World Literature: Your Guide To Analyze Fairy-tales

Storytelling and fairytales have always been an important part of preserving oral culture and traditions. Fairytale is usually a short story that takes place in a magical setting, with human characters and other beings and they face different kinds of obstacles.

Fairytales have worked as moral guides, entertainment and also as inspirational stories during hard times.

In this class, we will go through seven different fairytales. These are Cinderella, Snow White, Rapunzel, Puss in Boots, Hansel and Gretel, Mulan and Red Riding Hood. We will also go through different character archetypes such as the villain and the hero. Different fairytale narratives like a damsel in distress and from rags to riches.

Archetypes

Archetypical characters in fairy tales fall into a certain category by their visual appearance, characteristics, personality traits and their mission. We will find common archetypes in fairy tales, myths and folklore. In the world of fairy tales, archetypes are universal and similar archetypes appear in different cultures and fairy tales told in different parts of the world. Classical archetypes in Fairy tales are damsels in distress- types of princesses like Cinderella and Snow White. Evil Stepmother in the stories such as Hansel and Gretel and Sleeping Beauty. A wise old mage whose job is to help the protagonist in their journeys such as Dumbledore in Harry Potter and Merlin the wise guide of King Arthur.