Editing Fairy tale (section)

==History==
[[File:WUL-he21 02799 剪燈新話 2.pdf|thumb|page=12|Pages from a printed edition of the 14th-century Chinese "wonder tales" collection ''[[Jiandeng Xinhua]]'' by [[Qu You]]; the collection is considered to be one of the most influential East Asian works of fiction.<ref>{{cite web | url = https://ilab.org/assets/catalogues/catalogs_files_Kagerou%20Bunko%202018%20China%20in%20Print%20Catalogue.pdf | title = Kagerou Bunko | work = International League of Antiquarian Booksellers (ILAB) | quote = ... many writers in those countries were inspired to regard ''Jiandeng Xinhua'' as the supreme model for composing fiction.}}</ref>]]

The [[oral tradition]] of the fairy tale came long before the written page. Tales were told or enacted dramatically, rather than written down, and handed down from generation to generation. Because of this, the history of their development is necessarily obscure and blurred. Fairy tales appear, now and again, in written literature throughout literate cultures,{{efn|Scholars John Th. Honti and Gédeon Huet asserted the existence of fairy tales in ancient and medieval literature, as well as in classical mythology.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Honti |first1=John Th. |title=Celtic Studies and European Folk-Tale Research |journal=Béaloideas |date=1936 |volume=6 |issue=1 |pages=33–39 |doi=10.2307/20521905 |jstor=20521905 }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Krappe |first1=Alexander Haggerty |title=Review of Les contes popularies. |journal=Modern Language Notes |date=1925 |volume=40 |issue=7 |pages=429–431 |doi=10.2307/2914006 |jstor=2914006 }}</ref>}}{{efn|Even further back, according to professor Berlanga Fernández, elements of international "Märchen" show "exact parallels and themes (...) that seem to be common with Greek folklore and later tradition".<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Berlanga Fernández |first1=Inmaculada |title=Temática folclórica en la Literatura asiática (Oriente Extremo). Relación con los mitos griegos |trans-title=Folk themes in Asian Literature (Far East). Relationship to Greek myths |language=es |journal=Aldaba |date=4 December 2017 |issue=31 |pages=239–252 |doi=10.5944/aldaba.31.2001.20465 |doi-broken-date=2 November 2024 |doi-access=free }}</ref>}} as in ''[[The Golden Ass]]'', which includes ''[[Cupid and Psyche]]'' ([[Ancient Rome|Roman]], 100–200 AD),<ref name="timeline">{{Cite web |first=Heidi Anne |last=Heiner |url=https://www.surlalunefairytales.com/intro-pages/fairy-tale-timeline.html |title=Fairy Tale Timeline |work=Sur La Lune |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200815081558/https://surlalunefairytales.com/intro-pages/fairy-tale-timeline.html |archive-date=15 August 2020 |url-status=live}}</ref> or the ''[[Panchatantra]]'' ([[Folklore of India|India]] 3rd century BC),<ref name="timeline"/> but it is unknown to what extent these reflect the actual folk tales even of their own time. The stylistic evidence indicates that these, and many later collections, reworked folk tales into literary forms.{{Sfn|Swann Jones|1995|p=35}} What they do show is that the fairy tale has ancient roots, older than the ''[[The Book of One Thousand and One Nights|Arabian Nights]]'' collection of magical tales (compiled ''circa'' 1500 AD),<ref name="timeline"/> such as ''[[Baital Pachisi|Vikram and the Vampire]]'', and ''[[Bel and the Dragon]]''. Besides such collections and individual tales, in [[Chinese folklore|China]] [[Taoism|Taoist]] philosophers such as [[Liezi]] and [[Zhuangzi (book)|Zhuangzi]] recounted fairy tales in their philosophical works.<ref name=Roberts>{{cite book |editor-first=Moss |editor-last=Roberts |date=1979 |chapter=Introduction |page=xviii |title=Chinese Fairy Tales & Fantasies |publisher=Knopf Doubleday Publishing |isbn=0-394-73994-9}}</ref> In the broader definition of the genre, the first famous Western fairy tales are those of [[Aesop]] (6th century BC) in [[ancient Greece]].

