"A Vintage Books original"--Title page verso.

INTRODUCTION / Ann and Jeff VanderMeer -- THE QUEEN'S SON / Bettina von Arnim -- HANS-MY-HEDGEHOG / Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm -- THE STORY OF THE HARD NUT / E.T.A. Hoffmann -- RIP VAN WINKLE / Washington Irving -- THE LUCK OF THE BEAN-ROWS / Charles Nodier -- TRANSFORMATION / Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley -- THE NEST OF NIGHTINGALES / Theophile Gautier -- THE FAIRYTALE ABOUT A DEAD BODY, BELONGING TO NO ONE KNOWS WHOM / Vladimir Odoevsky -- THE STORY OF THE GOBLINS WHO STOLE A SEXTON / Charles Dickens -- THE NOSE / Nikolai Gogol -- THE FACTS IN THE CASE OF M. VALDEMAR / Edgar Allan Poe -- THE STORY OF JEON UNCHI / Anonymous -- FEATHERTOP: A MORALIZED LEGEND / Nathaniel Hawthorne -- MASTER ZACHARIUS / Jules Verne -- THE FROST-KING: OR, THE POWER OF LOVE / Louisa May Alcott -- THE TARTARUS OF MAIDS / Herman Melville -- THE MAGIC MIRROR / George MacDonald -- THE DIAMOND LENS / Fitz-James O'Brien -- GOBLIN MARKET / Christina Rossetti -- THE WILL-O'-THE-WISPS ARE IN TOWN / Hans Christian Andersen -- THE LEGEND OF THE PALE MAIDEN / Aleksis Kivi -- LOOKING-GLASS HOUSE / Lewis Carroll -- FURNICA, OR THE QUEEN OF THE ANTS / Carmen Sylva -- THE STORY OF IVAN THE FOOL / Leo Tolstoy -- THE GOOPHERED GRAPEVINE / Charles W. Chestnutt -- THE BEE-MAN OF ORN / Frank R. Stockton -- THE REMARKABLE ROCKET / Oscar Wilde -- THE ENSOULED VIOLIN / H.P. Blavatskaya -- THE DEATH OF ODJIGH / Marcel Schwob -- THE TERRESTRIAL FIRE / Marcel Schwob -- THE KINGDOM OF CARDS / Rabindranath Tagore -- THE OTHER SIDE: A BRETON LEGEND / Count Eric Stanlislaus Stenbock -- THE FULNESS OF LIFE / Edith Wharton -- PRINCE ALBERIC AND THE SNAKE LADY / Vernon Lee -- THE LITTLE ROOM / Madeline Yale Wynne -- THE PLATTNER STORY / H.G. Wells -- THE PRINCESS BALADINA--HER ADVENTURE / Willa Cather -- THE RELUCTANT DRAGON / Kenneth Grahame -- IKTOMI TALES / Zitkala-Sa -- MARIONETTES / Louis Frechette -- DANCE OF THE COMETS: AN ASTRAL PANTOMIME IN TWO ACTS / Paul Scheerbart -- THE WHITE PEOPLE / Arthur Machen -- BLAMOL / Gustav Meyrink -- GOBLINS: A LOGGING CAMP STORY / Louis Frechette -- SOWBREAD / Grazia Deledda -- THE ANGRY STREET / G.K. Chesterton -- THE AUNT AND AMABEL / E. Nesbit -- SACRIFICE / Aleksey Remizov -- THE PRINCESS STEEL / W.E.B. Du Bois -- THE HUMP / Fernan Caballero -- THE CELESTIAL OMNIBUS / E.M. Forster -- THE LEGEND OF THE ICE BABIES / E. Pauline Johnson -- THE LAST REDOUBT / William Hope Hodgson -- JACK PUMPKINHEAD AND THE SAWHORSE / L. Frank Baum -- THE PLANT MEN / Edgar Rice Burroughs -- STRANGE NEWS FROM ANOTHER STAR / Hermann Hesse -- THE METAMORPHOSIS / Franz Kafka -- THE HOARD OF THE GIBBELINS / Lord Dunsany -- THROUGH THE DRAGON GLASS / A. Merritt -- DAVID BLAIZE AND THE BLUE DOOR / E.F. Benson -- THE BIG BESTIARY OF MODERN LITERATURE / Franz Blei -- THE ALLIGATOR WAR / Horacio Quiroga -- FRIEND ISLAND / Francis Stevens -- MAGIC COMES TO A COMMITTEE / Stella Benson -- GRAMOPHONE OF THE AGES / Yefim Zozulya -- JOIWIND / David Lindsay -- SOUND IN THE MOUNTAIN / Maurice Renard -- SENNIN / Ryunosuke Akutagawa -- KOSHTRA PIVRARCHA / E.R. Eddison -- AT THE BORDER / Der Nister -- THE MARVELOUS EXPLOITS OF PAUL BUNYAN / W.B. Laughead -- TALKATIVE DOMOVOI / Aleksandr Grin -- THE RATCATCHER / Aleksandr Grin -- THE SHADOW KINGDOM / Robert E. Howard -- THE MAN TRAVELING WITH THE BROCADE PORTRAIT / Edogawa Ranpo -- A VISIT TO THE MUSEUM / Vladimir Nabokov -- THE WATER SPRITE'S TALE / Karel Capek -- THE CAPITAL OF CAT COUNTRY / Lao She -- COYOTE STORIES / Mourning Dove -- UNCLE MONDAY / Zora Neale Hurston -- ROSE-COLD, MOON SKATER / Maria Teresa Leon -- A NIGHT OF THE HIGH SEASON / Bruno Schulz -- THE INFLUENCE OF THE SUN / Fernand Dumont -- THE TOWN OF CATS / Hagiwara Sakutaro -- THE DEBUTANTE / Leonora Carrington -- THE JEWELS IN THE FOREST / Fritz Leiber -- EVENING PRIMROSE / John Collier -- THE COMING OF THE WHITE WORM / Clark Ashton Smith -- THE MAN WHO COULD WALK THROUGH WALLS / Marcel Ayme -- LEAF BY NIGGLE / J.R.R. Tolkien.

Unearth the enchanting origins of fantasy fiction with a collection of tales as vast as the tallest tower and as mysterious as the dark depths of the forest. Fantasy stories have always been with us. They illuminate the odd and the uncanny, the wondrous and the fantastic: all the things we know are lurking just out of sight--on the other side of the looking-glass, beyond the music of the impossibly haunting violin, through the twisted trees of the ancient woods. Other worlds, talking animals, fairies, goblins, demons, tricksters, and mystics: these are the elements that populate a rich literary tradition that spans the globe. A work composed both of careful scholarship and fantastic fun, The Big Book of Classic Fantasy is essential reading for anyone who's never forgotten the stories that first inspired feelings of astonishment and wonder.