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    The Tales Of Mother Goose
    The Tales Of Mother Goose
    The Tales Of Mother Goose
    Ebook67 pages53 minutes

    The Tales Of Mother Goose

    By Charles Perrault

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    About this ebook

    Published in 1697, Charles Perrault’s Tales of Mother Goose first appeared as Histoires ou contes du temps passés, avec des moralités. It is one of the most successful collections of fairy tales in literary history as it was published at a time when reading fairy tales was a common pastime in literary salons. Perrault is considered to be the inventor of the fairy tale, and based his works on folktales and stories written by earlier writers, but updated them to reflect literary and social themes popular in 17th-century France. Perrault’s best-known stories include such timeless classics as “Cinderella,” “Sleeping Beauty,” “Red Riding Hood,” and “Puss in Boots,” which continue to be updated and adapted for modern audiences, as well as for the stage, ballet, and film.

    HarperPerennial Classics brings great works of literature to life in digital format, upholding the highest standards in ebook production and celebrating reading in all its forms. Look for more titles in the HarperPerennial Classics collection to build your digital library.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins
    Release dateMay 8, 2012
    ISBN9781443414999
    The Tales Of Mother Goose

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    Reviews for The Tales Of Mother Goose

    4/5

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    • 4/5
      2018 reread via audiobook:3.5*I missed the illustrations in my hardcover edition. Without rereading that edition, I can't be sure but I think that I also prefer the translation in the hardcover...However, I still found this satire amusing; my comments above are primarily to remind me why I am giving this audiobook edition a lower rating than I had previously given the book.
    • 5/5
      Juvenal once said, "It is difficult not to write satire", meaning that even if he put ink to paper with different intentions, his worldview would press him on in one direction. He and Voltaire would have got along famously, I suspect.
    • 3/5
      Zeker mooiste verhaal van Voltaire. Episodisch opgebouwd, maar met duidelijke lijn: de Bildung van Candide; ontluistering van het verhaal van Pangloss en tussendoor de traditionele stokpaardjes van Voltaire.
    • 5/5
      This book was pretty funny. I didn't understand most of the satire being that it was written well before my time, but I got the overall sense that it was humorous and quite enjoyable.
    • 4/5
      Frank McLynn's work 1759: The Year Britain Became Master of the World mentioned a good deal about Voltaire, as did Leo Dramrosch's Jean-Jacques Rousseau: Restless Genius. This is my first Voltaire and I was surprised by how small the novella is relative to its historical impact. This has led me to purchase Edmund Burke's A Philosophical Enquiry into the Sublime and Beautiful and to take up Tristram Shandy again. Candide and Tristram Shandy were, of course, both published in 1759 so the linkages with my earlier reading are apparent, if unintended. If anything I have gained from Candide confirmation of the idea of tending one's own garden, not to mention a burning desire to remove all further naivety from my very being.
    • 3/5
      This tiny little book took me 8 days to read. Not because it was boring, the writing is just harder to read in this day and age (to me anyway).
    • 4/5
      This is my second read of Candide. I was inspired to do so after reading a biography of Voltaire. I enjoyed the book more, I think, with more of the context of Voltaire's life...or maybe I'm just older and wiser!This isn't my kind of book....too much plot, not enough character development. But, like many reviewers, I think the book raises issues that remain relevant today, and that made it thought-provoking. A true classic.
    • 4/5
      A dark, comic, and biting satire. Whenever I revisit Candide, I always find Voltaire is making points which are relevant to contemporary events,
    • 5/5
      A complete and utter failure! Voltaire presents us with the premise that this is the best of all possible worlds, but only evil befalls his poor characters: scandal, conscription, rape, murder, pillage, mutilation, disease, disaster, inquisition, genocide, adultery, slavery, shipwreck, kicks in the backside, you name it. What the author was thinking of, I can scarcely imagine. I'm going back to my garden now.
    • 4/5
      Still funny, this sarcastic, cynical tale about the innocent young man learning about the ways of the world the hard way. "Why then was the world created?" " To drive us mad!"
    • 5/5
