Sunday, March 1, 2015

Tell a Fairy Tale Day - February 26th

I can't believe I missed "Tell a Fairy Tale Day." It was February 26. Of course I didn't know it existed,  but that makes no nevermind. There is a fine article with suggestions for participating with kids at the link above.

Sharing fairytales on a specific day is an interesting concept. I found though that when my daughter was little, we read fairy tales sporadically depending on her mood. And there are some great books out there, both with pictures and without, some classic collections and some more recent, or stand alone stories of all sorts. 




One of our favorites wasTam Lin by Jane Yolen. If you're not familiar with the story, this is the brief synopsis from Goodreads.com: A young girl triumphs over the Queen of Faeries to reclaim her ancestral home and free her true love in this haunting retelling of an old Scottish ballad. What it doesn't mention is that in the process, the girl must hold onto her love no matter what he changes into. This and the lovely illustrations by Charles Mikolaycak enthralled her.

Another picture book that grabbed her attention was Marianna Mayer's version of The Twelve Dancing Princesses illustrated by K.Y. Craft. The pictures are rich with details of the different parts of the story.




Two more modern tales are Princess Smartypants by Babette Cole and The Paperbag Princess by Robert Munsch illustrated by Michael Martchenko. In both stories, the heroine saves herself. This appeals to some people, but oddly enough there are those who don't like them specifically for that reason as well. I thought it was a valuable concept for my daughter to be exposed to: that sometimes the princess saves herself as well as others.

These are just a handful of the wonderful picture books that are out there to be shared. I will talk about fairy tales in other formats another time. Do you have a favorite? Please share it in the comments. Happy Reading!

3 comments:

  1. Oh, I remember that Twelve Dancing Princesses book. My daughter loved it. We loved watching Shelley Duvall's Faerie Tale Theatre. Such good memories!

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    1. Good memories for me too. I loved the way Shelley Duvall's series was more true to the original tales and not so much sugar coated. Did you watch Jim Henson's Storyteller too?

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    2. I can't remember. I'll have to go look it up. I just remember how some of those Faerie Tales were a lot of fun. Don't know if you watch Downton Abbey, but Cora, the mother, was Snow White. She was very young and beautiful.

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