Fairy tale facts for kids

1865 picture of Tom Thumb and the Giant

The European fairy tale Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf in a painting by Carl Larsson in 1881.

A fairy tale (alternative names include fairytale, fairy story, magic tale, or wonder tale) is a short story that belongs to the folklore genre. Such stories typically feature magic, enchantments, and mythical or fanciful beings. In most cultures, there is no clear line separating myth from folk or fairy tale; all these together form the literature of preliterate societies. Fairy tales may be distinguished from other folk narratives such as legends (which generally involve belief in the veracity of the events described) and explicit moral tales, including beast fables. Prevalent elements include dragons, dwarfs, elves, fairies, giants, gnomes, goblins, griffins, merfolk, monsters, talking animals, trolls, unicorns, witches, wizards, magic, and enchantments.

Fairy tales can also mean unusual happiness (for example, the expression "fairy tale ending", meaning a happy ending, even though not all fairy tales have a happy ending). Also, "fairy tale" can simply mean any unbelievable story.

Where demons and witches are seen as real, fairy tales can sometimes be similar to legends, where the story is claimed to be historically true. However, differently from legends and epics, they usually do not specifically mention religion and actual places, people, and events. They also do not say exactly when it happened. Instead, they say that the story happened "once upon a time".

Fairy tales are found in oral form (passed on from mouth to mouth) and in literary form (written down). Fairy tales' histories are hard to find. This is because only written fairy tales can be passed on for a long time. Still, literary works show that there has been fairy tales for thousands of years. Many fairy tales today have are based on very old stories that have appeared, though in different ways, in many different cultures around the world. Fairy tales, and works based on from fairy tales, are still written today.

At first, fairy tales were for both adults and children, but now children are mostly connected with fairy tales. Examples of traditional old fairy tales are Sleeping Beauty, Little Red Riding Hood and "The Three Little Pigs". There can also be new fairy tales written by an author, like The Little Mermaid or Pinocchio. New fairy tales were for example written by Hans Christian Andersen, James Thurber and Oscar Wilde.

History

Fairy tales were passed down by speaking of it from person to person before writing was developed. Stories were told or acted out dramatically. Because of this, the history of fairy tales is not very clear. The oldest written fairy tales we know are from ancient Egypt, around 1300 BC. There are sometimes fairy tales in written literature in different cultures, such as The Golden Ass, which includes Cupid and Psyche (Roman, 100–200 AD). They show that fairy tales were told from very long ago.

Cross-cultural transmission

Two theories of origins have attempted to explain the common elements in fairy tales found spread over continents. One is that a single point of origin generated any given tale, which then spread over the centuries; the other is that such fairy tales stem from common human experience and therefore can appear separately in many different origins.

Fairy tales with very similar plots, characters, and motifs are found spread across many different cultures. Many researchers hold this to be caused by the spread of such tales, as people repeat tales they have heard in foreign lands, although the oral nature makes it impossible to trace the route except by inference. Folklorists have attempted to determine the origin by internal evidence, which can not always be clear; Joseph Jacobs, comparing the Scottish tale The Ridere of Riddles with the version collected by the Brothers Grimm, The Riddle, noted that in The Ridere of Riddles one hero ends up polygamously married, which might point to an ancient custom, but in The Riddle, the simpler riddle might argue greater antiquity.

Folklorists of the "Finnish" (or historical-geographical) school attempted to place fairy tales to their origin, with inconclusive results. Sometimes influence, especially within a limited area and time, is clearer, as when considering the influence of Perrault's tales on those collected by the Brothers Grimm. Little Briar-Rose appears to stem from Perrault's The Sleeping Beauty, as the Grimms' tale appears to be the only independent German variant. Similarly, the close agreement between the opening of the Grimms' version of Little Red Riding Hood and Perrault's tale points to an influence, although the Grimms' version adds a different ending (perhaps derived from The Wolf and the Seven Young Kids).