Scholarship points out that [[Medieval literature]] contains early versions or predecessors of later known tales and motifs, such as [[Grateful dead (folklore)|the grateful dead]], [[The Bird Lover]] or the quest for the lost wife.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Szoverffy |first1=Joseph |title=Some Notes on Medieval Studies and Folklore |journal=The Journal of American Folklore |date=July 1960 |volume=73 |issue=289 |pages=239–244 |doi=10.2307/537977 |jstor=537977 }}</ref>{{efn|Folklorist [[Alexander Haggerty Krappe]] argued that most of historical variants of tale types are traceable to the Middle Ages, and some are attested in literary works of [[classical antiquity]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Krappe |first=Alexander Haggerty |title=The Science of Folklore |location=New York: Barnes & Noble |date=1962 |pages=14–15 |oclc=492920}}</ref> Likewise, Francis Lee Utley showed that medieval [[Celtic literature]] and [[Arthurian mythos]] contain recognizable motifs of tale types described in the international index.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Utley |first1=Francis Lee |title=Arthurian Romance and International Folktale Method |journal=Romance Philology |date=1964 |volume=17 |issue=3 |pages=596–607 |jstor=44939518 }}</ref>}} Recognizable folktales have also been reworked as the plot of folk literature and oral epics.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Bošković-Stulli |first1=Maja |title=Sižei narodnih bajki u Hrvatskosrpskim epskim pjesmama |trans-title=Subjects of folk tales in Croato-Serbian epics |journal=Narodna umjetnost: Hrvatski časopis za etnologiju i folkloristiku |date=1962 |volume=1 |issue=1 |pages=15–36 |url=https://hrcak.srce.hr/34044 |language=hr |access-date=20 April 2021 |archive-date=20 April 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210420222326/https://hrcak.srce.hr/34044 |url-status=live }}</ref>

Jack Zipes writes in ''When Dreams Came True'', "There are fairy tale elements in [[Geoffrey Chaucer|Chaucer]]'s ''[[The Canterbury Tales]]'', [[Edmund Spenser]]'s ''[[The Faerie Queene]]'', and&nbsp;in many of [[William Shakespeare]] plays."{{Sfn|Zipes|2007|p=12}} ''[[King Lear]]'' can be considered a literary variant of fairy tales such as ''[[Water and Salt]]'' and ''[[Cap O' Rushes]]''.<ref>{{Cite book |first1=Soula |last1=Mitakidou |first2=Anthony L. |last2=Manna |first3=Melpomene |last3=Kanatsouli |title=Folktales from Greece: A Treasury of Delights |page=100 |publisher=Libraries Unlimited |location=Greenwood Village, Colorado |date=2002 |isbn=1-56308-908-4}}</ref> The tale itself resurfaced in [[Western literature]] in the 16th and 17th centuries, with ''[[The Facetious Nights of Straparola]]'' by [[Giovanni Francesco Straparola]] (Italy, 1550 and 1553),<ref name="timeline"/> which contains many fairy tales in its inset tales, and the [[Naples|Neapolitan]] tales of [[Giambattista Basile]] (Naples, 1634–36),<ref name="timeline"/> which are all fairy tales.{{Sfn|Swann Jones|1995|p=38}} [[Carlo Gozzi]] made use of many fairy tale motifs among his [[Commedia dell'Arte]] scenarios,<ref>{{cite web |last1=Windling |first1=Terri |title=White as Ricotta, Red as Wine: The Magical Lore of Italy |url=https://endicottstudio.typepad.com/articleslist/white-as-ricotta-red-as-wine-the-magical-lore-of-italy-by-terri-windling.html |work=Journal of Mythic Arts |access-date=19 August 2022 |archive-date=3 October 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221003235121/https://endicottstudio.typepad.com/articleslist/white-as-ricotta-red-as-wine-the-magical-lore-of-italy-by-terri-windling.html |url-status=live }}</ref> including among them one based on ''[[The Love for Three Oranges (fairy tale)|The Love For Three Oranges]]'' (1761).{{Sfn|Calvino|1980|p=738}} Simultaneously, [[Pu Songling]], in China, included many fairy tales in his collection, ''[[Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio]]'' (published posthumously, 1766),<ref name=Roberts /> which has been described by Yuken Fujita of [[Keio University]] as having "a reputation as the most outstanding short story collection."<ref>{{cite journal |last=Fujita |first=Yuken |url=https://koara.lib.keio.ac.jp/xoonips/modules/xoonips/detail.php?koara_id=AN00072643-00030001-0049 |title=聊齋志異研究序説 : 特に蒲松齡の執筆態度に就いて |trans-title=Introduction to the study of "liao chai chih i" (Ryosai shii) : with special reference to the author's attitude |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221205233648/https://koara.lib.keio.ac.jp/xoonips/modules/xoonips/detail.php?koara_id=AN00072643-00030001-0049 |archive-date=5 December 2022 |journal=藝文研究 [Geibun kenkyū] |issue=3 |date=1954 |pages=49–61 |issn=0435-1630 |lang=ja}} CRID [https://cir.nii.ac.jp/crid/1050282813926397312 1050282813926397312]</ref> The fairy tale itself became popular among the ''[[précieuses]]'' of upper-class [[Early Modern France|France]] (1690–1710),<ref name="timeline"/> and among the tales told in that time were the ones of [[La Fontaine]] and the ''Contes'' of [[Charles Perrault]] (1697), who fixed the forms of ''[[Sleeping Beauty]]'' and ''[[Cinderella]]''.{{Sfn|Zipes|2007|pp=38–42}} Although Straparola's, Basile's and Perrault's collections contain the oldest known forms of various fairy tales, on the stylistic evidence, all the writers rewrote the tales for literary effect.{{Sfn|Swann Jones|1995|pp=38–39}}

