Season 3 - Episode 8 - Special Birthday Epsiode! Gina's thoughts: Opie's, Brother's Grimm, and Julia Bishop

 In this episode, host Gina explores the legacy of Iona and Peter Opie, pioneers in the study of children’s folklore, and how contemporary scholars are bringing their groundbreaking work into the 21st century. We discuss how scholars like Julia Bishop, Andrew Burn, Rebekah Willett, and Jackie Marsh have expanded on the Opies’ research by examining how children’s play and folklore have evolved in the digital age. These researchers show that while technology has changed the way children engage with traditional games, rhymes, and stories, the core elements of folklore—creativity, community, and shared language—remain unchanged. We also highlight how the Opies' extensive archives are being digitized and made accessible, ensuring that their work continues to influence and shape the study of children’s culture today. Tune in for a look at how modern scholars are keeping the Opies’ legacy alive while adapting it for new generations of researchers and digital natives! 

Transcript

Welcome to today’s episode, where I’m diving deep into the world of nursery rhymes and fairy tales scholarship.  These timeless tales and playful verses might seem simple at first glance, but when we scratch the surface, we uncover hidden layers of history, politics, and culture. In today’s discussion, we’ll explore the groundbreaking work of Iona and Peter Opie, who cataloged nursery rhymes with an eye for historical context, and the Brothers Grimm, whose fairy tales were originally collected to preserve cultural heritage. Whether you’re a folklore enthusiast or simply curious about how these childhood stories reflect our past, this episode is for you. Get ready to discover how these nursery rhymes and fairy tales hold a mirror up to the societies that created them, and why they still captivate us today!

It’s my birthday this week and I wanted to do a special episode pertaining to what’s on my mind on a bigger picture level. The 2025 American Folklore Conference Call for Presentations just came out and I’m considering what I’d like to propose. As my listeners, you likely know better than anyone that talking is a great way to get out my ideas, so I sat down this morning, hit record, and thought out loud for over an hour. This episode is a much more organized and coherent version of that. 

In the exploration of nursery rhymes, their origins, and their historical and political significance, two major works stand out: The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes (1998) by Iona and Peter Opie and The Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm (2017), edited by Noelle Daniel. Both collections represent a critical effort to understand and preserve these oral traditions, yet they approach their subject matter with slightly different goals and methodologies. At their core, both the Opies and the Brothers Grimm sought to catalog and preserve stories and rhymes that had been passed down for generations, but in doing so, they raised important questions about the nature of folklore, its role in shaping culture, and the challenges of compiling such material.

The Opies' work on nursery rhymes in The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes is a monumental contribution to the field of folklore. Their book builds upon the pioneering work of James Orchard Halliwell, whose Nursery Rhymes of England was first published more than a century ago. Halliwell’s collection, as the Opies note, was “the first work to draw attention to the antiquity of the rhymes with any conviction, and the first collection which attempted to be comprehensive.” Published when Halliwell was just 22 years old, this book was a treasure trove of rhymes gathered from oral traditions, offering notes about their age and origins. Halliwell’s work became the cornerstone of subsequent studies, and as the Opies acknowledge, “For a century, its authority as the standard work has been unchallenged.” Despite the significance of Halliwell’s collection, the Opies lament that little effort has been made to update or verify the findings contained in it, leaving many inaccuracies to persist unchecked. They note that “his inaccuracies have been repeated with monotonous regularity,” and criticize the lack of effort to consolidate new facts that have emerged in the years following its publication. While Halliwell was aware of the limitations of his own work, the Opies point out that much of his material was drawn from contemporary rhyme books, many of which he did not acknowledge explicitly. This gap in his citations becomes a key part of the Opies' critique, as they stress the importance of noting where the material was sourced and, when possible, comparing early collections to understand how the rhymes evolved over time.

