Fairy tales and the art of subversion : the classical genre for children and the process of civilization / Jack Zipes.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Zipes, Jack, 1937-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Fairy tales--History and criticism.

Fairy tales.

Children--Books and reading.

Children.

Socialization.

Moral development.

Physical Description:

xii, 254 pages ; 23 cm

Edition:

Second edition.

Place of Publication:

New York : Routledge, 2006.

Summary:

The fairy tale may be one of the most important cultural and social influences on children's lives. But until the publication of the first edition of Fairy Tales and the Art of Subversion little attention had been paid to the ways in which the writers and collectors of tales used traditional forms and genres in order to shape children's behavior, values, and relationship to society.

As Jack Zipes convincingly shows, fairy tales have always been a powerful discourse, capable of being used to shape or destabilize attitudes and behavior within culture. He asks questions that link the fairy tale to society and to our political unconscious. How and why did certain authors try to influence children or social images of our children? How did they react to the prescribed fairy-tale discourse?

This updated and expanded second edition of Fairy Tales and the Art of Subversion incorporates important recent research in the fields of folklore and fairy-tale studies. Jack Zipes has added new chapters on the influence of Italian fairy tale authors Basile and Straparola on the classic French writers Perrault and d'Aulnoy and a new essay on Walt Disney's extraordinary impact on the genre as a 'revolutionary' fairy tale filmmaker.

Contents:

1 Fairy-Tale Discourse: Toward a Social History of the Genre 1

2 The Origins of the Fairy Tale in Italy: Straparola and Basile 13

3 Setting Standards for Civilization through Fairy Tales: Charles Perrault and the Subversive Role of Women Writers 29

4 Who's Afraid of the Brothers Grimm? Socialization and Politicization through Fairy Tales 59

5 Hans Christian Andersen and the Discourse of the Dominated 81

6 Inverting and Subverting the World with Hope: The Fairy Tales of George MacDonald, Oscar Wilde, and L. Frank Baum 105

7 The Battle over Fairy-Tale Discourse: Family, Friction, and Socialization in the Weimar Republic and Nazi Germany 137

8 The Liberating Potential of the Fantastic in Contemporary Fairy Tales for Children 169

9 Walt Disney's Civilizing Mission: From Revolution to Restoration 193.

Notes:

Previous ed.: London: Heinemann, 1983.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 227-237) and index.

ISBN:

0415976693

0415976707

OCLC:

62281575

Publisher Number:

9780415976695

9780415976701