Walter Rehn

A farmer and his wife had a girl in addition to their seven sons. An evil old woman turned the boys into ravens because she had not been invited to the christening. When the girl turned seven, she learned of the sad fate of her brothers and set out to redeem them. Her journey to the end of the world, to the sun, moon and stars, was adventurous and full of danger. But the girl persevered, found her brothers in the glass mountain, was able to rescue them and return with them to her parents' house.

Thumbelina is born in a calyx. A bumblebee opens the flower and the little one goes on a journey of discovery. She has to hide from a nubile frog in a nut and lands on a water lily leaf. A fish bites through the stem of the leaf. Thumbelina swims down the stream until she is called to dance by a cockchafer. The dance fails and the beetle pushes her off the leaf into the depths. She falls into a spider's web and onto a dandelion. She sails away with an umbrella of seeds and lands on her calyx again. The autumn storm breaks the flower. Thumbelina finds shelter with a field mouse. There she cares for a sick swallow. The mouse wants to marry Thumbelina off to the mole, but the little girl manages to escape with the help of the swallow. They both fly off to the sunny south.

A pretty mouse, gray as a pebble, comes into money, builds herself a cabbage house and looks around for a man. As she likes to sing herself, she wants him to have a nice voice. She doesn't like sheep, frog and rooster, so she gives her favor to a tomcat. One day, when he gets to lick her blood, his appetite overcomes him. She manages to escape - and they have lived in enmity ever since.