To follow up on the examples provided below. There are a myriad of visualizations of fairy tales, beyond the iconic movie images from the Walt Disney studios. Exploring how image captures story–or a moment in the story–invites the reader/viewer to situate themselves within.
Born in Strasbourg in 1832, Gustave Doré was a prodigious talent as a child, engraving his own lithographic stones by the time he was twelve. In the first three years he worked in a publishing house, he created an astonishing 700 drawings and five albums, all without taking formal art lessons. Over a remarkably scored career, Doré created 238 Bible engravings, 10,000 engravings, 1,000 lithographs, 400 oil paintings, and 30 sculptures. Although he was enormously successful as an illustrator, Doré yearned to be seen first and foremost as a painter, and he abandoned illustration in his twilight years. The abandonment was surprising given he had announced more than a 1,000 illustrations for four Shakespeare plays.
The illustrator that I learned about was Gustave Dore. He was born in 1832 and he was naturally very talented. He completed projects for many famous authors including Shakespeare, Edgar Allen Poe, and Charles Perrault. His artwork consisted on Gothic turrets, looming forests, and romantic vista. Dore is known for capturing the terror of Perrault’s Tales with his etchings, one example being this image of the ogre from Tom Thumb.
I had worked on George Cruikshank with Emma. We found that he was a well known satirist that focused on sociopolitical topics such as slavery and temperance. He had a caricaturist style and used etching and woodcuts to create his works. Most of his works poked fun at the royal family and other political figures. After class I did some more research to see if he ever got in trouble for these works, and I found that he was not formally prosecuted for his satirical illustrations of the royal family, but he did received a substantial bribe from King George IV to stop caricaturing him. he took the bribe, but didn’t fully keep up his end of the bargain. 
Can you identify the fairy tale references in this poem by Anne Caston:
Prelude by Anne Caston
Every tree is one tree. That tree
grows in every forest, that forest always
dark and deep, always lying precisely
at the edge of every village everywhere.
Be there lost children, you will
have abandoned them there with a sack
of breadcrumbs; you will have filled
the trees with hungry birds.
Be there a huntsman, you
will have honed the hidden
blade he carries and sent him
in search of a girl’s heart.
Monsters, wolves or witches,
they are yours. Destroying angels,
devils, a crooked mirror on the wall, one
ripe bite of fruit lodged in a throat: yours.
The paralyzing poison. Drifting
snow. A wall of thorns. A coat of nettles.
Likewise, all extinctions. You have
traveled the deep Nothing to arrive here.
It is time.
Sleeper; waken.
Look: there. A tree.
What are you waiting for?
Find a grove of trees, enter it, close your eyes and listen…
Use this image to create a fairy tale to share with others… we will do this in class
If you were to craft your own folk/fairy tale, who would you make as your main character and why?
We all recall the fairy tales that entranced us when we were young… and maybe still do. Before they were called “fairy tales,” they were folk tales. Where do fairy tales come from? What makes a story a “fairy tale?” How are they related to myths, if they are?
In our freshmen seminar and on this site, we will explore how fairy and folk tales captivate our imaginations, their history, their meaning and the many ways that scholars have attempted to “tame” them and unpack their influence on us. Welcome!
What fascinates you most about these kinds of tales?
Fairy Tales are both completely familiar and mysteriously alien. Most of us grow up hearing the stories of Little Red Riding Hood, Sleeping Beauty, Beauty and the Beast and there are many films and TV shows which can capitalized on our love of these stories. While we tend to relegate them to “children’s literature” these stories were originally told within the family circle as entertainment for all ages or written down in versions which clearly were intended for adults, not kids.
One of the most important goals of education is to encourage us to question, examine, 
reflect on what seems obvious but as we explore it carefully, not so much. Education is essentially regaining our childhood talent at questioning for meaning. This site is connected to a freshman seminar course at St. Joseph’s University in New York where first year college students will share in a collaborative adventure in inquiry. In exploring fairy tales and their interpretations we will range through psychology, history, sociology, philosophy, literature, and education. Join us as our website develops over the next couple of months.
Dr. W. C. Turgeon
June 2025
I found this excellent Prezi on philosophy and Fairy tales. Kudos go out to Belinda Tamrakar.
