Grimm - Maria Tatar

By turns grotesque, historic, charming, and witty, the fairy tales collected by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm are timeless. While they exist in countless versions and adaptations, these tales are best as the brothers told them. In The Annotated Brothers Grimm: The Bicentennial Edition (W.W. Norton, $35), A.S. Byatt’s deep appreciation for the gift of these tales comes through in her introduction, and editor Maria Tatar’s analysis will expand every warm feeling or chill you experienced when first reading or listening to these stories. Filled with illustrations from various editions over the collection’s two-hundred-year history, this Bicentennial Edition is deserving of as much careful devotion as any enthralled child or still-wistful adult can muster.