Look once now, but remember later
Blech! Its the Struwwelpeter!
he let his nails grow without a care,
and never cut and never combed his hair
Blech! let us cry out to everyone:
the Struwwelpeter is an ugly one!

Der Struwwelpeter is a book in the fine tradition of "be good or die" german fairy tales and stories. As a child, I was exposed to the charming imagery and sledgehammer morals of this book and I fear I may never remove the haunting pictures from my subconscious. However, the nightmares that followed were a very effective behavior training mechanism. As an extra burden of guilt, I am told my grandfather used to print these books to keep my family fed during the war.

I am now inflicting this horror upon the rest of the world by scanning it and translating the german text into english. I did not translate it verbatim, partly because my german is not that good, but also it makes for rather awkward and crude sounding english. Actually, I have rewritten the words completely, using the plots and moral lessons of Dr Heinr. Hoffmann's charming tales.

As a side note, this lovely image was one of the inspirations for Tim Burton's creation of Edward Scissorhands.