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posted by [personal profile] tadorna at 09:33pm on 15/11/2005 under
Do you have a favourite fairy tale? If you do, what do it be, pray? And what do you like about it?
Mood:: 'curious' curious
There are 25 comments on this entry. (Reply.)
 
posted by [identity profile] shirecreature.livejournal.com at 09:35pm on 15/11/2005
I love The Princess Bride, if that counts.

If it doesn't count, I love Peter Pan (before Disney got hold of it).

If that doesn't count, I'd say the Brer Rabbit stories (again, before Disney got hold of them)

 
posted by [identity profile] andabusers.livejournal.com at 09:52pm on 15/11/2005
Princess Furball. I have read several different versions with various additions. I like that in one version she has dresses made of the sun, the moon and the stars, and in another she falls in love with a bear, and in another her ugly sisters hit her over the head with ladles and they make the sound: "pop pop pop".
 
posted by [identity profile] rochefort.livejournal.com at 10:03pm on 15/11/2005
When I was little my very favourite was The Tinder Box, firstly because it had a happy ending, and secondly because I couldn't get my head around the idea of dogs with eyes the size of dinner plates and windmills.
 
posted by [identity profile] andabusers.livejournal.com at 10:56pm on 17/11/2005
Oh I love that one too, especially for the eyes the size of dinnerplates. :)
 
posted by [identity profile] tvillingar.livejournal.com at 10:07pm on 15/11/2005
I REALLY tried to figure out my favourite fairy tale - and realised I don't have one. As a kid I read probably every storybook available and also different versions of the same fairy tale. I just like them. I'm a fairy tale whore. It looks a lot more weird when I write it down but it makes perfect sense in my head.

I'll just go away now and stop rambling, okay?
 
posted by [identity profile] opheliaskiss.livejournal.com at 10:24pm on 15/11/2005
The one about King Arthur, who must find the Holy Grail, and needs to do a show on Broadway... *hee*

Does "The Little Prince" count as a fairytale? I fell in love with that one - because it is so strange, yet sweet. Somehow, sadly maybe, I can only think of movies connected with "fairytale". "Legend" is one of my very favorites, such a beautiful, visually rich film. "Sleepy Hollow", with Mr. Depp. Hmmm - which is not really a "fairy" tale. I think I've always liked things with a darker theme.

What I did love reading as a child were all the Greek/Roman myths. I loved the one about the seasons - how Persephone (I think?) was taken by Hades to the underworld, he wanted to marry her, and if she ate anything there she would be his - so she ends up eating six pomegranate seeds, and therefore she must spend 6 months of the year with him - during those six months, her mother doesn't let anything grow on earth (fall/winter), and when Persephone is able to be with her, it becomes spring/summer. It has been a long time, but I think I got that one right.
 
posted by [identity profile] shrinetolust.livejournal.com at 10:32pm on 15/11/2005
I looked that one up recently, and as far as I remember you've got it right! I did like mythology a lot, too, when I was a kid, but some of them are very dark and disturbing. I remember very distinctly learning the lesson one more time about "Mom is always right"...hee...she got a book from the library for me and read me a new myth every night before I went to sleep. She left the book in my room but warned me not to read them w/o her because some of them were scary. Well, of course, curiosity got the better of me and I read one that included some sort of awful death and I was verrrrrrry upset. And I'm pretty sure I didn't try reading any others after THAT! AUGH! Mum's right again! Hee!

I guess Sleepy Hollow counts as a legend, rather than a fairy tale. I wonder what the actual definition of a fairy tale is--is some form of spirit or magic required? A moral of some kind? Hmmm...*ponders*
lazulus: (mermaid)
posted by [personal profile] lazulus at 10:24pm on 15/11/2005
The princess and the pea.

Hi, Duckie!!!

Por quoi are you asking?
lazulus: (mermaid)
posted by [personal profile] lazulus at 10:38pm on 15/11/2005
Oops! I forgot to say why! hee

I think it's the absurdity of it; the idea that only someone very special can feel that much. The images the story conjures are interesting as well: the way the princess ends up black and blue from the pea under all those mattresses! I have a feeling that Angela Carter or Jack Zipes or someone talks about the sexual imagery in this tale. I should look at work tomorrow. I have the Angela Carter fairy tales here and we have loads of interesting stuff at work. Fascinating!
 
posted by [identity profile] sheldrake.livejournal.com at 10:52pm on 15/11/2005
Hi! Yay, fairy tale icon!

Well, possibly for an actual reason, possible just to get my brain moving, because it's so very sluggish lately. But these answers are brilliant, and my brain is moving, so it's working. Yay!

Unfortunately it appears to be bedtime. Bloody time, moving onward like that...
 
posted by (anonymous) at 04:22am on 16/11/2005
You should check this out then. :)

No Rest For The Wicked
http://www.icarusfalls.com/wicked/
lazulus: (gosh)
posted by [personal profile] lazulus at 07:14am on 16/11/2005
Oooohh! Thank you very much, Anonymous!
 
posted by [identity profile] shrinetolust.livejournal.com at 10:27pm on 15/11/2005
This is one of those things where if you give me a list to pick from, I'd prolly point out more favorites, but I have to say at least ONE of the biggies is, yes...

Cinderella...

*G* Is anyone surprised? And it's not just the beautiful dress and the shiny shoes and the handsome prince (though that's nice, too), but it's that she was always kind and good and even though she went through hardships and got treated poorly, she was rewarded for her goodness eventually. And got to rub her stepsisters' noses in it...lol!