In contrast, the Opies made it their mission to be as thorough as possible in collecting and cataloging nursery rhymes. They set out to create a comprehensive reference work that not only collected the rhymes themselves but also provided detailed notes on their origins and changes through the years. The Opies were careful to note variations in the wording of rhymes, and their approach was “to choose the version which seems to us the fullest, while bearing in mind how the rhyme is commonly known today.” This balanced approach reflects their understanding of how nursery rhymes, like all folklore, evolve over time as they are passed down through generations. Their decision to arrange the rhymes alphabetically, rather than by theme, was a deliberate choice to facilitate easier reference and to account for the challenges of categorizing such diverse and varied material. As they note in their introduction, “Nursery rhymes may be gathered, but they defy regimentation,” emphasizing the difficulty in organizing folklore into neat, regimented categories. Despite this, the Opies managed to create a work that offered not only the rhymes themselves but a rich historical context, illustrating the political and social subtexts embedded within them.

The Opies’ exploration of nursery rhymes also serves as a reminder of the inherent complexity and ambiguity of folklore. These rhymes, although often dismissed as simple entertainment for children, can carry hidden meanings that reveal much about the historical and political climate in which they were created. The Opies stress the importance of understanding these rhymes as part of a broader cultural landscape, where “a knowledge of their past adds to the pleasure of them in the present.” For example, many nursery rhymes were originally used to comment on the political landscape, whether through satire, social critique, or coded messages. Their long-lasting appeal may be attributed to their ability to subtly communicate complex ideas in a form that was accessible to children and adults alike. The Opies emphasize this point, noting that “our belief is… that a knowledge of their past adds to the pleasure of them in the present,” suggesting that uncovering the hidden layers of meaning in these rhymes is an essential part of their continued relevance.

The work of the Brothers Grimm is similarly essential in understanding the preservation of folklore, albeit from a different perspective. As Noelle Daniel notes in the introduction to The Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm, the Grimms were not authors of the fairy tales they collected but rather cultural anthropologists and linguists who sought to document the collective consciousness of the people. Initially, the Grimm brothers set out to collect these tales as part of their academic work, aiming to preserve the oral traditions of the German-speaking population. Daniel writes that “the Grimm set about collecting tales as cultural anthropologists and linguists, not as children's authors,” emphasizing their scholarly mission to capture the folklore of their time. Their work was not intended to be a collection for children but rather a preservation of the vernacular oral traditions that had been passed down for generations. The Grimm brothers were primarily concerned with “gathering evidence of people’s poetry,” believing that these tales represented a “collective consciousness” that could be captured and preserved for future generations.

This is remarkably similar to the Opies’ approach to nursery rhymes. Both the Opies and the Grimms recognized the value of these oral traditions as a way of preserving cultural memory and identity. The Opies’ focus on nursery rhymes as “a living tradition” mirrors the Grimms' understanding of the tales as part of a larger, ever-evolving folklore. As Daniel notes, the Grimms were trained scholars—librarians and lawyers—who were committed to preserving these tales not for personal fame but as an academic pursuit. Their goal was to secure these stories in writing, ensuring that they would not be lost to history. In this way, the Grimms’ work was less about the tales themselves and more about documenting the language, culture, and traditions from which they arose.

While the Grimms’ initial collection was not aimed at children, it was eventually edited to cater to a broader audience, including the emerging middle class. As Daniel explains, it was only after the publication of their early editions that the Grimms realized the broader appeal of their work. “The Grimms began to edit out the more adult content to tailor their book for younger readers,” eventually creating a version of the collection that would be suitable for children and adults alike. This final, child-friendly edition, published in 1857, became the version of the Grimms’ tales that we know today. This shift in focus highlights the changing cultural context in which the Grimms worked. The emergence of a literate middle class, particularly during the Industrial Revolution, created new demands for literature that could be enjoyed by both children and adults. The Grimms responded to these shifts by making their collection more accessible to younger readers, ultimately ensuring its continued popularity.

The process of collecting, editing, and preserving folklore, whether through nursery rhymes or fairy tales, is fraught with challenges. Both the Opies and the Grimms faced difficulties in capturing the essence of these oral traditions while maintaining their historical and cultural integrity. As the Opies note, “Nursery rhymes may be gathered, but they defy regimentation,” highlighting the inherent complexity of folklore that resists neat categorization. The process of recording and preserving these traditions is never straightforward, and it often involves navigating the fine line between historical accuracy and contemporary relevance. Yet, as both the Opies and the Grimms demonstrated, this process is crucial to understanding the role of folklore in shaping culture and society.