      In a constant barrage of hilarious, yet fairly accurate to history horror show: another war between the french and the english, the Lisbon earthquake and the inquisition's response to it, colonialism; Candide barely survives "this best of all possible worlds" according to his philosophy professor and a popular doctrine of the time period proposed by Leibniz (the argument not being that this world is free of evil, but given our species, it's the best we can achieve - for if we were capable of optimizing our world in any facet, God would have created that one instead). His experiences teach him that humanity is shit overall:"Do you believe that men have always slaughtered each other as they do today, that they've always been liars, cheats, traitors, ingrates and thieves, weak, fickle, cowardly, envious, greedy, drunken, miserly, ambitious, bloodthirsty, slanderous, lecherous, fanatical, hypocritical and foolish?Do you believe that hawks have always eaten pigeons when they find them?"But in too small doses it does redeem itself individually. He ends with hope."Man cannot obliterate the cruelty of the universe, but by prudence he can shield certain small confines from that cruelty." Cultivate your garden!Pretty keen on Voltaire now.
    • 4/5
      Great book. However, the Bantam Classic edition is only an ok translation. I got my copy for cheap. It tells the story but I'm sure there are other more scholarly translations I would choose if I were to read it again.
    • 3/5
      Zeker mooiste verhaal van Voltaire. Episodisch opgebouwd, maar met duidelijke lijn: de Bildung van Candide; ontluistering van het verhaal van Pangloss en tussendoor de traditionele stokpaardjes van Voltaire.
    • 3/5
      Interesting satire - wonderful narration.
    • 4/5
      Tragedy and comedy presented in sharp contrast satirising the optimism of certain philosophies.
    • 3/5
      Wish I knew what everyone sees in this one. I've known a few people who have claimed this as one of their favorite works, and to me, anyway, this book appears so slight when compared with other classical works. But then, allegory was never my favorite form of literature. I can completely understand Balzac, or Zola, or Flaubert. They were amazing writers, and you can get something new out of them with each reading, I think, depending upon what stage you are at in your own life. But it seems like there is a trend in French literature - the spare and esoteric work, the one that says, "this may not look like much, but it has Layers." I'm thinking especially of The Little Prince, this work, and possibly all of Camus. It may be very worthy. I'm sure the fault is mine here. But I just don't get it.
    • 5/5
      For good reason, Candide is considered one of the true "must reads." Centuries after its writing, the book remains current not only in its concise, easy reading style, but also in its message about human nature. An all time favorite.
    • 4/5
      I think that Candide is probably the type of book that enriches the reader the deeper he or she delves into it. It would probably reward repeated readings. It would probably reveal deeper layers of satire and absurdity if it were read in the original French. It would probably take on deeper shades of meaning if it were read in conjunction with any of the commentaries that have been written about it over the past 250-odd years.

      Having said that, I'm not going to do any of those things. I have way too many books on my plate to reread this book any time in the next year; the limits of my French (one year of college French, an ex-wife who was fluent) would make reading it in that language a brutal, dictionary-in-hand chore; and I generally dislike reading books about books, so commentaries are right out.

      So, I didn't dig too deeply into Candide, instead just reading it as the absurd tale it was, not looking for too much meaning beyond the surface. And you know what? I enjoyed it thoroughly. It was like Forrest Gump, only with a little less faith in humanity and a lot more murder, rape, cannibalism, zoophilia, and child prostitution. It was full of pitch-black humor, and the breezy, matter-of-fact way in which some of the horrific situations were described only served to make it funnier.

      Unsurprisingly, this was a super dark book, and an angry one, full of scathing satire. It served up a double middle finger salute to pretty much everyone: nobility, clergy, self-styled intellectuals, real intellectuals, commoners, the French, the Germans, the English - nobody escapes Voltaire's poison pen. Virtually everyone is portrayed as stupid, dishonest, self-serving, small-minded, and hypocritical. Religion and government receive the brunt of Voltaire's onslaught; it isn't hard to see why this book was banned in so many places for so many years - even well into the 20th century in parts of the United States.

