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Author
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Comment
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janeyolen
Registered User
(6/14/04 3:18 am)
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Re: What Fueled Your Fairy Tale Obsession
Nalo--as I live ten minutes from Smith College (and often lecture there) don't you DARE arrive without letting me know!
Jane
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Nalo
Registered User
(6/15/04 7:55 pm)
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Re: What Fueled Your Fairy Tale Obsession
Deal!
-nalo
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Kali
Randone
Registered User
(7/13/04 1:10 pm)
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Re: What Fueled Your Fairy Tale Obsession
I've read fairytales before, and watched some of the Disney movies
based on fairytales, but I think that what really fueled my fairytale
obsession was--strangely enough--playing "Kingdom Hearts"
recently, specifically the area "Hollow Bastion." I'm
not sure what it was, but going through the level and letting my
mind work on its own brought about a sort of epiphany. I suddenly
had an interest in watching the Disney movie "Sleeping
Beauty," and I pieced together certain ideas that appeared
in my mind. From those ideas I put together a very sketchy idea
for a fairytale of my own, which I'm currently attempting to write.
Anyway, since then, I've read several different versions of "Sleeping
Beauty," and found other ones like "Donkeyskin"
that I'd also like to read.
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Kali
Randone
Registered User
(7/15/04 10:01 am)
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East Of The Sun & West Of The Moon.
This may be a little irrelevant, but I just read the fairytale "East
Of The Sun & West Of The Moon," and I really enjoyed
it! It's now my favorite fairytale. ^_^ Also, it somehow reminds
me of the one that I'm trying to write, so maybe I could use it
as inspiration.
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bwcajp
Registered User
(7/16/04 12:28 am)
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Re: What Fueled Your Fairy Tale Obsession
For me it wasn't so much books at first, as television. As a small
child growing up in the 1960's I was entranced by the East German
series "The Singing Ringing Tree", which was adapted and
broadcast on the BBC. Also, my mum had an old chest in the loft
which was lined with coloured Victorian engravings - all these things
terrified me more than any of the insipid children's books in the
house at the time. A couple of years later I was old enough for
my mum to let me peruse her own children's fairy tale volumes, cheap
compilations of various stories released by Dent in the 1930's,
and full of illustrations by Arthur
Rackham, the Robinsons,
Helen
Stratton, etc. These made a massive impact on me.
The biggest impression in later years was Arthur Rackham's illustration work, which I re-discovered and was completely swept away by at age 15.
Since then other artists have kept me inspired (the latest is a re-discovery of Sidney Sime), so I've never really come back to earth since.
Should I be embarrassed for that? Not a bit. In fact I highly recommend fairy tales as a suitable antidote and escape from all the nastiness around the world.
John (out there and proud of it)
**************************
John Shelley Illustration
http://www.jshelley.com
**************************
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claudiasky79
Registered User
(7/20/04 11:17 pm)
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Re: Mad, bad and dangerous to read!
I wouldn't say Alice
in Wonderland was bratty but rather she was courious, a seeker,
an explorer in a sense searching for something, a truth insomething
or someone ..but don't we all do that in a sense?? I know i do...
I love that story because of the dream state of consiousness I feel
it streams. I am involved in studing fairy tales from the perspective
of how it relates to a child {now being an adult I myself do not
recall much feeling from stories}... how Fairy tales relate to a
child through their everyday life and their state of dreams and
nightmares... there is so much symbolism I feel in fairy tales that
remind me of the dreaming state. As I read or listen I sit and visualize
as if I am seeing the story tellers dreams or nightmares...
anyway...
Edited by: claudiasky79 at: 7/20/04 11:26 pm
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Laura
Registered User
(7/24/04 10:32 pm)
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Adding in my chime
So many others here have noted the same influences as me, and Helen
has it right: the formative experiences seem to have formed us all
something alike. Like others, I was a precocious reader -- like
others, I loved the stories so much I quickly tired of being read
to, since I could get the story faster by reading it myself. Like
others, I had favorite collections with illustrations I could lose
myself in (sadly, they didn't stand the test of artistic time, but
they'll always have value for the emotional memory). A particular
favorite, Pickle
Chiffon Pie by Roger Bradfield, was no classic tale, but
it drew on enough of the motifs to trigger a lifelong love -- and
an adult quest to understand why that one story had hit me so hard.
