A comprehensive analysis of fairy tales as historical relics and dynamic cross-cultural products. To understand the distinctive nature of the fairy tale as both uniquely regional and (for the most part) universally recognizable, we’ll start with a question: What do we mean when we call something a “fairy tale”? (Also, what is the difference between an oral folk tale and a literary fairy tale? Who wrote the Arabian Nights? What about Grimm’s Fairy Tales? Which came first, Yeh-hsien or Cinderella? Why do we remember the gingerbread house from Hansel and Gretel but not the duck?) Beginning with the “classics” (from Little Red Riding Hood to Blue Beard) and their cultural variants, we’ll explore the “irresistible” appeal of the fairy tale in ancient and modern societies, as well as the elements of tale type, motif and aesthetic form within popular imagination and scholarly taxonomies of folk and fairy tales. Finally, we’ll consider the creative and cultural implications of adapting or revising the simple fairy tale into more complex forms of storytelling through literature, film and visual art.
- Teacher: Barbara Tannert-Smith