Book Information

About the book

Reviews

From Court to Forest Giambattista Basile's "Lo cunto de li cunti' and the Birth of the Literary Fairy Tale Nancy L. Canepa

From Court to Forest is a critical and historical study of the beginnings of the modern literary fairy tale. Giambattista Basile's Lo cunto de li cunti, written in Neapolitan dialect and published in 1634-36, comprises fifty fairy tales and was the first integral collection of literary fairy tales to appear in Western Europe. It contains some of the best known fairy-tale types, such as Sleeping Beauty, Puss in Boots, Cinderella, and others, many in their earliest literary versions. Although it became a central reference point for subsequent fairy-tale writers, such as Perrault and the Grimms, as well as a treasure chest for folklorists, Lo cunto de li cunti has had relatively little attention devoted to it by literary scholars. This work fills a gap in fairy-tale and Italian literary studies through its rediscovery of one of the most important authors of the Italian Baroque and the genre of the literary fairy tale.

"A pioneering work in its comprehensive depiction of Basile's significance as one of the founders of the literary fairy tale in Europe. Canepa's excellent scholarship is of interest to scholars both inside and outside the field of Italian literature." —Jack Zipes, University of Minnesota Nancy L. Canepa is an associate professor of French and Italian at Dartmouth College. She is the author of Out of the Woods: The Origins of the Literary Fairy Tale in Italy and France. Choice Outstanding Academic Title

$44.95s cloth / ISBN 0-81432758-3 320 pages / 6 x 9 1999 contents > introduction [partial] > extract > index >