In my own research, I am particularly interested in how nursery rhymes, despite their apparent simplicity, contain layers of political and historical significance. This interest stems from the work of the Opies and the Grimms, whose scholarship has illuminated the hidden depths within these otherwise innocuous verses. Nursery rhymes, much like fairy tales, often serve as vessels for political commentary, social critique, and cultural preservation. As I continue my exploration of these rhymes, I am drawn to the ways in which they carry forward messages that transcend their original context, influencing new generations of listeners. The work of the Opies and the Grimms serves as a reminder of the importance of preserving and studying these oral traditions, not just for their entertainment value, but for the deeper insights they offer into the political and cultural histories they embody.

Both the Opies' and the Grimm’s works offer invaluable contributions to our understanding of folklore. Through their meticulous efforts, they have preserved these oral traditions for future generations, shedding light on the complexities of the cultures from which they arose. As we continue to study these rhymes and tales, we are reminded of the rich historical context that shapes them and the enduring legacy they leave behind. The Opies and the Grimms provide a framework for understanding the evolving role of folklore in society, and their work remains essential in the ongoing study of nursery rhymes, fairy tales, and the cultural traditions that sustain them.

Daniel then discusses popular visual culture and how it proliferated after the Industrial Revolution. She writes that as more books were published to meet the expanding needs of the literate public, and as these books began to include illustrations, the 19th century saw the dawn of a mass visual culture on a scale not seen before.

Fairy tales and folk tales played a key role in this intense conflagration of art and commerce, expanding the field of book illustration and transforming how books were made and marketed. The Grimm's Tales, along with adaptations and the works of Charles Perrault—who shared some crossover tales but with notable differences in retelling—became critical ingredients that ignited the combustible mix of widespread literacy, prolific artistic talent, and advances in affordable printing technology.

This perfect storm of factors laid the foundation for what we now recognize as "children's books." While children's literature existed before this era, it was largely pedagogical, morally safe, unillustrated, and accessible only to the upper classes. However, the new wave of children's books gave innovative artists opportunities to experiment with the relationship between text and image, leaving an indelible mark on the history of illustrated books.

Returning to the Grimms, Daniel describes their work as the DNA of all fairy tale scholarship. Although their influence on visual culture was widespread and formidable, this legacy has received less attention than their well-documented and thunderous impact on language and history. The Grimms helped standardize the German language through books like German Grammar and The History of the German Language, and their German Legends and German Mythology gathered pre-Christian tales from the region.

When it came to their fairy tales, the Grimms were the first to annotate their tales with details about age, place of origin, and comparisons to versions from other countries. Sound familiar? These annotations elevated their collection far beyond earlier fairy tale publications and laid the foundation for the academic study of folklore, shaping both fairy tale and nursery rhyme scholarship.

Despite popular imagination, the Grimms did not travel the countryside on horseback, knocking on doors and collecting tales firsthand. Instead, they relied heavily on a few local sources for oral stories, many of which had multicultural roots, and they also drew from literary sources. Their work was a quiet, scholarly pursuit, embodied in one of their most important local sources, Dorothea Viehmann, the innkeeper’s daughter whose portrait they included as the frontispiece of their collection. This sage female storyteller became an enduring image, later inspiring 20th-century British artist Arthur Rackham’s silhouette of children listening attentively to a grandmotherly figure.

It's important to remember that when the Grimms published their tales, Germany was not yet a unified country but rather a collection of independent states loosely connected by a common language yet divided by hundreds of dialects, regional cultures, literatures, religions, fashions, and culinary traditions. Since the late 1700s, Europe had been rocked by the French Revolution, Napoleon’s wars, and the upheaval of rapid industrialization. In response to these political and social changes, many European countries turned inward, celebrating their vernacular heritage and traditions.