Fairy tales tend to take on the color of their location, through the choice of motifs, the style in which they are told, and the depiction of character and local color.

The Brothers Grimm believed that European fairy tales derived from the cultural history shared by all Indo-European peoples and were therefore ancient, far older than written records. This view is supported by research by the anthropologist Jamie Tehrani and the folklorist Sara Graca Da Silva using phylogenetic analysis, a technique developed by evolutionary biologists to trace the relatedness of living and fossil species. Among the tales analysed were Jack and the Beanstalk, traced to the time of splitting of Eastern and Western Indo-European, over 5000 years ago. Both Beauty and the Beast and Rumpelstiltskin appear to have been created some 4000 years ago. The story of The Smith and the Devil (Deal with the Devil) appears to date from the Bronze Age, some 6000 years ago. Various other studies converge to suggest that some fairy tales, for example the swan maiden, could go back to the Upper Palaeolithic.

Compilations

Authors and works:

From many countries

García Carcedo, Pilar (2020): Entre brujas y dragones. Travesía comparativa por los cuentos tradicionales del mundo
Andrew Lang's Color Fairy Books (1890–1913)
Wolfram Eberhard (1909–1989)
Howard Pyle's The Wonder Clock
Ruth Manning-Sanders (Wales, 1886–1988)
World Tales (United Kingdom, 1979) by Idries Shah
Richard Dorson (1916–1981)
The Annotated Classic Fairy Tales (United States, 2002) by Maria Tatar

Italy

Pentamerone (Italy, 1634–1636) by Giambattista Basile
Giovanni Francesco Straparola (Italy, 16th century)
Giuseppe Pitrè, Italian collector of folktales from his native Sicily (Italy, 1841–1916)
Laura Gonzenbach, Swiss collector of Sicilian folk tales (Switzerland, 1842–1878)
Domenico Comparetti, Italian scholar (Italy, 1835–1927)
Thomas Frederick Crane, American lawyer (United States, 1844–1927)
Emma Perodi, Italian writer, author of the Casentinian folk tales (Italy, 1850–1918)
Luigi Capuana, Italian author of literary fiabe
Italian Folktales (Italy, 1956) by Italo Calvino

France

Charles Perrault (France, 1628–1703)
Eustache Le Noble, French writer of literary fairy tales (France, 1646–1711)
Madame d'Aulnoy (France, 1650–1705)
Emmanuel Cosquin, French collector of Lorraine fairy tales and one of the earliest tale comparativists (France, 1841–1919)
Paul Sébillot, collector of folktales from Brittany, France (France, 1843–1918)
François-Marie Luzel, French collector of Brittany folktales (France, 1821–1895)
Charles Deulin, French author and folklorist (France, 1827–1877)
Édouard René de Laboulaye, French jurist, poet and publisher of folk tales and literary fairy tales
Henri Pourrat, French collector of Auvergne folklore (1887–1959)
Achille Millien, collector of Nivernais folklore (France, 1838–1927)
Paul Delarue, establisher of the French folktale catalogue (France, 1889–1956)

Germany

Grimms' Fairy Tales (Germany, 1812–1857)
Johann Karl August Musäus, German writer of Volksmärchen der Deutschen (5 volumes; 1782–1786)
Wilhelm Hauff, German author and novelist
Heinrich Pröhle, collector of Germanic language folktales
Franz Xaver von Schönwerth (Germany, 1810–1886)
Adalbert Kuhn, German philologist and folklorist (Germany, 1812–1881)
Alfred Cammann [de] (1909–2008), 20th century collector of fairy tales

Belgium

Charles Polydore de Mont (Pol de Mont) (Belgium, 1857–1931)

