Fairy Tale and Folktale

Fairy tales are a type of traditional story from both literary and oral tradition that include fantasy characters such as trolls, goblins, giants, and elves.  Often they include special powers or magic.  They do not have to include fairies to be classified as fairy tales.  Since the tales are very old for the most part, they have been shaped by years of tellings.  They have some common elements, including a happy ending which is sometimes called a fairy tale ending. The intended audience for fairy tales, for many centuries, was adults.  In more recent history they have become known as stories for children.  Collectors of fairy tales recorded these stories as they were told.  The brothers Grimm were well known as collectors of fairy tales. There have been many collectors of tales, converting the spoken word to written word.  They often compared similar stories found in geographically remote populations. Hans Christian Anderson was not a story collector.  He created original fairy tales.  The fairy tale genre still exists and authors still create original fairy tales today.  Some of these tales are written for adults or teens, and have mature themes. They include violence, disfunctional families, disasters, starvation, and many kinds of struggles but for the majority of these stories everything works out for the best in the end. Other modern created fairy tales are intended for kids. These have harmless magic and have less serious story problems to resolve.

Folktales are also short stories that have been handed down in the oral tradition for a long time.  They usually center around every day life.  They may include tricksters who represent the common man trying to get the better of the aristocracy.  Many of them have the theme of good triumphing over evil, and heroes showing bravery and sacrificing their own wealth or life for the good of their tribe. The traditional tales were a way to pass on cultural values, often showing the seriousness of mistakes and violating the expectations of society.  Sometimes these old stories have been made less harsh in modern written versions intended for young audiences.

Since the genre is so very large, tale types were created to group stories with similar elements.  They were given a tale type number and assigned a motif in the Aarne-Thompson Uther classification system.  It is helpful for storyteller, folklorists and those who are writing original folktales to study the tale types. The variety is astounding.  Many important literary works, including opera, theater, poetry and fiction, are based on these tale types.