Its message of compassion and wisdom before strength, bravery, or
wit is one I have struggled to live up to all my life. Other texts
-- D'Aulaire's,
the colored fairy books,
Lloyd Alexander novels, Terri
and Ellen's collections, etc. -- each had their place and moment.
I still vividly recall the Christmas I received my complete HC Andersen
volume and the depth of anger, frustration, and heartbreak I felt
at the Little Mermaid's
death (well before the Disney film was made). Took me years to understand
why the story was written the way it was, and even longer to decide
what my visceral reaction to his stories meant for me personally.
My only regret was not being exposed to a greater number of non-European
stories, and the diversity of stories now available in readable
translation is something I look forward to sharing with my own child.
I regard folk tales as of such seminal importance that, when my
niece was adopted away into her new home, my parting gift to her
was a copy of Jane Yolen's Favorite
Folktales from Around the World. I can only hope that the
stories play as wonderful a role in her life as they have in mine.
Laura Scheuer
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CrCeres
Unregistered User
(7/25/04 2:49 pm)
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My Fairy Tale Obsession
From age 3 to 8 my family read the Oz
books, Little
House books, and the Hobbit
aloud. Even though they're not fairy tales, I think they have the
same sort of serious/fantastical tone. Also, my mom is an excellent
storyteller, so I got hilarious interpretations of Greek and Norse
myths. Then at some point I discovered a collection of Grimm tales
illustrated by Rackham,
at which point I began seriously packing down a foundation of stories.
I didn't think much about retellings until I started reading McKinley
and some of Terri
Windling's collections. Then there were illustrations by Pogany,
Pyle, Nielson,
whoever did the Lang
books, Dulac,
and Alan Lee.
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Ailanna
Unregistered User
(7/26/04 11:11 pm)
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East o' the Sun, West o' the Moon, etc.
My mother read to me constantly as a child-- from day one, really,
since my older sister was already addicted to this daily (or sometimes
more than daily) habit by the time I was born. I think the illustrations
were what drew me to fairy tales by the time I was old enough to
pick out the books. Fairy tale picture books have some of the loveliest
artwork, and I grew up with both Kinuko
Craft and Ruth
Sanderson's Twelve Dancing Princesses, O'Zelinsky's
Rumpelstiltskin, Trina
Schart Hyman's Sleeping Beauty, and too many others to list.
I particularly liked a version of East
o' the Sun, West o' the Moon with bright, stylized illustrations.
It's still my favorite fairy tale, I suppose because the heroine
is such an active figure in her own story.
Anyway, the fairy tale picture books led to children's fantasy,
mainly Lloyd Alexander but also Patricia
Wrede and Thurber's 13
Clocks. Despite flings with (how embarrassing! the Babysitter's
Club books when I was eight), Robin Hood retellings, and more recently
space opera, fantasy is still my first love. I read books in several
subgenres; fairy tale influenced fantasy is one of them. I've always
preferred fantasy with strong fairy tale overtones to adventure
or action driven fantasy-- Dunsany and Beagle and McKillip to, oh,
Eddings and Feist and Martin. I'm reading Mervyn Peake's Titus
Groan. It's fascinating in that it contains a number of the
traditional elements of fairy tales: the princess, the castle, the
christening-- but in a decayed and utterly pessimistic fashion.
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Gregor9
Registered User
(7/27/04 9:29 am)
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What fueled your fairy tale habit?
