Grimm

I got the latest Taschen catalogue last night, full of their usual mix of high art and ridiculously exensive porn. I assume there's someone out there who thinks $69.95 is a reasonable sum to spend on a book of photos of Kate Moss, but I hope my life never intersects with theirs. However, one book in there that I do need to own is Noel Daniel's upcoming fancy-pants edition of The Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm.

What Daniel has done is comb through 150 years of different Grimm editions and translations from all over the wrld, and chosen the best illustrations for the best stories, presenting them all together in one big book. It's a great idea which, like many ideas, I'm amazed nobody had before*.

Some innards:

This is also as good a time as any to post one of my other favourite covers, a sexy and ornate interpretation by Vania (or Ivan) Zouravliov for Vintage Classics.

* My own great ideas are never so great. The other night, waking up at 2am, I had what seemed at the time a bolt of inspiration: start a Tumblr called 'Books' Ends: The Last Word in Great Books', and each day I would post the last word from a great book, somehow revealing the natures of said books and their authors through their well-chosen final words. I have not yet done this, because the world doesn't really need another pointless Tumblr blog, but I'm still tempted.