On tonight's podcast, we'll be looking at The Raven, another German folk tale from the collection of the Brother's Grimm. The version we are interested in is found in the 1905 edition of Grimm's Fairy Tales, and is of type 401, as classified by the Aarne-Thompson system. For those keeping score, these are tales where young girls are transformed into animals. In our particular case, that animal is a Raven. This is one of those stories where I find myself questioning the translation a little. In the very first scene, the princess is transformed into a Raven and flies off into the dark, dark woods. Yet, throughout the rest of the telling, she rides around in carriages, hands out magical foodstuffs and golden rings, and generally gets on about her business just fine. I don't know a lot of Ravens who could pull off half the tricks that she manages.  This is also a fairy tale that manages to pack in witches, giants and highwaymen all at the same time, which is quite a feat when you think about it. The Raven is a story of magic sticks, magic food, and incredibly talented bird women. I hope you enjoy.  Background music provided by: https://soundcloud.com/michel-escaillas/classik-electro Subscribe to the podcast on iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/steve-reads-stories/id1087197185 Follow us on Twitter @StoriesCast