Mother Goose

Frontispiece from Contes de ma mère l'Oye by Charles Perrault (1697)

Mother Goose ( French Ma Mère l'Oye , German  mother goose ) is a literary figure from nursery rhymes and fairy tales , which is particularly widespread in America and Great Britain. In book illustrations she is usually shown as an older farmer's wife with a high pointed hat, or alternatively as a goose with a cap. Mother Goose rhymes (Mother Goose rhymes) are a generic name for poems that are addressed to children as humorous verses, counting rhymes or lullabies, have a simple meter and some have been passed on orally.

history

Puss in boots from Contes de ma mère l'Oye by Charles Perrault

Mother Goose was first mentioned by name in 1697, when the writer and keeper of fairy tales Charles Perrault published a collection of eight fairy tales in French under the name of his son. The fairy tales contained were La Belle au bois dormant ( Sleeping Beauty ), Petit Chaperon rouge ( Little Red Riding Hood ), La Barbe bleüe ( Bluebeard ), Le Maistre Chat, ou le Chat botté ( Puss in Boots ), Les Fées ( Frau Holle ), Cendrillon, ou la Petite Pantoufle de verre ( Cinderella ), Riquet à la Houppe ( Riquet with the forelock ) and Le Petit Poucet ( The Little Thumbnail ). The collection became known under its subtitle “ Contes de ma mère l'Oye ” (Stories from my mother goose). In 1729, Robert Samber's Histories or Tales of Past Times was the first translation of the edition into English, and made the fairy tales known in the English-speaking world.

Well-known Mother Goose rhymes

• As I Was Going to St Ives
• Humpty Dumpty
• Mary Had a Little Lamb

Fairy tales, stories and poems by Mother Goose

Known publications before 1923

Sorted in chronological order. The annual limit of 1923 results from the American protection period for texts and illustrations, which means that the following publications are available online:

• Charles Perrault: Histoires ou contes du temps passés, avec des moralités - Contes de ma mère l'Oye . Paris 1697. (Translation into English by Charles Welsh: Tales and Stories of the Past with Morals: Tales of Mother Goose )
• Mother Goose's Melody; or Sonnets for the Cradle . Newbery, London 1780. (Copyright filed December 29, 1780 by John Carnan, stepson of publisher John Newbery .)
• The Only True Mother Goose Melodies . Munroe & Francis, Boston ca.1825
• L. Frank Baum : Mother Goose in Prose , with illustrations by Maxfield Parrish . Way and Williams, Chicago 1897.
• The Real Mother Goose , illustrated by Blanche Fisher Wright. Rand McNally, Chicago 1916.

Adaptations

Ballet music for orchestra:

• Ma mère l'oye by Maurice Ravel , first performed on January 29, 1912 at the Théâtre des Arts in Paris

Music:

• Mother Goose by Jethro Tull
• Mother Goose March John Philip Sousa

Movie and TV:

• Mother Goose Rock 'n' Rhyme , a 1990 Disney Channel television film directed by Jeff Stein , et al. a. with Harry Anderson , Cyndi Lauper , Art Garfunkel and Woody Harrelson

literature

• EW Scripture: The Verse Forms in Mother Goose . In: "Anglia". Vol. 1930, Issue 54, ISSN  0340-5222 , pp. 199-208.

Web links

Commons : Mother Goose  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Collection of Mother Goose rhymes sorted by topic.

Individual evidence

1. ^ Charles Perrault : Riquet with the head in the Gutenberg-DE project ( archive version )
2. ^ Lina Eckenstein : Comparative Studies in Nursery Rhymes . BiblioBazaar, Charleston 2008, ISBN 0559144512 , p. 3.