# Magic, Fairys and Fairy Tales.



## Rojack79 (Nov 18, 2016)

Ok so we've all heard of fairy tales. But how many fairy tales actually have fairys? Or for that matter magic? I feel like I could count on my fingers the number of tales that have magic and fairys in them. Just an observation. If I'm wrong them please point me in the right direction.


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## Bishop (Nov 18, 2016)

First couple paragraphs explain the origins, from what I can see, the French versions of fairy tales often had fairies, whereas English and thereby American versions did not:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairy_tale


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## Rojack79 (Nov 18, 2016)

Hey Bishop long time no see. Thanks for the Wiki Link. I get that vibe as well. So I guess I can add some more fairys and magic to my story to spice it up a little bit. Thank again.


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## JustRob (Nov 18, 2016)

Surely the plural is "fairies", not "fairys". I think the origin of the words is a bit odd anyway. They were, as I understand it, originally known as the fae, which term is still used by the cognoscenti, so faery must have been the folklore about them and eventually these faery folk became known just as fairies. That's what happens when people try to write down words that were only meant to be spoken originally. What idiot invented this writing nonsense anyway? Wouldn't it have been a lot easier to have invented the voice recorder in the first place? I've heard it said that it might be possible to play back the voice of the potter who made an ancient clay pot if one ran a pickup stylus around the grooves left in it by his fingernails, so the basic technology has been around for a very long time. However, that could just be a fairy tale without any fairies in it. Haha! You may have thought that I was getting off topic there. I certainly did just for a moment. What was the topic, by the way?

Wikipedia suggests that there are several characteristics of a story that may qualify it as a fairy tale of sorts apart from the actual presence of fairy folk. Faery is fundamentally illusion, so any story with that characteristic is a fairy tale in effect. For example my novel (Yes! Clock up yet another reference to it.) is an illusion in that there don't appear to be any fairies in it when there actually are, so I can legitimately claim, as I do on the flyleaf, that it is a fairy tale. Of course, if I hadn't created the illusion in the first place it would have been obvious that it was a fairy tale all along, but where's the fun in that? That too is an important aspect of faery and fairies, that it and they take delight in teasing us mortals. 

Er, did any of that help at all? If not, then you're starting to understand what a fairy tale is. As for the frequently suggested happy ending, fairies are so far as I understand immortal, so surely there never is an ending. Should I mention at this point that my story is actually _at least _a trilogy of novels for that very reason?


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## Rojack79 (Nov 18, 2016)

Well...ok then. That was informative. I have to admit that I wasn't trying to go that deep. But you went there so... anyway. I was just curious about the lack of fey individual's in fairy tales. But now that I know a bit more about them I'll need to do some more research on the subject. Thanks for your..... insightful post JustRob.


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## Olly Buckle (Nov 18, 2016)

They get altered, partly because they are part of an oral  tradition, partly because when people write them down they sanatise them in a way they don't feelthe necessity for when they are telling them, words come and are gone, writing remains for you to be judged by, and many ofthe tales were recorded at a time when magicalfolk were looked on with great suspicion by authority, times changed more slowly in those days, to them it was not long since Judge Jeffries had been going round hanging heretics and witches.  Might be an explanation why we have more moral tales than magical tales, there are certainly plenty of magical beings in the oralstories I tell, dragons, silkies, Gods, all sorts


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## The Fantastical (Nov 18, 2016)

It would depend on how far back you went with your "fairy tales". The word "fairy" which comes from the Old French word faerie, describing "enchantment". In fact the fairy, fae, fey and all the other versions, just mean, a creature of magic or enchantment rather than the idea of a little person in a flower dress. So all creatures like changelings, sirens, domovoy, giants, trolls, ogres are all "fairies".   

If you go back to the old legends and myths, Beowulf, Homer time table you will find a lot more references to magical beings playing a important part in the over all story. Be it good or bad or just is. 

The modern idea of a fairy started to arrive in the Victorian era but it wasn't until Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote about them depicting them like they were pixies that the image was cemented in the minds of people everywhere. Of course Arthur Rackham helped! 

There is also always some version of a fairy in all cultures elves, nixies, kobolds come from western Europe, peris  come from Persia, jinn are Arabic versions of fairies, you have the Kitsune from Japan and the húli jīng from china... and so on. Some countries like Japan and China have more than most... but there are if you broaden your idea of the fairy a lot of stories that do contain them even though they may not fit in with the modern idea of the fairy tale.


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## Shi (Nov 19, 2016)

Well. The points made above are all well and good, but I would like to add something.

From OP's phrasing, I will assume that OP equates fairy tales with magical stories. However, it's not that clear cut. You have to remember that these stories we lump under the umbrella term 'fairy tales' are actually household stories that people in the olden times believed to be real. And what they deemed 'magical' might not seem like the wand-waving, fairy-godmother magic that OP wants to see.

Like Little Red Riding Hood. The magic in it is just the fact that the wolf can talk.

But if you look at Cinderella, it uses quite obvious magic.

However, in those obscure, lesser known stories, magic isn't upfront and in your face. It's more of an incessant whisper in the background of the story, like in Goose Girl: the charm is implied to be magical, to keep the princess away from harm, and the talking horse is magical by our standards, too. But there isn't any wand-waving or spell-weaving, just things that are normal by our standards given magic.

So, fairy tales might not have fairies, but they certainly all have magic.


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## JustRob (Nov 19, 2016)

Shi said:


> Like Little Red Riding Hood. The magic in it is just the fact that the wolf can talk.



My favourite word at present is "preternatural" meaning something between the natural and supernatural, i.e. a marvel according to Wikipedia, although there are a number of explanations of its precise meaning, which is probably why it isn't used much any more. Magic falls into the preternatural category as does the talking wolf as both may just involve unusual application of the natural rather than supernatural. That is why Robert Heinlein claimed that "One man's magic is another man's engineering." Anne McCaffrey's teleporting dragons in the stories of Pern are preternatural in being genetically engineered by mankind from lizards with unusual abilities. As a consequence what first appears to be a fantastical fairy tale evolves seamlessly into a science fiction story. 

In Slavic folklore the witch Baba Yaga is a confusing character possibly symbolising many things. She lives in a hut that has legs and can move around the forest. So maybe she's just a wise and cunning old lady who lives in a mobile home. The difference between fairy tales and science fiction is that the engineering is taken for granted and not explained. Of course, in my writing I take Anne McCaffrey's approach and explain the aerodynamics of fairies in flight and how it is that they are often depicted without wings at all, but then the protagonist in the story happens to be an engineer with a close interest in such things.


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## Rojack79 (Nov 19, 2016)

Wow. Thanks again for all the info. I now have a clearer understanding of what I want my book to have now thanks to you guys.


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