===The Salon Era===

In the mid-17th century, a vogue for magical tales emerged among the intellectuals who frequented the [[salon (gathering)|salons]] of Paris. These salons were regular gatherings hosted by prominent aristocratic women, where women and men could gather together to discuss the issues of the day.

In the 1630s, aristocratic women began to gather in their own living rooms, salons, to discuss the topics of their choice: arts and letters, politics, and social matters of immediate concern to the women of their class: marriage, love, financial and physical independence, and access to education. This was a time when women were barred from receiving a formal education. Some of the most gifted women writers of the period came out of these early salons (such as [[Madeleine de Scudéry]] and [[Madame de Lafayette]]), which encouraged women's independence and pushed against the gender barriers that defined their lives. The [[salonnières]] argued particularly for love and intellectual compatibility between the sexes, opposing the system of arranged marriages.

Sometime in the middle of the 17th century, a passion for the conversational [[parlour game]] based on the plots of old [[Folklore|folk tales]] swept through the salons. Each [[salonnière]] was called upon to retell an old tale or rework an old theme, spinning clever new stories that not only showcased verbal agility and imagination but also slyly commented on the conditions of aristocratic life. Great emphasis was placed on a mode of delivery that seemed natural and spontaneous. The decorative language of the fairy tales served an important function: disguising the rebellious subtext of the stories and sliding them past the court censors. Critiques of court life (and even of the king) were embedded in extravagant tales and in dark, sharply [[dystopia]]n ones. Not surprisingly, the tales by women often featured young (but clever) aristocratic girls whose lives were controlled by the arbitrary whims of fathers, kings, and elderly wicked fairies, as well as tales in which groups of wise fairies (i.e., intelligent, independent women) stepped in and put all to rights.

The [[salon (gathering)|salon]] tales as they were originally written and published have been preserved in a monumental work called ''[[Le Cabinet des Fées]]'', an enormous collection of stories from the 17th and 18th centuries.<ref name=Windling1 />

===Later works===
[[File:Redsun.jpg|thumb|right|alt=Illustration of the Russian fairy tale about Vasilisa the Beautiful, showing a rider on a horse in a forest|[[Ivan Bilibin]] (1876–1942)'s illustration of the [[Russian fairy tale]] about [[Vasilisa the Beautiful]]]]
[[File:The violet fairy book (1906) (14751020284).jpg|thumb|[[Lang's Fairy Books#The Violet Fairy Book (1901)|The Violet Fairy Book]] (1906)|alt=]]
The first collectors to attempt to preserve not only the plot and characters of the tale, but also the style in which they were told, was the [[Brothers Grimm]], collecting German fairy tales; ironically, this meant although their first edition (1812 & 1815)<ref name="timeline"/> remains a treasure for folklorists, they rewrote the tales in later editions to make them more acceptable, which ensured their sales and the later popularity of their work.{{Sfn|Swann Jones|1995|p=40}}

