1
/
of
1
Balefire Publishing
The Story of Jack and the Giants
The Story of Jack and the Giants
Regular price
$0.99 USD
Regular price
Sale price
$0.99 USD
Shipping calculated at checkout.
Quantity
Couldn't load pickup availability
This version of Jack and the Giants is an historic 1851 edition is illustrated with 35 drawings by Richard Doyle.
Jack and the Giants is based on a Cornish fairy tale called "Jack the Giant Killer". The story is about a plucky lad who slays a number of giants during King Arthur's reign. The tale is characterized by violence, gore, and blood-letting. Giants are prominent in Cornish folklore and Welsh Bardic lore. Some parallels to elements and incidents in Norse mythology have been detected in the tale, and the trappings of Jack's last adventure with the giant Galigantus suggest parallels with French fairy tales. Jack's belt is similar to the belt in "The Valiant Little Tailor", and his magical sword, shoes, cap, and cloak are similar to those owned by Tom Thumb or those found in Norse mythology.
Neither Jack or his tale are referenced in English literature prior to the eighteenth century, and his story did not appear in print until 1711. It is probable an enterprising publisher assembled a number of anecdotes about giants to form the 1711 tale. One scholar speculates the public had grown weary of King Arthur – the greatest of all giant killers – and Jack was created to fill his shoes. Henry Fielding, John Newbery, Dr. Johnson, Boswell, and William Cowper were familiar with the tale.
In 1962, a feature-length film based on the tale was released starring Kerwin Mathews. The film made extensive use of stop-motion animation in the manner of Ray Harryhausen.
Tales of monsters and heroes are abundant around the world, making the source of "Jack the Giant Killer" difficult to pin down. Folklorists Iona and Peter Opie observe in The Classic Fairy Tales (1974) that "the tenor of Jack's tale, and some of the details of more than one of his tricks with which he outwits the giants, have prototypes in Norse mythology." An incident between Thor and the giant Skrymir in the Prose Edda of ca. 1220, they note, resembles the incident between Jack and the stomach-slashing Welsh giant. The Opies further note that the Swedish tale of "The Herd-boy and the Giant" shows similarities to the same incident, and "shares an ancestor" with the Grimms's "The Valiant Little Tailor", a tale with wide distribution. According to the Opies, Jack's magical accessories – the cap of knowledge, the cloak of invisibility, the magic sword, and the shoes of swiftness – were borrowed from the tale of Tom Thumb or from Norse mythology.[1] Ruth B. Bottigheimer observes in The Oxford Companion to Fairy Tales that Jack's final adventure with Galigantus was influenced by the "magical devices" of French fairy tales. The Opies conclude that analogues from around the world "offer no surety of Jack's antiquity."
The Opies note that tales of giants were long known in Britain. King Arthur's encounter with the giant of St Michael's Mount was related by Geoffrey of Monmouth in Historia Regum Britanniae in 1136, and published by Sir Thomas Malory in 1485 in the fifth chapter of the fifth book of Le Morte d'Arthur.
Jack and the Giants is based on a Cornish fairy tale called "Jack the Giant Killer". The story is about a plucky lad who slays a number of giants during King Arthur's reign. The tale is characterized by violence, gore, and blood-letting. Giants are prominent in Cornish folklore and Welsh Bardic lore. Some parallels to elements and incidents in Norse mythology have been detected in the tale, and the trappings of Jack's last adventure with the giant Galigantus suggest parallels with French fairy tales. Jack's belt is similar to the belt in "The Valiant Little Tailor", and his magical sword, shoes, cap, and cloak are similar to those owned by Tom Thumb or those found in Norse mythology.
Neither Jack or his tale are referenced in English literature prior to the eighteenth century, and his story did not appear in print until 1711. It is probable an enterprising publisher assembled a number of anecdotes about giants to form the 1711 tale. One scholar speculates the public had grown weary of King Arthur – the greatest of all giant killers – and Jack was created to fill his shoes. Henry Fielding, John Newbery, Dr. Johnson, Boswell, and William Cowper were familiar with the tale.
In 1962, a feature-length film based on the tale was released starring Kerwin Mathews. The film made extensive use of stop-motion animation in the manner of Ray Harryhausen.
Tales of monsters and heroes are abundant around the world, making the source of "Jack the Giant Killer" difficult to pin down. Folklorists Iona and Peter Opie observe in The Classic Fairy Tales (1974) that "the tenor of Jack's tale, and some of the details of more than one of his tricks with which he outwits the giants, have prototypes in Norse mythology." An incident between Thor and the giant Skrymir in the Prose Edda of ca. 1220, they note, resembles the incident between Jack and the stomach-slashing Welsh giant. The Opies further note that the Swedish tale of "The Herd-boy and the Giant" shows similarities to the same incident, and "shares an ancestor" with the Grimms's "The Valiant Little Tailor", a tale with wide distribution. According to the Opies, Jack's magical accessories – the cap of knowledge, the cloak of invisibility, the magic sword, and the shoes of swiftness – were borrowed from the tale of Tom Thumb or from Norse mythology.[1] Ruth B. Bottigheimer observes in The Oxford Companion to Fairy Tales that Jack's final adventure with Galigantus was influenced by the "magical devices" of French fairy tales. The Opies conclude that analogues from around the world "offer no surety of Jack's antiquity."
The Opies note that tales of giants were long known in Britain. King Arthur's encounter with the giant of St Michael's Mount was related by Geoffrey of Monmouth in Historia Regum Britanniae in 1136, and published by Sir Thomas Malory in 1485 in the fifth chapter of the fifth book of Le Morte d'Arthur.
Share