I did like Drew Barrymore's modern take on it, with Cinderella being fiesty and the prince adoring her for it...the stepmother having a deep emotional scar that led to her evilness, and one stepsister not being so very bad after all.

It's just one of those things that is a classic fantasy ideal for kids, and hell, adults, too.
ext_25473: my default default (chibi me)
posted by [identity profile] lauramcewan.livejournal.com at 11:03pm on 15/11/2005
Cinderella.

When I was a child, I was totally in love with the Disney storybook of the film, the color of her ball gown, that pumpkins could turn into coaches.

And that kindness and love always wins. :)
birdsflying: (brains)
posted by [personal profile] birdsflying at 11:51pm on 15/11/2005
I've always been strangely fond of the original version of Rupunzel, where she has twins (I think) out in the desert and it's generally not a happy tale. I always loved Rumplstilikin (spelling?) for the whole name thing and the way he gets angrier and angrier. It always amused me.

And Cinderella, pre-disney. The sisters getting their eyes pecked out....

And Sleepy Hollow. I watched the disney version so often as a kid and it still scares the shit out of me.
gramarye1971: (Snow Rune)
posted by [personal profile] gramarye1971 at 12:25am on 16/11/2005
For fairy-tales of the truly grim (Grimm?) kind, I like 'The Juniper-Tree'. The one which features the little boy who is killed by his stepmother and eaten by his father and his sister Marlinchen takes his bones and puts them beneath the juniper-tree. There's something almost hypnotic about that story, because you know it's going to end horribly and yet you can't stop reading it. And it made me terribly afraid of black puddings.

But as for tales with a happier ending, I think I like the tale of the shoemaker and the elves best of all. Both sides benefit from the work done in the end, and it's a good tale about how kindness is best repaid with kindness.
 
posted by [identity profile] andabusers.livejournal.com at 11:01pm on 17/11/2005
Sounds like Isabella, or the Pot of Basil. Sort of.
 
posted by [identity profile] azewewish.livejournal.com at 12:56am on 16/11/2005
The original Cinderella, as told by the Brothers' Grimm. Bloody & nasty & full of twisted revenge.
 
posted by [identity profile] sumbitch.livejournal.com at 01:06am on 16/11/2005
Puss in Boots. always Puss in Boots.

because a good pair of boots can take you far.

because it was said of the Marquis of Carabas that The King caressed him after a very extraordinary manner.

because
 
posted by [identity profile] burntcopper.livejournal.com at 10:17am on 16/11/2005
Beauty and the Beast. Mostly because everyone has to work at it, learn to even like each other, and there's no necrophilia or princesses. (you don't want to know the issues I have with snow white)
ext_42507: (grimmwald)
posted by [identity profile] ia-ne.livejournal.com at 12:48pm on 16/11/2005
the happy prince all the way. i always like things that make me cry... otherwise, i can really identify with the brothers grimm tales (i don't really like the term 'fairy tale'. Märchen!), with their darkness, and medievil-ness (and yes, i know they weren't written then), and german-ness.
 
posted by [identity profile] depptart.livejournal.com at 02:16pm on 16/11/2005
Yes, yes, Cinderella!!

And it's not a fairy tale, but I love The Tortoise and the Hare, because slow and steady wins the race.

 
posted by [identity profile] lobelia321.livejournal.com at 09:29pm on 16/11/2005
my favourite Grimm's fairy tale, "The Two Brothers" (Die zwei Brüder). It can be read here: http://www.ucs.mun.ca/~wbarker/fairies/grimm/060.html

It is the longest fairy tale I have read. It has two brothers and omg, only now as I type this do I realise that it expresses my tender childhood proto-slasher's heart!!! Because what did I care about the princesses and wives and whatnot: it was the scene with the SWORD and how they were JEALOUS of each other, and why am I factoring out the women altogether in my memory of this? And the dragon slaying and the cutting out of the tongue and oh, the KNIFE that turns dull and rusty when the other brother is in trouble and the ANIMALS.
 
posted by (anonymous) at 10:42pm on 16/11/2005
I reread your version of Prince/Buttons the other day and loved it very much!
Hansel and Gretel because of the gingerbread house.
Jack and the Beanstalk beecause you could imagine planting something and then waking up to see it bigger...just like the apple pips you put down the sink.
King Midas; as to have wishes and to be able to touch things seemed so real and immediate and possible for a 4yo. Now, strangely, I adore roses and cross a road to smell them. My first present as a child that I remember receiving.
The Three Bears....for the repetition. I hated Goldilocks and couldnt understand why she was so rude and bad mannered. Hated her. Dreadful.
Hans C.A....the emperor's new clothes....as the idea of a kid being right was very appealing when aged 6yo, but also confusing; couldnt understand why the adults would be fooled. Incomprehensible but also vaguely self-satisfying.

thanks for the post; veryinteresting to revisit a past-life!

poule x

 
posted by [identity profile] adjectivegirl.livejournal.com at 05:42pm on 17/11/2005
I have to say it's the Steadfast Tin Soldier, where the titular character has an ill-fated never-ever-can-be romance with the paper ballerina and both of them fall into a fire and die. Unlike other very depressing original fairy tales (like the Little Mermaid where all her sisters cut off their very pretty hair and the wench kills herself anyway) I did not reject this as a child as somehow wrong or against the grain. Their love was impossible, so they burned and found togetherness in death.

Which. Is probably why I'm single.

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