The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Green Fairy Book, by Various

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Title: The Green Fairy Book

Author: Various

Editor: Andrew Lang

Release Date: January, 2005 [EBook #7277]
Posting Date: August 6, 2009

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GREEN FAIRY BOOK ***

Produced by JC Byers, and Wendy Crockett

THE GREEN FAIRY BOOK

By Various

Edited by Andrew Lang

To
Stella Margaret Alleyne
the
Green Fairy Book
is dedicated

To The Friendly Reader

This is the third, and probably the last, of the Fairy Books of many
colours. First there was the Blue Fairy Book; then, children, you asked
for more, and we made up the Red Fairy Book; and, when you wanted more
still, the Green Fairy Book was put together. The stories in all the
books are borrowed from many countries; some are French, some German,
some Russian, some Italian, some Scottish, some English, one Chinese.
However much these nations differ about trifles, they all agree in
liking fairy tales. The reason, no doubt, is that men were much like
children in their minds long ago, long, long ago, and so before they
took to writing newspapers, and sermons, and novels, and long poems,
they told each other stories, such as you read in the fairy books. They
believed that witches could turn people into beasts, that beasts could
speak, that magic rings could make their owners invisible, and all the
other wonders in the stories. Then, as the world became grown-up, the
fairy tales which were not written down would have been quite forgotten
but that the old grannies remembered them, and told them to the little
grandchildren: and when they, in their turn, became grannies, they
remembered them, and told them also. In this way these tales are older
than reading and writing, far older than printing. The oldest fairy
tales ever written down were written down in Egypt, about Joseph's time,
nearly three thousand five hundred years ago. Other fairy stories Homer
knew, in Greece, nearly three thousand years ago, and he made them all
up into a poem, the Odyssey, which I hope you will read some day. Here
you will fin