Fairy tales at the British Library

The British Library hosts an exhibition on fairy tales, which brings to the fore the common elements of folk tales across cultures, such as the fable as a way of advising the reader about how to live their lives, the plot as the battle between good and evil, magical powers as a way to transcend the limitations of human agency, and transformations as a reflection on identity.

The Beast, Belle and her father
in the classic tale of The Beauty and the Beast

The exhibition starts with editions of the works by Brothers Grimm and Charles Perrault. Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm gathered many folk tales from friends and family and put them in writing, preparing versions for adults and for children. Stories include Snow White and Hansel and Gretel. Perrault lived in France over 300 years ago and he is attributed Cinderella, Red Riding Hood, and Sleeping Beauty.

Edition of Brothers Grimm fairy tales

One section of the exhibition concerns villains, and features prominently giants, goblins, stepmothers, wolves, dragons, lions, and witches. Some villains are ill-intentioned humans, some are talking animals, and some are monsters. The wolf is a very common villains, as the forest or the wood is typically a place of danger where main characters get lost or need to face challenges. The big bad wolf appears in The Three Little Pigs, Red Riding Wood, and many other stories, reflecting the fact that at the time wolves were considered scary predators.

The Wolf

There is a wonderful Japanese edition of Girl with the Kneading Bowl, a version of Cinderella, where young Hachikazuki is mistreated by her stepfamily. Before dying, her mother had given her a bowl to wear on her head to hide her beauty and the bowl is removed only when the girl marries.

Girl with the Kneading Bowl

In many contemporary fairy tales, traditional villains are portrayed as good characters with plenty of redeeming features, which shows that we should not judge a book by its cover. One example is that of the good witch: in Disney’s version of the Ice Queen story, Elsa is not a selfish character but a hero. In the movie The Bad Guys there are some highly stigmatised animals (Mr Wolf and Mr Snake among others) who are thieves but then become good and even collaborate with the police to catch the real “bad guys”.

The wolf huffs and puffs

Finally, the section on transformation is very interesting (there is also a sequence from Studio Ghibli’s masterpiece, Howl’s Moving Castle). What happens when a character transforms into something very different, such as the princes who turn into frogs and beasts, and the young woman in Howl’s Moving Castle (Sophie Hatter) who spends most of the story in the body (and mind) of an old lady? It is clear from the details of these stories that the transformations are not merely cosmetic, and cannot be compared to wearing a disguise. The person being transformed acquires some of the dispositions of the creature they turn into, while preserving some of their own features. Beast is more impulsive and aggressive than the original prince and Sophie is more calm and assertive as a 90-year-old woman than she was a young woman.

There is plenty for a philosopher to think about in an exhibition on fairy tales, including the way in which such tales can be conceived as powerful arguments that (just like thought experiments) engage both reason and imagination.