 Rumpelstiltskin from The Blue Fairy Book, illustrated by Henry J. Ford. | |
The Blue Fairy Book The Red Fairy Book The Blue Poetry Book The Green Fairy Book The True Story Book The Yellow Fairy Book The Red True Story Book The Animal Story Book The Pink Fairy Book The Arabian Nights' Entertainments The Red Book of Animal Stories The Grey Fairy Book The Violet Fairy Book The Book of Romance The Crimson Fairy Book The Brown Fairy Book The Red Romance Book The Orange Fairy Book The Olive Fairy Book The Red Book of Heroes The Lilac Fairy Book The All Sorts of Stories Book The Book of Saints and Heroes The Strange Story Book | |
| Author | Andrew Lang Nora Lang |
|---|---|
| Illustrator | Henry J. Ford (and others) |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Fairy tales |
| Published | 1889–1913 |
| No. of books | 25 |
The Langs' Fairy Books are a series of 25 collections of true and fictional stories for children published between 1889 and 1913 by Andrew Lang and his wife, Leonora Blanche Alleyne. The best known books of the series are the 12 collections of fairy tales also known as Andrew Lang's "Coloured" Fairy Books or Andrew Lang's Fairy Books of Many Colors. In all, the volumes feature 798 stories, besides the 153 poems in The Blue Poetry Book.
Leonora Blanche Alleyne (1851–1933) was an English author, editor, and translator. Known to her family and friends as Nora, she assumed editorial control of the series in the 1890s,[1] while her husband, Andrew Lang (1844–1912), a Scots poet, novelist, and literary critic, edited the series and wrote prefaces for its entire run.
According to Anita Silvey, "The irony of Lang's life and work is that although he wrote for a profession—literary criticism; fiction; poems; books and articles on anthropology, mythology, history, and travel ... he is best recognized for the works he did not write."[2]
The authorship and translation of the Coloured Fairy Books is often and incorrectly attributed to Andrew Lang alone. Nora is not named on the front cover or spines of any of the Coloured Fairy Books, which all tout Andrew as their editor. However, as Andrew acknowledges in a preface to The Lilac Fairy Book (1910), "The fairy books have been almost wholly the work of Mrs. Lang, who has translated and adapted them from the French, German, Portuguese, Italian, Spanish, Catalan, and other languages."
The 12 Coloured Fairy Books were illustrated by Henry Justice Ford, with credit for the first two volumes shared by G. P. Jacomb-Hood and Lancelot Speed, respectively.[3] A. Wallis Mills also contributed some illustrations.
- ^ Day, Andrea (2017-09-19). ""Almost wholly the work of Mrs. Lang": Nora Lang, Literary Labour, and the Fairy Books". Women's Writing. 26 (4): 400–420. doi:10.1080/09699082.2017.1371938. S2CID 164414996.
- ^ Anita Silvey, Children's Books and Their Creators, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1995; p. 387.
- ^ Richard Dalby (1997). "Ford, H J". In John Clute; John Grant (eds.). Encyclopedia of Fantasy. Retrieved 2016-10-31.
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