detail of Swan Lake by Lisbeth Zwerger
FAIRY TALES IN
CONTEMPORARY
LITERATURE
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These contemporary authors are a few of the pillars in the field of fairy tales and have engaged with its genre construction and motifs throughout their careers.
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→ AIMEE BENDER
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Surrealist, emotionally wise and precise, Bender is a masterful short story​ author and novelist, as well as a teacher. She is the author of The Girl in the Flammable Skirt, The Color Master, and The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake, amongst other titles.
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→ KATE BERNHEIMER
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Bernheimer might be the person to know in the world of contemporary fairy tales. She is a novelist, short story writer, pivotal scholar, teacher, and editor. She is the editor of The Fairy Tale Review and co-curator and co-editor of Fairy Tale Architecture, and she has edited multiple anthologies of contemporary fairy tales. Tin House called her “one of the living masters of the fairy tale.”
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→ ANGELA CARTER
Best known for her collection of short story fairy tale adaptations The Bloody Chamber, Carter was a British author writing feminist fairy tale satires in the 60s, 70s, and 80s. Her writing has served as a foundation for our critical relationship to the fairy tale today.
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→ KELLY LINK
While not strictly a fairy tale author, Link's short stories regularly take place in worlds in which magic is taken as a given and characters brush against fairy tale tropes before turning sharply away at the last minute. Link is a masterful fabulist author, editor of Small Beer Press, and owner of the delightful Book Moon Books bookstore.
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→ CARMEN MARIA MACHADO
Machado is a short story author and novelist who uses sci-fi, fantasy, and fabulist themes to write about the body, feminism, and queer identity. In Machado's memoir In the Dreamhouse, she catalogs her experiences within an abusive relationship using →Thompson's Motif-Index of Folk Literature.
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→ SABRINA ORAH MARK
Orah Mark's poetry and flash fiction teeter across genre boundaries to explore lyricism, the writer's positioning within a story, and the playfulness of form. She is well known for →her column Happily on fairy tales and motherhood in The Paris Review.
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→ HELEN OYEYEMI
Oyeyemi's fairy tale novels take place in lyrical, imaginative settings where fairy tale worlds seem to overlap and fairy tale logic reigns. Her novel Boy, Snow, Bird is a loose re-telling of Snow White set in New York City.
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→ CRISTINA RIVERA GARZA
Rivera Garza is one of Mexico's most renowned authors, and her novels, short stories, and poetry are dark, fantastical, disorienting, and prime examples of how fairy tale themes can be rendered magical for adults.
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ADDITIONAL AUTHORS TO KNOW
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Margaret Atwood / Italo Calvino / Robert Coover / Neil Gaiman / Yumiko Kurahashi / Tanith Lee / Clarice Lispector / Mayako Murai / Haruki Murakami / Joy Williams / Jane Yolen / Tawada Yoko
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Author photograph credits, linked in name: (top to bottom) →Aimee Bender, →Kate Bernheimer, →Angela Carter, →Kelly Link, →Carmen Maria Machado, →Sabrina Orah Mark, →Helen Oyeyemi, →Cristina Rivera Garza
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These publications and publishers are reliable sources for literary fairy tales:
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→ THE FAIRY TALE REVIEW
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A delightful annual literary journal of contemporary fairy tale poetry, fiction, and non-fiction edited by living fairy tale wonder Kate Bernheimer, based out of Wayne State University, the only university (to my knowledge) with a fairy tale studies department.
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→ DOROTHY, A PUBLISHING PROJECT
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Dorothy is a small press with a stellar reputation for publishing hybrid-genre writing. While not solely a publisher of fairy tales, they have a penchant for the wild, magical, and form-conscious. This press has published writing by contemporary fairy tale authors Sabrina Orah Mark and Christina Rivera Garza.
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→ TARPAULIN SKY PRESS
Tarpaulin sky, like Dorothy, specializes in publishing hybrid-genre writing. In particular, Tarpaulin Sky tends to feature lyrical texts with a magical element. They've published works like Moon: Letters, Maps, Poems by Jennifer S. Cheng, a collection of poems which explores the Chang'e fairy tale, and Rebecca Brown's Not Heaven, Somewhere Else, a collection of flash fiction revamped fairy tales and myths.
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→ SMALL BEER PRESS
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This indie press publishes fantasy and fiction, often featuring magical realist-bent writing that frequently veers fairy tale. The press is run by fabulist queen Kelly Link and her husband.
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→ PENGUIN BOOKS
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For those interested in less indie, more popular books, Penguin's website includes a fairy tale subsection under their science fiction and fantasy heading.
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Tips for locating resources specifically featuring contemporary fairy tale imaginative writing.
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→ See "General Search Strategies" for additional tips on finding fairy tale resources.
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1. SUBJECT HEADINGS
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Library of Congress subject headings potentially relevant for locating contemporary fairy tales in literature:
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​Note that there are many ​geography and culture specific variants of the "folk literature" and "folk poetry" headings available
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Fairy tales in literature
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Ghouls and ogres in literature
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Literature and folklore
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Magic--Fiction
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Magic realism (Literature)
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Myth in literature
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Note that there are many ​geography and culture specific variants of the "Picaresque literature" heading available
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Princes in literature
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Princesses--Fiction
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Princesses in literature
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Postmodernism (Literature)
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Surrealism (Literature)
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2. SPECIFY PUBLICATION DATE
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You want contemporary fairy tales, after all, so why not specify that in your search terms? With most library catalogs, you can filter your search by publication year. You can also try searching with variants of the terms "twentieth century" and "twenty-first century" literature.
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3. FAIRY TALE AS GENRE
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Did you know that some library catalogs classify fairy tales as their own genre (like fiction or poetry)? You can use this to narrow your search results using the advanced search or search filter.
If you're not finding much you like within the fairy tale genre filter, however, don't be discouraged. Many fairy tale texts embrace hybrid genres and/or are classified simply as fiction or poetry, so be sure to look in those genres as well.
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4. TWITTER & BOOKSTAGRAM
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If you find an author whose fairy tales you enjoy, follow them on Twitter and Instagram—you'll see when they put out new work and see the reading recommendations they share.
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These Twitter accounts are always sharing fantastic fairy tale reading recommendations:
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5. LOOK AT THE BLURBS
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Often book blurbs just tell you who an author's most famous connection is, but sometimes it can tell you what authors they admire. Take a contemporary fairy tale book you love and take a look at the back cover. Who are the authors blurbing this book? Who is the author getting compared to in reviews? They might write fairy tale-esque books as well.
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Recommendations of contemporary fiction, poetry, and hybrid-genre writing featuring fairy tales.
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Click a title to learn more about it. Descriptions are from the books' back cover copy.