Fairy Tales for the Disillusioned: Enchanted Stories from the French Decadent Tradition (Oddly Modern Fairy Tales) - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0691161658 ISBN 13: 9780691161655

Publisher: Princeton University Press, 2016

Synopsis

The wolf is tricked by Red Riding Hood into strangling her grandmother and is subsequently arrested. Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella do not live happily ever after. And the fairies are saucy, angry, and capricious. Fairy Tales for the Disillusioned collects thirty-six tales, many newly translated, by writers associated with the decadent literary movement, which flourished in France in the late nineteenth century. Written by such creative luminaries as Charles Baudelaire, Anatole France, and Guillaume Apollinaire, these enchanting yet troubling stories reflect the concerns and fascinations of a time of great political, social, and cultural change. Recasting well-known favorites from classic French fairy tales, as well as Arthurian legends and English and German tales, the updated interpretations in this collection allow for more perverse settings and disillusioned perspectives―a trademark style and ethos of the decadent tradition.

In these stories, characters puncture the optimism of the naive, talismans don't work, and the most deserving don’t always get the best rewards. The fairies are commonly victims of modern cynicism and technological advancement, but just as often are dangerous creatures corrupted by contemporary society. The collection underlines such decadent themes as the decline of civilization, the degeneration of magic and the unreal, gender confusion, and the incursion of the industrial. The volume editors provide an informative introduction, biographical notes for each author, and explanatory notes throughout.

Subverting the conventions of the traditional fairy tale, these old tales made new will entertain and startle even the most disenchanted readers.

About this title

From the Back Cover

"Fairy Tales for the Disillusioned brings together fairy tales by canonical and noncanonical nineteenth-century French authors. Many of these works have not been anthologized for an English audience--nor a French one--and these translated texts provide a complex view not only of the decadent tale but also of the possibilities of the fairy tale in general."--Anne E. Duggan, author of Queer Enchantments

"French fairy tales are too often associated only with the emergence of the genre, especially Charles Perrault's influential stories, and then much later with fairy-tale films. Where did all the fairies go in the nineteenth century? Featuring a wide range of translated decadent fairy tales from France, this welcome and entertaining collection fills a large gap in English readers' access to such texts. It will definitely have a place in my library."--Cristina Bacchilega, author of Fairy Tales Transformed?

About the Author

Gretchen Schultz is professor of French studies at Brown University. Her recent books include Sapphic Fathers: Discourses of Same-Sex Desire from Nineteenth-Century France and An Anthology of Nineteenth-Century Women's Poetry from France. Lewis Seifert is professor of French studies at Brown University. He is the author of Fairy Tales, Sexuality, and Gender in France, 1690–1715 and Manning the Margins: Masculinity and Writing in Seventeenth-Century France.

Edition details

• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Publication date: 2016
• ISBN 10: 0691161658
• ISBN 13: 9780691161655
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 296
• Editor: Schultz Gretchen, Seifert Lewis