Yellow Dwarf

The Yellow Dwarf is a fairy tale written by Catherine d'Aulnoy, who coined the phrase 'fairy tale.' Her stories were very popular in her time and a century or two later, but are almost forgotten today. They are very imaginative but lack dramaturgy. She was writing for the nobility who wanted to spend the evenings at the courts watching staged action, and her text is essentially not for readers. D'Aulnoy's fairy tales also don't possess educational value or address immortal themes like the themes in the stories by the Grimm Brothers and are rather lengthy, which makes them less suitable for children. Another problem is they often don't end happily ever after.

Summary

The Yellow Dwarf is a fine example of d'Aulnoy's work. It starts with a queen who wants to find a husband for her daughter. While traveling to find a Desert Fairy who might help her, she gets into danger. Yellow Dwarf saves her in exchange for a promise. He wants to marry her daughter. She accepts the offer only to refuse it soon after when she finds out how the Yellow Dwarf's home looks. The Yellow Dwarf still wants the princess, the princess finds a prince who looks like a perfect match, the dwarf becomes aggressive, the young couple escapes, and a mermaid helps them, but the prince and the princess are careless, and the dwarf eventually kills the prince. The princess dies of sorrow.

Yellow Dwarf was quite popular at the end of the 19th and at the beginning of the 20th century (but never as popular as Rumpelstiltskin), so we have a chance to get familiar with the title character with images created by different masters of illustration for children. We selected only pictures with the yellow dwarf.

Walter Crane (1845-1915)

Walter Crane illustrated numerous picture books (some of them written himself), took care of design and typography, and set standards for a modern picture book where illustrations enhance the text, not just decorate it. The Yellow Dwarf is one of the numerous joint ventures with Edmund Evans, who revolutionized the market of picture books with great knowledge about printing techniques and understanding the needs of the audience.

Edmund Evans (1826-1905)

Edmund Evans started his career as an illustrator, engraver, and draftsman but became more and more of a businessman through the years.

This illustration is from the 1875 print of Grimm's Goblins by George Vickers.

Henry Justice Ford (1860-1941)

Next two illustrations are from the Blue Fairy Book by Andrew Lang, published in 1889.

Henry Justice Ford was very prolific illustrator, but the Lang's series made him really famous. If you find the first edition, you can sell it for several thousand dollars, depending on the condition. If it's signed, it's worth even more.

John Gilbert (1817-1897)

We have two pictures of the Yellow Dwarf by John Gilbert. The first one is a line drawing for Tales by the Countess d'Aulnoy from 1856.

The second picture by Gilbert is a watercolor painting from 1868.

Brinsley Le Fanu (1854-1929)

Brinsley Le Fanu illustrated numerous penny books. The Yellow Dwarf was published in the collection The Bairn's Christmas Box in 1906.

The complete book about the Yellow Dwarf can be read at the Brinsley Le Fanu fan website.

Alfredo Vaccari (1877-1933) and Paul Carrey (1865-1924)

The title page below belongs to the collection named Beautiful Fairy Tales, published in 1910.

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