United Kingdom and Ireland

Joseph Jacobs's two books of Celtic Fairytales and two books of English Folktales (1854–1916)
Alan Garner's Book of British Fairy Tales (United Kingdom, 1984) by Alan Garner
Old English fairy tales by Reverend Sabine Baring-Gould (1895)
Popular Tales of the West Highlands (Scotland, 1862) by John Francis Campbell
Jeremiah Curtin, collector of Irish folktales and translator of Slavic fairy tales (Ireland, 1835–1906)
Patrick Kennedy, Irish educator and folklorist (Ireland, ca. 1801–1873)
Séamus Ó Duilearga, Irish folklorist (Ireland, 1899–1980)
Kevin Danaher, Irish folklorist (Ireland, 1913-2002) Folktales from the Irish Countryside
W. B. Yeats, Irish poet and publisher of Irish folktales
Peter and the Piskies: Cornish Folk and Fairy Tales (United Kingdom, 1958), by Ruth Manning-Sanders

Scandinavia

Hans Christian Andersen, Danish author of literary fairy tales (Denmark, 1805–1875)
Helena Nyblom, Swedish author of literary fairy tales (Sweden, 1843–1926)
Norwegian Folktales (Norway, 1845–1870) by Peter Christen Asbjørnsen and Jørgen Moe
Svenska folksagor och äfventyr (Sweden, 1844–1849) by Gunnar Olof Hyltén-Cavallius
August Bondeson, collector of Swedish folktales (1854–1906)
Jyske Folkeminder by Evald Tang Kristensen (Denmark, 1843–1929)
Svend Grundtvig, Danish folktale collector (Denmark, 1824–1883)
Benjamin Thorpe, English scholar of Anglo-Saxon literature and translator of Nordic and Scandinavian folktales (1782–1870)
Jón Árnason, collector of Icelandic folklore
Adeline Rittershaus, German philologist and translator of Icelandic folktales

Estonia, Finland and Baltic Region

Suomen kansan satuja ja tarinoita (Finland, 1852–1866) by Eero Salmelainen [sv]
August Leskien, German linguist and collector of Baltic folklore (1840–1916)
William Forsell Kirby, English translator of Finnish folklore and folktales (1844–1912)
Jonas Basanavičius, collector of Lithuanian folklore (1851–1927)
Mečislovas Davainis-Silvestraitis, collector of Lithuanian folklore (1849–1919)
Pēteris Šmits [lv], Latvian ethnographer (1869–1938)

Russia

Narodnye russkie skazki (Russia, 1855–1863) by Alexander Afanasyev

Czechia and Slovakia

Božena Němcová, writer and collector of Czech fairy tales (1820–1862)
Alfred Waldau [cs], editor and translator of Czech fairy tales
Jan Karel Hraše [cs], writer and publisher of Czech fairy tales
František Lazecký [cs], publisher of Silesian fairy tales (Slezské pohádky) (1975–1977)
Karel Jaromír Erben, poet, folklorist and publisher of Czech folktales (1811–1870)
August Horislav Škultéty, Slovak writer (1819–1895)
Pavol Dobšinský, collector of Slovak folktales (1828–1885)
Albert Wratislaw, collector of Slavic folktales

Poland

Oskar Kolberg, Polish ethnographer who compiled several Polish folk and fairy tales (1814–1890)
Zygmunt Gloger, Polish historian and ethnographer (1845–1910)
Bolesław Leśmian, Polish poet (1877–1937)
Kornel Makuszyński, Polish writer of children's literature and tales (1884–1953)

Romania

Legende sau basmele românilor (Romania, 1874) by Petre Ispirescu
Queen Elisabeth of Wied's Romanian fairy tales, penned under nom de plume Carmen Sylva
Arthur (1814-1875) and Albert Schott (1809-1847), German folklorists and collectors of Romanian fairy tales
I. C. Fundescu [ro] (1836–1904)
Ion Creangă, Moldavian/Romanian writer, raconteur and schoolteacher (1837-1889)
Ioan Slavici, Romanian writer and journalist (1848–1925)
G. Dem. Teodorescu, Wallachian/Romanian folklorist (1849–1900)
Ion Pop-Reteganul [ro], Romanian folklorist (1853–1905)
Lazăr Șăineanu, Romanian folklorist (1859–1934)
Dumitru Stăncescu [ro], Romanian folklorist (1866–1899)

