A Cultural History of Fairy Tales in the Long Eighteenth Century

Book excerpt: How have the fairy tales of different cultures changed over the centuries? What can fairy tales tell us about our complex cultural histories? This volume traces the evolution of the genre over the period known as the long eighteenth century. It explores key developments including: the French fairy tale vogue of the 1690s, dominated by women authors including Marie-Catherine d'Aulnoy and Marie-Jeanne Lhéritier, the fashion of the oriental tale in the early eighteenth century, launched by Antoine Galland's seminal translation of The Thousand and One Nights from Arabic into French, and the birth of European children's literature in the second half of the eighteenth century. Drawing together contributions from an international range of scholars in history, literature, and cultural studies, this volume examines the intersections between diverse national tale traditions through different critical perspectives, producing an authoritative transnational history of the genre. An essential resource for researchers, scholars, and students of literature, history, and cultural studies, this book explores such themes and topics as: forms of the marvelous, adaptation, gender and sexuality, humans and non-humans, monsters and the monstrous, space, socialization, and power.