Note 1 — Chapter III · Tales with the Simple Theme and Miscellaneous Combinations.
Reading edition
One of the most prevalent types of The Grateful Dead is that in which it has combined with The Poison Maiden, a theme almost world-wide in distribution and application. From the time of Benfey and Stephens1 the connection between the two themes has been regarded as vital. Though Hippe recognized that the stories were perhaps originally independent,2 he took the compound as his point of departure and derived all other forms from it. As will be seen in the course of our study, such a filiation is exceedingly improbable, if the essential features of The Grateful Dead and The Poison Maiden be closely examined. Hippe went wrong, I should say, in failing to differentiate between what traits belong to the former and what to the latter theme.