      This was a fast, hilarious, exhilaratingly bitter read, and just the thing to top off your misanthropy tank if it's ever running low. Fine family fun!
    • 4/5
      This was not at all what I thought it would be. The read was interesting, and heavy on the satire. The theme is easily understood and carried throughout the work, and it's a relatively quick read. Read this if you have a couple of hours to spare.
    • 3/5
      The Baron's lady weighed about three hundred and fifty pounds, and was therefore a person of great consideration.One day when Cunegonde was walking near the castle, in a little wood which was called the Park, she observed Doctor Pangloss in the bushes, giving a lesson in experimental physics to her mother's waiting-maid, a very pretty and docile brunette. Mademoiselle Cunegonde had a great inclination for science and watched breathlessly the reiterated experiments she witnessed; she observed clearly the Doctor's sufficient reason, the effects and the causes, and returned home very much excited, pensive, filled with the desire of learning, reflecting that she might be the sufficient reason of young Candide and he might be hers.Candide that he was a young metaphysician, extremely ignorant of the things of this world...Candide, who trembled like a philosopher, hid himself as well as he could during this heroic butchery.Pangloss made answer in these terms: "Oh, my dear Candide, you remember Paquette, that pretty wench who waited on our noble Baroness; in her arms I tasted the delights of paradise, which produced in me those hell torments with which you see me devoured; she was infected with them, she is perhaps dead of them. This present Paquette received of a learned Grey Friar, who had traced it to its source; he had had it of an old countess, who had received it from a cavalry captain, who owed it to a marchioness, who took it from a page, who had received it from a Jesuit, who when a novice had it in a direct line from one of the companions of Christopher Columbus. For my part I shall give it to nobody, I am dying."Our men defended themselves like the Pope's soldiers; they flung themselves upon their knees, and threw down their arms,"Oh! what a superior man," said Candide below his breath. "What a great genius is this Pococurante! Nothing can please him." "But is there not a pleasure," said Candide,[Pg 141] "in criticising everything, in pointing out faults where others see nothing but beauties?" "That is to say," replied Martin, "that there is some pleasure in having no pleasure."Instantly Candide sent for a Jew, to whom he sold for fifty thousand sequins a diamond worth a hundred thousand, though the fellow swore to him by Abraham that he could give him no more."I know also," said Candide, "that we must cultivate our garden." "You are right," said Pangloss, "for when man was first placed in the Garden of Eden, he was put there ut operaretur eum, that he might cultivate it; which shows that man was not born to be idle." "Let us work," said Martin, "without disputing; it is the only way to render life tolerable."
    • 4/5
      Finally got around to reading this - it is one part satire, one part comedy, and one part ethical quandary. And... it is quite short and easy to read. Here we have poor Candide - who spends his whole life following the advice of Dr. Pangloss. Poor Candide - he loves the Lady Cunegonde, and she loves him, which gets him in trouble with his lord, and sets him on the path of black comedy.This book isn't pleasant to read. At times, it is quite dark. Its written to demonstrate a point. Which is 'happiness isn't given to you - you make it'. There are also ethical quandaries about war and the the noble class. Poor Candide - he is an idiot- afloat in a sea spending.I do think that this book has layers upon layers of meaning - It will be a book I intend to re-read and see its meaning changes.
    • 3/5
      First of all, let me be clear of one thing: I do recognize the historical importance of this book, but what I'm about to write is a judgement based only on my view as a "casual" reader rather than a book critical or anything of that sort. I will state my opinion of the book regarding what I thought about it reading it as a fiction, not as a satire or a critique to the society and such. Therefore, I'm disregarding the historical background. As one of the characters said (though not exactly with his words), I only read what pleases me because I can actually have fun doing it. Difficult reading does not appeal me at all.

