Fairy tales
A fairy tale is a story, either told to children or as if told to children, concerning the adventures of mythical characters such as: fairies, goblins, elves, trolls, giants and others. The fairy tale is a sub-class of the more general folktale. These stories often involve princes and princesses and modern versions normally have a happy ending. Within cultures where demons and witches are perceived as real, fairy tales may merge into legendary narratives, where the context is perceived by teller and hearers as having had historical actuality.
Sometimes fairy tales are simply miraculous entertainments but often, fairy tales are disguised morality tales. This is true for the Brothers Grimm Fairy Tale Collection, and much of the drily witty, dead-pan social criticism beneath the surface of Hans Christian Andersen's tales, which influenced Roald Dahl.
The fairy tale has ancient roots, older than the "Arabian Nights" collection of magical tales, in antiquity: Cupid and Psyche, Bel and the Dragon. Fairy tales resurfaced in literature in the 17th century, with the Neapolitan tales of Giambattista Basile and the later Contes of Charles Perrault, who fixed the forms of Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella.
An extensive collection of European fairy tales were published by Andrew Lang in a series of books: The Red Fairy Book, The Orange Fairy Book, and so forth. These provide some excellent examples of the genre.
According to a 2004 poll of 1,200 childen by Cinderella
- Sleeping Beauty
- Hansel and Gretel
- Rapunzel
- Little Red Riding Hood
- Fairy tales are more than true -
- not because they tell us dragons exist,
- but because they tell us dragons can be beaten.
- G. K. Chesterton
See also
External links and references
Reference
- Antti Aarne and Stith Thompson: The Types of the Folktale: A Classification and Bibliography (Helsinki, 1961)