Such literary forms did not merely draw from the folktale, but also influenced folktales in turn. The Brothers Grimm rejected several tales for their collection, though told orally to them by Germans, because the tales derived from Perrault, and they concluded they were thereby [[French folklore|French]] and not German tales; an oral version of "[[Bluebeard]]" was thus rejected, and the tale of ''Little Briar Rose'', clearly related to Perrault's "[[Sleeping Beauty]]", was included only because Jacob Grimm convinced his brother that the figure of [[Brynhildr]], from much earlier [[Norse mythology]], proved that the sleeping princess was authentically [[Germanic mythology|Germanic]] folklore.<ref>{{Cite book|first=G. Ronald|last=Murphy|date=2000|title=The Owl, The Raven, and the Dove: The Religious Meaning of the Grimms' Magic Fairy Tales|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=0-19-515169-0}}</ref>

This consideration of whether to keep ''Sleeping Beauty'' reflected a belief common among folklorists of the 19th century: that the folk tradition preserved fairy tales in forms from pre-history except when "contaminated" by such literary forms, leading people to tell inauthentic tales.{{Sfn|Zipes|2007|p=77}} The rural, illiterate, and uneducated peasants, if suitably isolated, were the ''folk'' and would tell pure ''folk'' tales.{{Sfn|Degh|1988|pp=66–67}} Sometimes they regarded fairy tales as a form of fossil, the remnants of a once-perfect tale.<ref>{{Cite book|last1=Opie|first1=Iona|last2=Opie|first2=Peter|author1-link=Iona Opie|author2-link=Peter Opie|date=1974|title=The Classic Fairy Tales|page=17|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-211559-1}}</ref> However, further research has concluded that fairy tales never had a fixed form, and regardless of literary influence, the tellers constantly altered them for their own purposes.<ref>{{cite book|last=Yolen|first=Jane|author-link=Jane Yolen|date=2000|page=22|title=Touch Magic|publisher=August House|location=Little Rock, Arkansas|isbn=0-87483-591-7}}</ref>

The work of the Brothers Grimm influenced other collectors, both inspiring them to collect tales and leading them to similarly believe, in a spirit of [[romantic nationalism]], that the fairy tales of a country were particularly representative of it, to the neglect of cross-cultural influence. Among those influenced were the Russian [[Alexander Afanasyev]] (first published in 1866),<ref name="timeline"/> the Norwegians [[Peter Christen Asbjørnsen]] and [[Jørgen Moe]] (first published in 1845),<ref name="timeline"/> the Romanian [[Petre Ispirescu]] (first published in 1874), the English [[Joseph Jacobs]] (first published in 1890),<ref name="timeline"/> and [[Jeremiah Curtin]], an American who collected Irish tales (first published in 1890).{{Sfn|Zipes|2001|p=846}} Ethnographers collected fairy tales throughout the world, finding similar tales in Africa, the Americas, and Australia; [[Andrew Lang]] was able to draw on not only the written tales of Europe and Asia, but those collected by ethnographers, to fill his [[Andrew Lang's Fairy Books|"coloured" fairy books series]].<ref>{{Cite book|first=Andrew|last=Lang|date=1904|title=The Brown Fairy Book|chapter-url=http://www.mythfolklore.net/andrewlang/brown.htm|chapter=Preface|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070304094615/http://www.mythfolklore.net/andrewlang/brown.htm|archive-date=4 March 2007}}</ref> They also encouraged other collectors of fairy tales, as when [[Yei Theodora Ozaki]] created a collection, ''Japanese Fairy Tales'' (1908), after encouragement from Lang.<ref>{{Cite book|first=Yei Theodora|last=Ozaki|title=Japanese Fairy Tales|chapter-url=https://www.surlalunefairytales.com/books/japan/ozaki/preface.html|chapter=Preface|via=Sur La Lune}}</ref> Simultaneously, writers such as [[Hans Christian Andersen]] and [[George MacDonald]] continued the tradition of literary fairy tales. Andersen's work sometimes drew on old folktales, but more often deployed fairytale motifs and plots in new tales.{{Sfn|Clute|Grant|1997|loc="Hans Christian Andersen"|pp=26–27}} MacDonald incorporated fairytale motifs both in new literary fairy tales, such as ''[[The Light Princess]]'', and in works of the genre that would become fantasy, as in ''[[The Princess and the Goblin]]'' or ''[[Lilith (novel)|Lilith]]''.{{Sfn|Clute|Grant|1997|loc="George MacDonald"|p=604}}