Exhibit spotlights work of Brothers Grimm

If you find yourself at the Dane County Regional Airport for a departure or a passenger pick-up, build a few extra minutes into your trip to check out the latest exhibit there coordinated by UW–Madison’s Tandem Press on behalf of the airport.

“Once Upon a Time, The Brothers Grimm Life and Work,” presents for the first time in North America, the life and work of the brothers Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm. Best known for the ethnic folk and fairy tales they collected, the show presents illustrations from many of the fairy tales along with other famous publications that the Grimm Brothers produced throughout their careers. The exhibit contains prints, books, engravings and historical documents.

The exhibit was organized by the international Association of the Brothers Grimm and came about through a sister-county relationship between Dane County and the brothers’ home in Kassel, Germany.

Jacob (1785–1863) and Wilhelm (1786–1859) Grimm were inseparable in life and their work. They shared a room during their university years and later worked in adjacent studies. Jacob remained a bachelor but lived with Wilhelm and his wife and children.

Their interest in the folk tales grew out of their academic work in linguistics and early German literature and history. Their library, which they used and continuously enlarged, contained more than 10,000 volumes at the end of their lives. They collected and wrote down tales that had been passed though the generations in an oral tradition, eventually publishing more than 200 stories, now known as “Grimms’ Fairy Tales.”

The brothers held positions at the state library of Kassel for 15 years and later worked as librarians and professors at the University of Göttingen. Their time there ended abruptly in 1837 when they protested (with five fellow professors) against the revocation of the constitution by Ernst August, the new King of Hanover. They lost their positions at the university and were deported. Without employment they returned to live in Kassel, but they were highly respected throughout Germany and Europe and were supported by donations.

They eventually moved to Berlin and worked in the capital of Prussia until their deaths as members of the Royal Prussian Academy of Science. It was there where they crowned their academic activity by editing the ‘German dictionary,’ which was intended to become the “sacred repository of language” and record the entire New High German vocabulary from Luther to Goethe. Scholars and political activists, the brothers died in Berlin and are buried side by side at the old Matthäi-Cemetery.

“Children’s and Household Fairy Tales” has been translated into more than 160 languages, from Inupiat in the Arctic to Swahili in Africa. The brothers, though, did not see their work as children’s entertainment. They were patriotic folklorists, working at a time when Germany was not a country, but a collection of fiefdoms and principalities overrun by Napoleon, who suppressed the local culture. Their goal was to save the German oral tradition.

The exhibit of the work and lives of these amazing brothers runs through June. For more information contact Karin Petersen Thurlow, 266-4533.