Prime logo Prime members: New to Audible?
Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
Premium Plus auto-renews for $14.95/mo after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

The Brothers Grimm

By: Ann Schmiesing
Narrated by: Eve Matheson
Pre-order: Try for $0.00

$14.95/month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Pre-order for $16.79

Pre-order for $16.79

Pay using card ending in
By confirming your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and Amazon's Privacy Notice. Taxes where applicable.

Publisher's summary

The first English-language biography in over fifty years to tell the full, vibrant story of Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, known to history as the Brothers Grimm

More than two hundred years ago, the German brothers Jacob Grimm (1785–1863) and Wilhelm Grimm (1786–1859) published a collection of fairy tales that remains famous the world over. It has been translated into some 170 languages—more than any other German book—and the Brothers Grimm are among the top dozen most translated authors in the world. In addition to collecting tales, the Grimms were mythographers, linguists, librarians, civil servants, and above all the closest of brothers, but until now, the full story of their lifelong endeavor to preserve and articulate a German cultural identity has not been well known.

Drawing on deep archival research and decades of scholarship, Ann Schmiesing tells the affecting story of how the Grimms’ ambitious projects gave the brothers a sense of self-preservation through the atrocities of the Napoleonic Wars and a series of personal losses. They produced a vast corpus of work on mythology and medieval literature, embarked on a monumental German dictionary project, and broke scholarly ground with Jacob’s linguistic discovery known as Grimm’s Law. Setting their story against a rich historical backdrop, Schmiesing offers a fresh consideration of the profound and yet complicated legacy of the Brothers Grimm.

Ann Schmiesing is professor of German and Scandinavian studies at the University of Colorado Boulder. She is the author of Disability, Deformity, and Disease in the Grimms’ Fairy Tales. She lives in Longmont, CO.

©2024 Yale University (P)2024 Yale University Press

What listeners say about The Brothers Grimm

Average customer ratings

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.