SOURCE: "Once There Were Two Brothers Named Grimm," in The Complete Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm, translated by Jack Zipes, Bantam Books, 1987, pp. xvii-xxxi.

In the following excerpt, Zipes briefly outlines the history of the Grimm brothers' famous collection of fairy tales, describing both how they collected and edited the stories and how the tales were first received in various nations.

Though the Grimms made important discoveries in their research on ancient German literature and customs, they were neither the founders of folklore as a study in Germany, nor were they the first to begin collecting and publishing folk and fairy tales. In fact, from the beginning their principal concern was to uncover the etymological and linguistic truths that bound the German people together and were expressed in their laws and customs. The fame of the Brothers Grimm as collectors of folk and fairy tales must be...