Medium – Audiobook
About the Book – Philip Pullman retells fifty of his favourite Grimm Fairy Tales, such as ‘Snow White’, ‘The three snake leaves’, ‘Cinderella’ and ‘Thousandfurs’. The stories are told with humour, but generally stick to the same settings and language structure as the original tales. The audiobook is read by Philip Pullman (for the introduction) and Samuel West (for the stories). Pullman describes how the fairytales influenced his own creative process (including the reasons why he is not ‘re-setting’ the stories).
My Rating – 2.5/5
My Thoughts – I have to admit, I did not fully finish this audiobook. I am a big fan of fairy-tales, but unlike Philip Pullman (who was very disparaging about the trend), I really enjoy when the fairy tales are ‘re-set’ in other settings, or time periods, or with a feminist etc. lens. I found these tales just a little repetitive – which I understand is due to the Grimm Brothers’ reuse of themes, but after a while just gets a little repetitive. I managed 5 hours of the audiobook, but did not really want to listen to more. The introduction by Philip Pullman was interesting and informative – but really could have been either a lot longer (so going into more detail about the background of fairy tales in general) or shorter.
The one big plus point for me was Samuel West’s reading of the stories, which was really lovely. He has a wonderful voice, and provided a myriad of different voices and tones for all of the characters we meet along the way. So I would say, if you want something to go to sleep to, pick out this book, as even if the stories are a little repetitive, you do get the glorious voice of Sam West reading you to sleep.
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