      That being said, I'll tell you that I was somewhat surprised. Since this book seems to be mandatory reading for some schools throughout the world, I was already expecting something horribly boring (and I'll admit some parts dragged very, very slowly), but the reading was less painful than I thought it was going to be. In fact, at the beginning of the book I was actually smiling, because the situations Candide got himself into were hilarious in a tragic way (and vice-versa). After a while, the occurrences start getting repetitive and somewhat annoying. Candide's naivety becomes tiring, but at least the other characters are pretty decent, always trying to put him back on the right way.

      Although it isn't my favorite kind of book, even if you read it as a regular fiction, Candide is somewhat a "light" reading. It's easy to understand, it's short (thank goodness) and it doesn't get lost in details and descriptions. Not bad.
    • 2/5
      Should be renamed Job. Geez, what else was supposed to happen to this guy? And everyone in his life kept getting killed and then turning up again. Not my cup of tea even as a satire.
    • 3/5
      Historically interesting satire against the set of France's enlightenment period. Main character is just what it says - candid. Great if you love philosophy.
    • 4/5
      Entertaining, satirical, short. Feels like a 100-page YouTube comment troll. We should all be so fortunate as to accidentally kill someone and then find out they're still alive.
    • 5/5
      Fun and comic read. Easy to get through and hysterical.
    • 4/5
      Although I was familiar with the story of Candide from having seen the musical based on it in Stratford, Ontario some time ago, I had never read the book. My library's electronic media site had a copy available as an audiobook so I thought I would give it a try. It's fantastical, satirical but fun to listen to so I'm glad I did.Candide was brought up in a German castle by his uncle, the Baron Thunder-ten-Tronckh, with his uncle's children, Cunegonde and her brother. They are tutored by Dr. Pangloss who espouses optimism and tells his charges that they live in the best of all possible worlds and that whatever happens is for the best. Candide loves Cunegonde but when he is found kissing her his uncle throws him out of the castle. Soon after the castle is attacked. Pangloss escaped and he is reunited by happenstance with Candide. Pangloss tells Candide that everyone, including Cunegonde, was killed in the attack. Pangloss and Candide end up in the hands of the Catholic Inquisition in Lisbon where they are sentenced to death but Candide escapes as a result of a "lucky" earthquake. However, he saw Pangloss hung so he is despondent. Then he finds Cunegonde alive although prostituting herself and Candide rescues her. They leave for the New World where Candide and Cunegonde are separated once again and Candide has more near-misses with death. And on and on it goes with people who were thought to be dead turning up alive more often than you can imagine. Eventually Candide rejects Pangloss's philosophy of optimism. Instead he believes "we must all cultivate our garden".My take on this is that we should work to determine our own future and not rely on fate to work things out for us. I think I tend to this philosophy as well but it is certainly a question that has puzzled people throughout the ages.
    • 3/5
      Voltaire wrote this under a pseudonym as a satyrical critique to the popular philosophy of the day whereby we live in the best possilble world. It reads as a (rather long) series of atrocities and misfortunes that happen to just about every person Candice encounters during his rather curious adventures.
      An interesting read in it's historical and philosophical context, but rather tough read without it.
    • 5/5
      Loved it!!! Can't believe how something written more than 250 years ago is so relavent to today's society. Voltaire is brilliant and his satirical, cutting humor - spot on!!
    • 4/5
      All is well? All is for the best, in this best of all worlds? Think again, says Voltaire, in this satirical, comical refutation of institutional dogma. Globe-hopping outlandishness. Easy to see how this beacon of enlightenment ran afoul of the ecclesiastical muckity mucks. This Penguin Deluxe edition includes a fine introduction and insightful endnotes. Also in the appendices: portions of his "Philosophical Dictionary" and the entire text of his poem, "The Lisbon Earthquake".