Like Nalo said...so many things. A lot of the literature has been
mentioned in these 3 pages of posts. In my case not only literature,
but film. Cartoons like the "Popeye" version of Sinbad,
and Ali Baba; the Harryhausen films of Jason
& the Argonauts and Sinbad;
the early television series of Robin Hood and Ivanhoe; Danny
Kaye films, (yes, I know, these aren't fairy tales per se),
a movie version of "the Pied Piper" and Shirley Temple's
TV series in the late '50s that frequently featured fantasy pieces
from fairy tale to ETA Hoffman. For me, fairy tales were simply
part of the broader universe of fantasy literature & storytelling,
and I don't know that I made a distinction between them and myths
and fantastic stories period, until much later. I was attracted,
magpie-like, to all that was slightly dark and sinister (and I'm
sure some therapist could have fun with this if I let him). Fantasia's
"Night on Bald Mountain" sequence was the thing I remembered
for years from the film (a film which also set me on-course to a
love of Russian composers), and I used to sit around sketching the
images of Chernabog, long before I learned that Bela Lugosi had
posed for the rotoscoping. But the music also became a way into
story and imagination--Fingal's Cave and The Love for Three Oranges,
and Scheherazade, and so forth. So in a sense I probably can't pull
the fairy tales out of the larger fantasy mandala in which they're
embedded.
GF
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isildae21
Registered User
(8/2/04 11:10 pm)
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Re: What fueled your fairy tale habit?
I think I was born loving fairy tales, they are so much apart of my psyche.
My earliest memories are of watching the cannon movie-tales on The Disney Channel, or listening to old scratched albums of Tom Thumb, and Goldilocks and the Three Bears. My favorite show when I was in kindergarten wasn't Sesame Street, or The Smurfs, but The Grimm's Fairytale cartoons on Nick Jr.(if anyone can remember those.)
I practically worshiped The
Cannon movie-tales, they have shaped my imagination to this
day, and I still have my weary old T.V. recordings of them.
I didn't start reading fairy tales until I got a little older, and when I did they were always re-tellings, and always of a more adult nature. I became entranced, and obsessed.
I can't even really express how fairy tales effect me, I'm so deeply in love with them.
I've never related more with anyone or anything than I do with Snow White, and her Stepmother, or Bearskin, or the princess in Grisleybeard. Fairy Tales speak to my soul and always have.
For me its so much more than a habit, fairy tales ARE me.
But I give all the credit to The
Cannon Movie-Tales, and The Grimm's Fairy Tale cartoons on Nick
Jr., and to my Mother who used to read to me at night before I went
to bed.
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Colleen
Unregistered User
(8/3/04 9:43 am)
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Thanks to Moms (and Dads) Who Read to Their Kids
The previous post made me think of a snippet of poetry I've probably known forever (but don't know the author):
"Richer than I you can never be, for I had a Mother who read to me."
Maybe it sounds trite and cliched in our jaded age but I like it. It helps keep me in mind of what's truly important to me and what, really, is not.
Thanks Mom!
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ASweeney
Unregistered User
(8/3/04 1:06 pm)
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Animal Farm
This is odd, but my book is Orwell's Animal
Farm. I picked it up when I was in 4th grade, because I thought
it was about magic animals. I read it, and I understood it (and
was really proud that I did).
I was expecting a light read, and I was so excited to get a fairy
tale that didn't patronize me. Shortly after that, saw Watership
Down (wow - a cartoon that wasn't nice and sweet!). After that,
it was like a new world was open. I felt like I saw behind the curtain.
Enduring impressions have been made by Jim Henson (everything he
& his company ever did), Edith Hamilton's Mythology,
and the Gormenghast
novels (if only Peake could have finished!!)
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Ailanna
Unregistered User
(8/3/04 7:33 pm)
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Jim Henson
Your post reminded me of a teacher I had in elementary school named Mrs. Green-- she wasn't a regular teacher, but was a talented ventriloquist who really enlivened our once weekly story hour. She had a Gurgi puppet!
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isildae21
Registered User
(8/3/04 11:27 pm)
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Re: Animal Farm
I've just started reading The
Gormenghast Novels now, and they are so rich with fairytale
symbolics.
