National Dreams : The Remaking of Fairy Tales in Nineteenth-Century England / Jennifer Schacker.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Schacker, Jennifer, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Fairy tales in literature.

Fairy tales--Adaptations--History and criticism.

Fairy tales.

English fiction--19th century--History and criticism.

English fiction.

Books and reading--England--History--19th century.

Books and reading.

Popular literature--England--History and criticism.

Popular literature.

Children's stories, English--History and criticism.

Children's stories, English.

Fantasy fiction, English--History and criticism.

Fantasy fiction, English.

Fairy tales--England--History and criticism.

Genre:

Electronic books.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (205 pages) : illustrations

Edition:

First paperback edition.

Place of Publication:

Philadelphia : University of Pennsylvania Press, [2015]

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

Fairy tales and folktales have long been mainstays of children's literature, celebrated as imaginatively liberating, psychologically therapeutic, and mirrors of foreign culture. Focusing on the fairy tale in nineteenth-century England, where many collections found their largest readership, National Dreams examines influential but critically neglected early experiments in the presentation of international tale traditions to English readers. Jennifer Schacker looks at such wondrous story collections as Grimms' fairy tales and The Arabian Nights in order to trace the larger stories of cross-cultural encounter in which these books were originally embedded. Examining aspects of publishing history alongside her critical readings of tale collections' introductions, annotations, story texts, and illustrations, Schacker's National Dreams reveals the surprising ways fairy tales shaped and were shaped by their readers.Schacker shows how the folklore of foreign lands became popular reading material for a broad English audience, historicizing assumed connections between traditional narrative and children's reading. The tales imported and presented by such British writers as Edgar Taylor, T. Crofton Croker, Edward Lane, and George Webbe Dasent were intended to stimulate readers' imaginations in more ways than one. Fairy-tale collections provided flights of fancy but also opportunities for reflection on the modern self, on the transformation of popular culture, and on the nature of "Englishness." Schacker demonstrates that such critical reflections were not incidental to the popularity of foreign tales but central to their magical hold on the English imagination.Offering a theoretically sophisticated perspective on the origins of current assumptions about the significance of fairy tales, National Dreams provides a rare look at the nature and emergence of one of the most powerful and enduring genres in English literature.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Contents

Chapter 1. Introduction

Chapter 2. The Household Tales in the Household Library: Edgar Taylor's German Popular Stories

Chapter 3. Everything Is in the Telling: T. Crofton Croker's Fairy Legends and Traditions of the South of Ireland

Chapter 4. Otherness and Otherworldliness: Edward W. Lane's Arabian Nights

Chapter 5. The Dreams of the Younger Brother: George Webbe Dasenfs Popular Tales from the Norse

Chapter 6. Conclusion:Dreams

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Acknowledgments

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (p. [179]-188) and index.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 08. Jul 2019)

ISBN:

9780812204162

0812204166

OCLC:

933516498