Where Do Fairy Tales Come From?

A fairy tale is a fanciful tale of legendary deeds and magical creatures, usually intended for children. Upon analysis fairy tales can be viewed as dramatic representations of our inner world. They offer marvellous insights about ourselves and common life scenarios. Fairy tales carry valuable statements in symbolic form about human nature and may help us in reflecting upon things that we observe and do in our daily lives.

According to “The Bedford Book of Genres” A Genre is a compositions kind, category or sort”. One type of genre in Children’s literature is the Fairy Tale. Fairy tales can be difficult to define as many of the characteristics cross over into fables and folklore. In the beginning fairy tales were original targeted at adults as well as children and were both oral and written works. It is a type of short story usually about elves, fairies, dragons, or other magical beings with the point of teaching a lesson and involving a far-fetched sequence of events. This form may be used by authors as a way of examining the human condition or to recreate a sense of the fantastic. They have a conventional, happy ever after style full of magic and romance.

The wolf easily distracts her, showing, once again, her naivety and innocence. After the wolf shows up and eats the grandmother, Little Red arrives. Her mother instructed her not to look in all the corners when she arrived, and so, even though she was scared, she did what she was told, and the wolf swallowed Little Red and falls asleep. A wandering woodsman hears the snoring and enters the house to see what is wrong. He discovers the wolf and, instead of shooting it, cuts it open and gets Little Red and her grandmother unharmed out of the wolf. He sends Little Red off to get big stones, which he uses to fill the wolf?s belly. The wolf wakes up and attempts to run away, but the stones are too heavy, and he dies. After this experience, Little Red learned that she needed to heed her mother?s warnings, which shows that she has grown through her experiences with the wolf, and knows to listen to her mother. The story continues with another wolf coming across Little Red on her way to her grandmother?s house, but, having learned from the first wolf, Little Red is able to outsmart and kill him.

A fairy tale is a type of short story that typically features European folklore fantasy characters such as fairies and witches. One of The Canterbury Tales is similar to a fairy tale. "The Wife of Bath's Tale" contains many characteristics of fairy tales, and she strongly suggests that when a husband gives control to the wife it leads to a happy marriage.

Fairy Tales are not just stories that parents tell to their children, but stories with hidden valuable messages which are mostly left on a side. In the article “An Introduction to Fairy Tales,” Maria Tatar clearly explains how people need fairy tales in their lives. Tatar also states how fairy tales have the ability to take the listener, especially children’s, into a journey in which they can play with their imagination so that they can discover their deepest fears and wishes. Personally I agree with the author, because of the fact that in an individual’s lives as they get older, they will try to define themselves, sometimes comparing their own life with a character from their favorite story or Fairy Tale.

Fairy tales is the term also used to describe something adored with unusual happiness, like “fairy tale ending” a happing ending or “fairy tale romance”, though not all fairy tale as a happy ending. A fairy tales is a type of short story that consistently features European folkloric fantasy characters, such as dwarves, elves, fairies, giants, gnomes, goblins, mermaids, trolls, or witches, and usually magic or enchantments. Fairy Tale Fairy tales may be acclaimed from other folk narratives such as legends which generally involves belief in the veracity of the events described and explicitly moral tales, including beast fables. Fairy Tale." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 11 June 2014. Web. 13 Nov. 2014. According to Arthur Schlesinger, classical tales “tells children what they unconsciously know-that human nature is not innately good, that conflict is real, that life is harsh before it is happy-and thereby reassure them about their own fears and their own sense of self” (229). Fairy tales, according to the British illustrator Arthur Rackman have become “part of our everyday thought and expression, and help to shape our lives” (229). Fairy tales are mostly used in any story that is not only true, but could not possibly be true. Maria Tatar the author of numerous articles on fairy tales and also ten scholarly books wrote that “fairy tales are up close and personal, telling us about the quest of romance and riches, for power and privilege, and, and most important, for a way

Fairy tales picture a world filled with magic, love and the triumph of the good over the evil. Fairy tales are a window to other worlds where the wildest dreams can come true and the hero always lives happily ever after preferably paired with his loved one. Although some people argue that fairy tales are full of stereotypes, filled with frightening monsters and promote racism and sexism I believe that they are wrong because fairy tales provide valuable moral lessons to children, teach them other countries' cultures promote the imagination and the cognitive development and therefore they should be read to young children.