Balkan Area and Eastern Europe

Louis Léger, French translator of Slavic fairy tales (France, 1843–1923)
Johann Georg von Hahn, Austrian diplomat and collector of Albanian and Greek folklore (1811–1869)
Auguste Dozon, French scholar and diplomat who studied Albanian folklore (1822–1890)
Robert Elsie, Canadian-born German Albanologist (Canada, 1950–2017)
Donat Kurti, Albanian franciscan friar, educator, scholar and folklorist (1903–1983)
Anton Çetta, Albanian folklorist, academic and university professor from Yugoslavia (1920–1995)
Lucy Garnett, British traveller and folklorist on Turkey and Balkanic folklore (1849–1934)
Francis Hindes Groome, English scholar of Romani populations (England, 1851–1902)
Vuk Karadžić, Serbian philologist (Serbia, 1787–1864)
Elodie Lawton, British writer and translator of Serbian folktales (1825–1908)
Friedrich Salomon Krauss, collector of South Slavic folklore
Gašper Križnik [sl] (1848–1904), collector of Slovenian folktales

Hungary

Elek Benedek, Hungarian journalist and collector of Hungarian folktales
János Erdélyi, poet, critic, author, philosopher who collected Hungarian folktales
Gyula Pap, ethographer who contributed to the collection Folk-tales of the Magyars
The Hungarian Fairy Book, by Nándor Pogány (1913).
Old Hungarian Fairy Tales (1895), by Countess Emma Orczy and Montague Barstow.

Spain and Portugal

Fernán Caballero (Cecilia Böhl de Faber) (Spain, 1796–1877)
Francisco Maspons y Labrós (Spain, 1840–1901)
Antoni Maria Alcover i Sureda, priest, writer and collector of folktales in Catalan from Mallorca (Majorca, 1862–1932)
Julio Camarena [es], Spanish folklorist (1949–2004)
Teófilo Braga, collector of Portuguese folktales (Portugal, 1843–1924)
Zófimo Consiglieri Pedroso, Portuguese folklorist (Portugal, 1851–1910)
Wentworth Webster, collector of Basque folklore
Elsie Spicer Eells, researcher on Iberian folklore (Portuguese and Brazilian)

Armenia

Karekin Servantsians (Garegin Sruandzteants'; Bishop Sirwantzdiants), ethnologue and clergyman; publisher of Hamov-Hotov (1884)
Hovhannes Tumanyan, Armenian poet and writer who reworked folkloric material into literary fairy tales (1869–1923)

Middle East

Antoine Galland, French translator of the Arabian Nights (France, 1646–1715)
Gaston Maspero, French translator of Egyptian and Middle Eastern folktales (France, 1846–1916)
Hasan M. El-Shamy, establisher of a catalogue classification of Arab and Middle Eastern folktales
Amina Shah, British anthologiser of Sufi stories and folk tales (1918–2014)
Raphael Patai, scholar of Jewish folklore (1910–1996)
Howard Schwartz, collector and publisher of Jewish folktales (1945–)
Heda Jason [de], Israeli folklorist
Dov Noy [de], Israeli folklorist (1920–2013)

Turkey

Pertev Naili Boratav, Turkish folklorist (1907–1998)
Kaloghlan (Turkey, 1923) by Ziya Gökalp

