This is a fairytale about three goats. On their way to their summer
fields they met an evil troll. Were I asked, what is a fairytale? I
should reply, Read Undine: that is a fairytale ... of all
fairytales I know, I think Undine the most beautiful. As Stith
Thompson points out, talking animals and the presence of magic seem
to be more common to the fairy tale than fairies themselves.
However, the mere presence of animals that talk does not make a
tale a fairy tale, especially when the animal is clearly a mask on
a human face, as in fables. In his essay "On Fairy-Stories," J. R.
R. Tolkien agreed with the exclusion of "fairies" from the
definition, defining fairy tales as stories about the adventures of
men in Faerie, the land of fairies, fairytale princes and
princesses, dwarves, elves, and not only other magical species but
many other marvels. However, the same essay excludes tales that are
often considered fairy tales, citing as an example The Monkey's
Heart, which Andrew Lang included in The Lilac Fairy Book. Steven
Swann Jones identified the presence of magic as the feature by
which fairy tales can be distinguished from other sorts of
folktales. Davidson and Chaudri identify "transformation" as the
key feature of the genre. From a psychological point of view, Jean
Chiriac argued for the necessity of the fantastic in these
narratives. In terms of aesthetic values, Italo Calvino cited the
fairy tale as a prime example of "quickness" in literature, because
of the economy and concision of the tales. Originally, stories that
we would now call fairy tales were not marked out as a separate
genre. The German term "Marchen" stems from the old German word
"Mar," which means story or tale. The word "Marchen" is the
diminutive of the word "Mar," therefore it means a "little story."
Together with the common beginning "once upon a time" it means a
fairy tale or a marchen was originally a little story from long
time ago, when the world was still magic. (Indeed one less regular
German opening is "In the old times when wishing was still
effective.") The English term "fairy tale" stems from the fact that
the French contes often included fairies. Roots of the genre come
from different oral stories passed down in European cultures. The
genre was first marked out by writers of the Renaissance, such as
Giovanni Francesco Straparola and Giambattista Basile, and
stabilized through the works of later collectors such as Charles
Perrault and the Brothers Grimm. In this evolution, the name was
coined when the precieuses took up writing literary stories; Madame
d'Aulnoy invented the term conte de fee, or fairy tale, in the late
17th century. Before the definition of the genre of fantasy, many
works that would now be classified as fantasy were termed "fairy
tales," including Tolkien's The Hobbit, George Orwell's Animal
Farm, and L. Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. 21] Indeed,
Tolkien's "On Fairy-Stories" includes discussions of world-building
and is considered a vital part of fantasy criticism. Although
fantasy, particularly the sub-genre of fairytale fantasy, draws
heavily on fairy tale motifs, the genres are now regarded as
distinct. Literary fairy tales and oral fairy tales freely
exchanged plots, motifs, and elements with one another and with the
tales of foreign lands. Many 18th-century folklorists attempted to
recover the "pure" folktale, uncontaminated by literary versions.
Yet while oral fairy tales likely existed for thousands of years
before the literary forms, there is no pure folktale, and each
literary fairy tale draws on folk traditions, if only in parody.
This makes it impossible to trace forms of transmission of a fairy
tale. Oral story-tellers have been known to read literary fairy
tales to increase their own stock of stories and treatments.
General
Is the information for this product incomplete, wrong or inappropriate?
Let us know about it.
Does this product have an incorrect or missing image?
Send us a new image.
Is this product missing categories?
Add more categories.
Review This Product
No reviews yet - be the first to create one!
Welcome to Loot.co.za!
Sign in / Register |Wishlists & Gift Vouchers |Help | Advanced search
