INTRODUCTION

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Livid kings. Missing mothers. Isolation in towers. Lost children. We associate fairy tales with years uncountably long ago, and yet this genre still manages to hold urgency and relevance today.

 

Contemporary adaptations of fairy tales are exploring exciting reinterpretations of the genre through such lenses as feminism, disability, and queer identity. With the advent of mass media, tv, Disney films, and the internet, fairy tale adaptations have exploded.

 

Yet, despite the wealth of contemporary fairy tale adaptations, the field of fairy tale studies maintains its focus on the classics. There are a plethora of excellent guides for learning about the history of classic fairy tales, locating classic fairy tales, and general fairy tale studies. 

 

This guide is instead an introduction specifically to the contemporary fairy tale. The resources shared here are to help begin learning about and locating contemporary fairy tales broadly, as well as resources about contemporary fairy tale literature and visual art more specifically.

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 SCOPE

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PURPOSE

to offer multiple entry points into the realm of contemporary fairy tales, to provide a couple of approaches to contemporary fairy tales that hopefully spark further exploration.

 

COVERAGE

Contemporary fairy tale here is defined as an artistic adaptation—created since 1950—of fairy tale stories, themes, symbols, tone, and formal structure. This guide was designed for an adult audience who may not have access to a university library system; all resources shared in this guide are thus either freely available online or easily accessible to the public through a bookstore. All resources are in English.

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MATERIALS

This guide includes contemporary fairy tale reference texts, websites, journals, and presses, as well as recommendations of key authors and artists in the field.

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