Though most scholars insist on the characters being nothing but human, but I swear when I began reading that I thought them all to be faeries in disguise, I mean how much more fairy-ish and dastardly, and mischievous can a character be than Steerpike?
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ASweeney
Unregistered User
(8/4/04 9:05 am)
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Adult influences
Hmm. While I count Animal
Farm as the first "ooooh wow" book, my obession for
anything fantastic was dormant for a long time. I avoided fantasy
(and genre fiction of any sort) like the plague. I was reading the
wrong stuff - it didn't capture my sense of wonder at all. What
brought me back was Neil Gaiman's Sandman
series. It had everything I loved, and it didn't make me feel stupid
for reading it.
Ah, Neil. Thank you for saving me from an adulthood full of stuffiness.
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isildae21
Registered User
(8/4/04 12:00 pm)
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Re: Adult influences
Neil is the best. . .Him and Tori Amos. They're like a fairy
tale lovers dream!
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C Patton
Registered User
(8/15/04 5:15 am)
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Adult Influences
My first really strong memories of fairy tales come from the Time/Life 'Enchanted World' series (a 21 volume set of fairy tale books). I think I read them when I was 11 or 12, and I can remember sitting on the floor of the Houston Public Library's children's room and picking out the ones I had not read yet. I read constantly as a child, so I'm sure I read a lot of fairy tale books before those, but those are the ones I most clearly remember.
I discovered Joseph Campbell through the PBS series, 'Power
of Myth', and read many of his books, but
I didn't read fairy tales for a long time, and stumbled back into
them when I started reading science fiction and fantasy in college
- I would just pick up books that looked interesting, and fell in
love with Patricia
McKillip, Robin
McKinley, Charles
De Lint, Emma
Bull, Jane Yolen,
and Terri Windling.
I eventually started to realize that these writers knew each other,
and that there was a sort of mythopoeic community, which led me
to the Endicott studio website - and thank you, thank you, thank
you to Ms. Windling and the other writers/artists who contribute
to the Endicott studio, especially for the Recommended book reading
lists. I just started reading Kelly
Link (and don't read her Catskin right before going to sleep
- I did, and it freaked me out).
I'm new to the SurLaLune forum - I just checked it out last night, and found myself spending more than an hour reading discussion threads - you have a great discussion board here!
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Terri
Windling
Registered User
(8/15/04 8:11 am)
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Re: Adult Influences
Welcome, C. Patton! And thanks for the kind words about the Endicott site. Midori Snyder has been re-designing those recommended reading pages, updating them and making them more attractive.
If anyone here has book recommendations for our Featured Books section
(www.endicott-studio.com/recmainpage.html),
please come let us know over on the Endicott bulletin board.
pub31.ezboard.com/bendicottstudioformythicarts
Thanks!
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Elizabeth
Registered User
(8/21/04 9:55 pm)
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Time/Life books
Hooray! Another ENCHANTED WORLD series fan! I remember coveting
those when I was about 11 or 12, maybe even a little younger. I'd
see the ads on television and wish wish wish that I could have them,
but I knew my parents wouldn't go for it. By the time I got into
the habit of joining book clubs and trekking up to the post office
with my allowance for money orders, they were no longer available
and I was stuck with the MYSTERIES OF THE UNKNOWN series instead.
Which was cool and all, but, you know, not *as* cool. A friend of
mine had the ENCHANTED WORLD books and I'd sneak a peek at them
whenever I was at his house.
And then, one day a number of years ago (a good six or seven, maybe),
I stumbled upon a little something called the Advanced Book Exchange
(heh -- www.abe.com)
and, to my delight, found that someone had THE ENTIRE SET up for
sale. I remember fondly the day that they arrived. 'Twas like Christmas
in July. I just sat there and unwrapped them one after the other.
I practically cried. Gosh, it's good to be an adult sometimes.
When I started reading through them, of course I saw all of their faults (they're Time/Life, after all -- though those folks do make some great products), but who cares?
Whew! Just had to dork out about all that for a minute. Carry on...
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