a cheerful one

[kip_w]

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I've scanned the second of the fairy tales from that German 1873 edition. They aren't quite as scary as the 18th century versions, but with Gustav Dore's art, they reach some pretty Gothic levels of horror. Witness this cheery fellow:



That's Mister Giant to you, in the story of Tom Thumb. The picture I took this example from is probably the scariest thing in the book. Click on it to see all the current pictures in the "Es war einmal..." flickr set, including a rather lovely study of a lantern beam at night.
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Comments

[angevin2.livejournal.com]

First of all, HOLY SHIT.

Secondly, I have a book which I'm pretty sure reproduces one of the original paintings, or at least it doesn't look much like an engraving. So I scanned it for you.

[kip-w.livejournal.com]

That'd probably be the original. When the engraver copies it, and the print with it, it flips the image over. Thanks for that -- come to think, I'll look at my Dore biography and see if it mentions that being in a museum somewhere.