Once upon a
time, in a land not so far away, there lived a curious mind who wondered …
what’s going on with all the fairytale hype?
No, I’m not
about to tell you a beautifully woven story inhabited by a damsel in distress,
a wicked witch or a charming prince coming to the rescue for the sake of a
child-friendly happy ending. No, I think I’ll leave that task to my fellow
bloggers already doing an amiable job of spreading the well-known tales of the
Brothers Grimm, Hans Christian Anderson and Charles Perrault. What I am going
to do is tell you the lesser-known versions of those same stories by those same
authors, among others. I am going to tell you about the originals –
uncensored and uncut. The violence, sex and all things grotesque, that you
probably never knew were the foundation of the fairytales populating the
beloved land of rainbows and unicorns we were carried away to as children … and
more recently, our cinemas.
Fairytales have
found a foothold in today’s popular culture in the form of film. From
re-enactments to adaptations, from extensions to fractured fairytales. These
popular stories are being remade, rehashed and revived for a younger generation
and an older one alike. Most twenty-first century children made their first
contact with fairytales, not through a book but through Disney’s animated
films. Fairytales have truly come a far ways from the oral tradition in which
most were born. Yet, they continue to be a reflection of the cultural and
social norms of a time period, simultaneously spreading them. Socializing and
normalizing their rapt audience, telling us how the world could be and how to
handle it, fairytales and their film adaptations are no longer for children alone.
Follow me as I
tell you about the fairytales as transcribed by the Brothers Grimm, conceived
by Hans Christian Anderson and created by Charles Perrault as their revivals
find their way onto a big screen near you. And who knows, you might even learn
something about yourself and the society you live in.
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