The Sleeping Beauty and Other Fairy Tales from the Old French by Retold by Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch; Unabridged MP3 Audio Book; Narrator Roe Kendall

Quiller-Couch here gives us these four fairy tales that have been perennial favorites for centuries. The first three fairy tales are “The Sleeping Beauty,” “Blue Beard,” and “Cinderella,” all three of which were popularized in France by Charles Perrault in 1697 in his Tales of Mother Goose. The last tale in the compilation is “Beauty and the Beast,” this version attributed to Gabrielle de Villeneuve, who published it in 1740 and 1756.

Quiller-Couch had this to say regarding his translation of these tales: “I began by translating Perrault’s tales, very nearly word for word…the translations, when finished, did not satisfy me, and so I turned back to the beginning and have rewritten the stories in my own way, which (as you may say with the Irish butler) ‘may not be the best claret, but ‘tis the best we’ve got...’”

Sir Arthur T. Quiller-Couch (1863-1944) born at Bodmin, educated at Clifton College and Trinity College. Lecturer in Classics at Oxford from 1886-1887. Became a journalist in London and assistant editor of The Speaker from 1887-1892. In 1912 became professor of English Literature at Cambridge. Edited the Oxford Book of English Verse (1900). Author of many romances, short stories, and novels including: Dead Man’s Rock (1887), The Delectable Duchy (1893), Fort Amity (1904), and Foe-Farrell (1918).Wrote under pseudonym ‘Q’ in Q’s Mystery Stories (1937).

Roe Kendall is an acclaimed audiobook narrator whose titles include Peter Pan by James M. Barrie, The Dark Portal by Robin Jarvis, Mystical Paths by Susan Howatch, and Murder on the Links by Agatha Christie.