SOURCE: "The Tales of the Brothers Grimm: In the Black Forest," in Touchstones: Reflections on the Best in Children's Literature. Volume Two: Fairy Tales, Fables, Myths, Legends, and Poetry, Children's Literature Association, 1987, pp. 104-17.

In the following essay, Thomas examines the nature and significance of the Grimms' fairy tales.

As the great-grandparent of children's literature, fairy tales occupy a privileged place as touchstones for that literature. Basic as the peasant's crusty black bread, they nourish us upon essential sustenance—the fare of elemental story. Especially do the volhmarchen or folk fairy tales—those stories that were once part of an oral tradition of storytelling—lay the foundation for many, if not most, classics of children's literature. The works of such beneficiaries as Charles Kingsley, Lewis Carroll, George MacDonald, L. Frank Baum, Kenneth Grahame, C. S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien and Ursula Le Guin, among others, would be...