Indian Subcontinent

Panchatantra (India, 3rd century BC)
Kathasaritsagara, compilation of Indian folklore made by Somadeva in the 11th century CE
Lal Behari Dey, reverend and recorder of Bengali folktales (India, 1824–1892)
James Hinton Knowles, missionary and collector of Kashmiri folklore
Maive Stokes, Indian-born British author (1866–1961)
Joseph Jacobs's book of Indian Fairy Tales (1854–1916)
Natesa Sastri's collection of Tamil folklore (India) and translation of Madanakamaraja Katha
Village Folk-Tales of Ceylon, three volumes by H. Parker (1910)
Pandit Ram Gharib Chaube and British orientalist William Crooke
Verrier Elwin, ethographer and collector of Indian folk tales (1902–1964)
A. K. Ramanujan, poet and scholar of Indian literature (1929–1993)
Santal Folk Tales, three volumes by Paul Olaf Bodding (1925–29)
Shobhanasundari Mukhopadhyay (1877–1937), Indian author and collector of folktales

America

Marius Barbeau, Canadian folklorist (Canada, 1883–1969)
Geneviève Massignon, scholar and publisher of French Acadian folklore (1921–1966)
Carmen Roy, Canadian folklorist (1919–2006)
Joel Chandler Harris's Uncle Remus series of books
Tales from the Cloud Walking Country, by Marie Campbell
Ruth Ann Musick, scholar of West Virginian folklore (1897–1974)
Vance Randolph, folklorist who studied the folklore of the Ozarks (1892–1980)
Cuentos populares mexicanos (Mexico, 2014) by Fabio Morábito
Rafael Rivero Oramas, collector of Venezuelan tales. Author of El mundo de Tío Conejo, collection of Tío Tigre and Tío Conejo tales.
Américo Paredes, author specialized in folklore from Mexico and the Mexican-American border (1915–1999)
Elsie Clews Parsons, American anthropologist and collector of folktales from Central American countries (New York City, 1875–1941)
John Alden Mason, American linguist and collector of Porto Rican folklore (1885–1967)
Aurelio Macedonio Espinosa Sr., scholar of Spanish folklore (1880–1958)

Brazil

Sílvio Romero, Brazilian lawyer and folktale collector (Brazil, 1851–1914)
Luís da Câmara Cascudo, Brazilian anthropologist and ethnologist (Brazil, 1898–1986)
Lindolfo Gomes [pt], Brazilian folklorist (1875–1953)
Marco Haurélio, contemporary writer and folklorist, author of Contos e Fábulas do Brasil and Contos Folclóricos Brasileiros.

South Korea

Baek Hee-na, author of "The Cloud Bread" (South Korea, 1971–)
Hwang Seon-mi, author of "Hen out of the yard" (South Korea, 1963–)

Africa

Hans Stumme, scholar and collector of North African folklore (1864–1936)
Christine Goldberg

Asia

Kunio Yanagita (Japan, 1875–1962)
Seki Keigo, Japanese folklorist
Lafcadio Hearn
Yei Theodora Ozaki, translator of Japanese folk tales (1870–1932)
Dean Fansler, professor and scholar of Filipino folklore

Miscellaneous

Mixed Up Fairy Tales
Fairy Tales (United States, 1965) by E. E. Cummings
Fairy Tales, Now First Collected: To Which are Prefixed Two Dissertations: 1. On Pygmies. 2. On Fairies (England, 1831) by Joseph Ritson

Images for kids

Albert Edelfelt's illustration of Adalmina's Pearl, a Finnish fairy tale by Zachris Topelius.
A picture by Gustave Doré of Mother Goose reading written (literary) fairy tales
Ivan Bilibin's illustration of the Russian fairy tale about Vasilisa the Beautiful
The Violet Fairy Book (1906)
Cutlery for children. Detail showing fairy-tale scenes: Snow White, Little Red Riding Hood, Hansel and Gretel.
John Bauer's illustration of trolls and a princess from a collection of Swedish fairy tales
Kings' Fairy Tale, 1909, by Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis
Beauty and the Beast, illustration by Warwick Goble
Father Frost acts as a donor in the Russian fairy tale Father Frost, testing the heroine before bestowing riches upon her