    Book preview

    The Tales Of Mother Goose - Charles Perrault

    Mother_Goose_Cover.jpg

    The Tales

    of Mother Goose

    Charles Perrault

    Trans. Charles Welsh

    HarperPerennialClassicsLogo.jpg

    CONTENTS

    Cinderella, or The Little Glass Slipper

    The Sleeping Beauty in the Woods

    Little Thumb

    The Master Cat, or Puss in Boots

    Riquet With the Tuft

    Blue Beard

    The Fairy

    Little Red Riding-Hood

    About the Author

    About the Series

    Copyright

    About the Publisher

    Cinderella, or The Little Glass Slipper

    Once upon a time there was a gentleman who married, for his second wife, the proudest and most haughty woman that ever was seen. She had two daughters of her own, who were, indeed, exactly like her in all things. The gentleman had also a young daughter, of rare goodness and sweetness of temper, which she took from her mother, who was the best creature in the world.

    The wedding was scarcely over, when the stepmother’s bad temper began to show itself. She could not bear the goodness of this young girl, because it made her own daughters appear the more odious. The stepmother gave her the meanest work in the house to do; she had to scour the dishes, tables, etc., and to scrub the floors and clean out the bedrooms. The poor girl had to sleep in the garret, upon a wretched straw bed, while her sisters lay in fine rooms with inlaid floors, upon beds of the very newest fashion, and where they had looking-glasses so large that they might see themselves at their full length. The poor girl bore all patiently, and dared not complain to her father, who would have scolded her if she had done so, for his wife governed him entirely.

    When she had done her work, she used to go into the chimney corner, and sit down among the cinders, hence she was called Cinderwench. The younger sister of the two, who was not so rude and uncivil as the elder, called her Cinderella. However, Cinderella, in spite of her mean apparel, was a hundred times more handsome than her sisters, though they were always richly dressed.

    It happened that the King’s son gave a ball, and invited to it all persons of fashion. Our young misses were also invited, for they cut a very grand figure among the people of the countryside. They were highly delighted with the invitation, and wonderfully busy in choosing the gowns, petticoats, and head-dresses which might best become them. This made Cinderella’s lot still harder, for it was she who ironed her sisters’ linen and plaited their ruffles. They talked all day long of nothing but how they should be dressed.

    For my part, said the elder, I will wear my red velvet suit with French trimmings.

    And I, said the younger, shall wear my usual skirt; but then, to make amends for that I will put on my gold-flowered mantle, and my diamond stomacher, which is far from being the most ordinary one in the world. They sent for the best hairdressers they could get to make up their hair in fashionable style, and bought patches for their cheeks. Cinderella was consulted in all these matters, for she had good taste. She advised them always for the best, and even offered her services to dress their hair, which they were very willing she should do.

    As she was doing this, they said to her:—

    Cinderella, would you not be glad to go to the ball?

    Young ladies, she said, you only jeer at me; it is not for such as I am to go there.

    You are right, they replied; people would laugh to see a Cinderwench at a ball.

    Anyone but Cinderella would have dressed their hair awry, but she was good-natured, and arranged it perfectly well. They were almost two days without eating, so much were they transported with joy. They broke above a dozen laces in trying to lace themselves tight, that they might have a fine, slender shape, and they were continually at their looking-glass.

    At last the happy day came; they went to Court, and Cinderella followed them with her eyes as long as she could, and when she had lost sight of them, she started crying.

    Her godmother, who saw her all in tears, asked her what was the matter.

    I wish I could—I wish I could— but she could not finish for sobbing.

    Her godmother, who was a fairy, said to her, You wish you could go to the ball; is it not so?

    Alas, yes, said Cinderella, sighing.

    Well, said her godmother, be but a good girl, and I will see that you go. Then she took her into her chamber, and said to her, Run into the garden, and bring me a pumpkin.

    Cinderella went at once to gather the finest she could get, and brought it to her godmother, not being able to imagine how this pumpkin could help her to go to the ball. Her godmother scooped out all the inside of it, leaving nothing but the rind. Then she struck it with her wand, and the pumpkin was instantly turned into a fine gilded coach.

    She then went to look into the mousetrap, where she

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