Episode Details

Part Three of Folk Tales of the Netherlands continues William Elliot Griffis's Dutch Fairy Tales for Young Folks of 1918 in our own telling, with the book's fifth and sixth tales, in his order.

"Prince Spin Head and Miss Snow White" is Drifa, called Snow White, the forest maiden who grew up among the wild creatures, and the spider she named Spin Head as a baby, who comes courting with a secret worth more than furs, gold, or gems. In keeping with this shelf's practice, the tale stands as Griffis told it: the hunting life of the forest household stands in his summary narration, and the care of the motherless cubs is the brothers' standing lesson; no completeness is claimed beyond what is read here. Out of the black stalk of the blue flower comes the gift of flax, and with it linen and lace, and the making of Belgic Land.

"The Boar with the Golden Bristles" is the fairies' gift to the cold northern people: Gullin, the fire-born boar forged by the dwarfs for the fairy Fro, whose sons the wild boars root up the hard earth and teach men the furrow. The tale stands as Griffis told it: the boar's strength against beast and earth stands in single descriptive clauses, the wise men's boast stands in their own speech, and the hunting-out of the wild boars in one closing clause. From the furrow come grain and bread, and from men's pride, the plough.

Chapters:

00:10 — Prince Spin Head and Miss Snow White

14:08 — The Boar with the Golden Bristles

Source: William Elliot Griffis, Dutch Fairy Tales for Young Folks (New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1918), from the public-domain 1918 edition (Project Gutenberg eBook #7871). Griffis retold these tales in his own English; our telling is a fresh in-house rendering of his 1918 text. Music: gentle instrumental bed under the narration.

Thank you for listening — Part 4 of the Dutch tales follows on this shelf.

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