During the 18th-century Enlightenment, scholars sought to cast strong rays of empirical knowledge into society’s more mysterious corners, sweeping away mysticism, the occult, and sentimentality, which were considered outdated. However, by the early 19th century, the pendulum had swung back toward sentimentality and feeling, leading to the rise of the Romantic Movement. This movement prized authentic, direct communication with emotions and nature—values that aligned with the oral storytelling traditions the Grimms sought to preserve.

The Grimms’ tales were published just as society was beginning to recognize the importance of children’s learning and play. With public education and literacy on the rise, there was a growing need for reading material, and fairy tales—particularly those with a moral essence—filled that gap. Unlike nursery rhymes, which tend to fade as childhood advances, fairy tales and the rich fantasy worlds they create remain relevant, inspiring literature, memoirs, films, animations, songs, operas, theater pieces, and video games. It was this primal, non-rational narrative power that drew in the Grimms, the artists who illustrated their tales, and generations of readers, both children and adults.

If you’re interested in learning more about the Brothers Grimm, I highly recommend this book. It’s a short volume—about 150 pages long—so it’s not a comprehensive biography, but it provides a great overview of who they were and their impact on language, literature, and anthropology.

Now, one of the big questions I’ve been researching over the past three years for my podcast is: Who has continued the study of nursery rhymes and children’s lore since the Opies? Peter and Iona Opie stopped their research in the 1980s after Peter’s passing, but who has taken up the mantle?

There are a few scholars out there, and if I miss anyone, I apologize—I’m still relatively new to the field. One major name to know is Julia Bishop at the University of Sheffield in the UK. As I immerse myself in folklore scholarship, I’m trying to learn more about contemporary researchers who share my interests, and Bishop is an outstanding scholar whose work is truly remarkable. She has been instrumental in continuing the Opies' research, and I would love to collaborate with her and her colleagues in the future.

Bishop and others work on the Opie Archive, which you can explore at opiearchive.org. This collection is dedicated to digitizing the Opies’ decades of research—much of it conducted before the digital age—and includes primary sources like children’s notes and drawings. Their Childhoods in Play project, established in 2012, is a long-term initiative that aims to make these materials freely accessible for research and public engagement. The project is a collaboration between the University of Sheffield, University College London, the Bodleian Libraries, the Folklore Society, and the British Library. It has even received recognition as a British Academy Research Project, a mark of academic excellence.

In a recent email conversation with Julia Bishop, she mentioned other scholars working in this field, including Andrew Byrne, Rebecca Willett, and Jackie Marsh, all of whom have explored children's play, particularly in the digital age. Byrne, in particular, has a fantastic website where he shares his publications, and I’m currently making my way through them.

The key takeaway here is that scholarship on nursery rhymes and children’s lore is ongoing. I’m just one person who decided to start a podcast, but it’s exciting to see researchers continuing the kind of fieldwork that the Opies and scholars before them—like John Orchard Halliwell and the Brothers Grimm—undertook. Many of these earlier researchers were not solely focused on child lore; they came from fields like pedagogy, linguistics, and even the church. As a result, scholars like me who want to focus exclusively on this subject must sift through a lot of additional material.

Understanding the history of this research is crucial before we undertake new studies. If you’re a student, consider diving into this field—whether in an academic setting or as an independent scholar. And if you’re in a position to support folklore research, universities and scholars could always use the help.

I wanted to discuss this topic now because it’s my birthday, and I wanted to talk about something I’m truly passionate about. Plus, the call for papers for the 2025 American Folklore Society Conference just came out! If you’re interested in folklore, I highly encourage you to apply and share your passions. AFS is always looking for new voices, and it’s a fantastic conference. Even if you don’t want to present, just attending is an incredible experience. This year, it will be in Atlanta, Georgia, and if you love folklore, history, politics, art, or culture, it’s absolutely the place to be.

As for me, I’m still deciding what to present this year. I’m thinking about a research project I might want to undertake, and I wanted to take some time to reflect on those who came before me and how their work informs what I—and many others—hope to do in the future.