Karl and the Clockmaker

 There's something kinda cozy about this book.  Part of a series of books for children about other children around the world.  It was published by Silver Burdett Company in 1968.  I believe this is the only one of the series that we have, probably because I came across it second hand and liked the illustrations.

Karl and the Clockmaker

Frederick J. Moffitt

illustrated by Fritz Kredel 1968

A pair of brothers are tasked with taking their broken cuckoo clock to the clockmaker who lives in the forest.  Along the way they stop to eat their sausage and cheese and meet the forester of the Black Forest who keeps them from getting lost.  It feels very old fashioned, even for 1968.  And there's a handy glossary for understanding the German words that are sprinkled in.  

The Rabbit Catcher

Some fairy tales with rather lovely vintage illustrations.  Instead of the Grimm stories we are so familiar with, these are translated from Ludwig Bechstein's collection of German fairytales and legends.  Randall Jarrell in the introduction describes the stories like this:

"A few fairy tales are like wedding cakes, a few are like old stale soda crackers, and most are like plain rye bread baked in a country oven,  These three stories are rye bread."  

The Rabbit Catcher

And Other Fairy Tales of Ludwig Bechstein

translated by Randall Jarrell

illustrated by Ugo Fontana 1962

(Ugo Fontana was an Italian illustrator and I always enjoy finding his work).

Little John

 Theodor Storm was a 19th century German writer and poet.  He is important in the German Realist movement.  Doris Orgel retells his children's story "Little John" and it is full of fantasy!

Little John

Theodore Storm

retold by Doris Orgel

pictures by Anita Lobel 1972

Little John sleeps in a trundle bed but wants to be trundled to sleep.  His mother obliges, until she falls asleep herself.  Little John then concocts a ridiculous contraption with his big toe and sleep shirt to trundle himself around the room, out into the town, the woods, and finally the sky.  Anita Lobel's drawings make this a worthy addition to silly folktale stories.