"Once upon a time," the most used introduction phrase in common fairy tales used to start an adventure. These adventures have been around for years. The importance of some tales might be more significant than others, also based on culture. My goal for this paper is to educate my readers with the importance of fairy tales, especially for younger children. Fairy tales have been around for centuries from generations to generations. Different cultures, such as the Japanese and Western, have also expressed them differently. All these fairly tales teach children different aspects of life, which make these tales so important.

Not all folktales are fairy tales, but all fairy tales are folktales (Brewer). Fairy tales are a product of the folk (Bottigheimer). Fairy tales initially referred to tales about fairies, but the Grimms reconceptualized the genre (Bottigheimer). Fairy tales now mean “...magical tales, folktales… anecdotes, animal tales, jests, burlesques, and legends” (Bottigheimer). They represent the passage from youth to adulthood, which is a topic of continued interest young to old (Brewer). “Only since the eighteenth century in West Europe have fairy tales been...” meant for kids (Brewer). The things that draw people in are the fun stories with lessons and the encouragement of self-esteem and confidence (Brewer). Kids like fairy tales because they convey “...the idea that if we persist, if we keep our nerve and our wits about us, are kind to the apparently weak and unfortunate, we shall win through, shall grow up” (Brewer). They also have fantasy and daydreaming at heart (Brewer). A lot of adult literature that deals with serious topics such as death also include an underlying fairy tale story to make it more appealing and easier to deal with (Brewer). Some well-known fairy tales are Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Sleeping Beauty, Puss in Boots, The Golden Goose and Jack and the Beanstalk. According to Brewer, fairy tales usually have patterns. The hero or heroine suffers from a disadvantage called a lack. They face adversity, and adventure follows. Oftentimes, the protagonist commits a fault, but “...overcomes it by ingenuity, bravery, and industry.” The motivation of their driving force can be found in family drama, desires, or something symbolic. In the end, the protagonist almost always finds a mate. There is frequent gender-stereotyping in fairy tales as well. They are still recognizable even when altered, because although “...so variable in detail, the main lines are clear”

Little Red was noticing how different her grandmother looked and the wolf was drooling over the smell of the goodies in the basket. Little Red Riding hood said, “My, oh, my, Grandma, What big white teeth you have.” Before he could think he said all the better to EAT you with and jumped out of bed and chased Little Red and her goodie basket. When they reached the door there stood grandmother and Mr. Whittle coming after the wolf. Little Red Riding Hood rand into the safety of her grandmother arms, While Mr. Whittle ran after the wolf with his ax swinging in the

Fairy tales are one of the many types of folklore that generally have some sort of fantastic element, usually featuring magic, imaginary creatures, and often a conflict between sides that are clearly good and evil. Within

The story starts with Red traveling to her grandmother’s house where she is attacked by a wolf along the way. The wolf believes that Red has stolen the grandmother’s recipes, however Red does not see it that way. Red believes that the wolf is trying to trick her so that he can eat her, but that is not the case as we find out later. Meanwhile, the grandmother is living a dangerous life and trying to escape from people who are hired to kill her. Then, a hunter with an axe accidentally crashes into the house right before Red and her

1. What is the genre of this story? Are there any other possible genres this story could fall into?

As we grow up, we hear fairy tales and we read them into our lives. Every word and every image is imprinted into our minds. The fairy tales we read are never abandoned. They grow with us and our dreams become molds of the many morals and happily ever afters fairy tales display. We tell children fairy tales when they go to sleep and they read them in school and we even have them watch Disney adaptions that reinforce them further. Generally, they were everywhere while we grew up and they continue to be present while children are growing up now. But what influence do these stories have? We casually expose our children to these tales, but in some cases they can have particularly, harmful personal effects on them, although there is nothing completely or visibly “bad” about them or about the characters in them. Before we divulge our youth to these stories, we should assess their substance and see what sort of effect they may be having on them. They have received so much scrutiny and have been studied by many. Recognizing fairy tales effects on the minds of children is vital in their development. This paper will focus on the underlying messages that the average person wouldn’t recognize in these everyday stories. There’s a modern distort with fairy tales because while they still are widely popular with the youth, they influence children’s self images, outlooks on reality and expectations for their futures, especially for young women.

Fairy tales are something that everyone has read or seen, they all seem to have important lessons at the end of each one to teach young children some of the lessons they need for life. These fairy tales when we were younger all seemed innocent and something we all hoped that would happen to us. Little did we know as we got older that the fairy tales we all knew and loved when we were younger, weren't as innocent as they seemed.