Breaking the Magic Spell: Radical Theories of Folk & Fairy Tales

Jack Zipes

jul 2002 · University Press of Kentucky

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“Zipes ably demonstrates that moral, political, religious, and other ideologies have shaped these apparently innocent narratives.” —Lore and Language

This revised, expanded, and updated edition of the 1979 landmark Breaking the Magic Spell examines the enduring power of fairy tales and the ways they invade our subjective world. In seven provocative essays, Zipes discusses the importance of investigating oral folk tales in their socio-political context and traces their evolution into literary fairy tales, a metamorphosis that often diminished the ideology of the original narrative. Zipes also looks at how folk tales influence our popular beliefs and the ways they have been exploited by a corporate media network intent on regulating the mystical elements of the stories. He examines a range of authors, including the Brothers Grimm, Hans Christian Anderson, Ernst Bloch, Tolkien, Bettelheim, and J.K. Rowling to demonstrate the continuing symbiotic relationship between folklore and literature.

“The name Jack Zipes is synonymous with highly regarded and widely read anthologies and critiques of fairy tales.” —Choice

“Fairy Tales are a highly fashionable study today for literary scholars as well as folklorists, and another new book shows what a range of interest can be evoked by them. This time in Jack Zipes’ interesting and vigorous study.” —Encounter

“Places traditional tales in their socio-political, economic and cultural contexts.” —Teacher Librarian

“Zipes reveals the extraordinary breadth of his acquaintance with both recent and classic literature in the field of folk and fairytale research.” —Fabula

“Zipes manages the impressive trick of communicating both detail and overview without simplifying either . . . the serious folklorist should definitely have this on his bookshelf.” —Fortean Times

Acerca del autor

Jack Zipes, professor of German and director of the Center for German and European Studies the University of Minnesota, is the author of many books on folk and fairy tales, including Fairy Tale as Myth, Myth as Fairy Tale. He lives in Minneapolis.