Mirror, Mirror on the Wall: Women Writers Explore Their Favorite Fairy TalesKate Bernheimer Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 2010 M04 21 - 400 pages New edition (revised and expanded) available 8/13/02. Fairy tales are one of the most enduring forms of literature, their plots retold and characters reimagined for centuries. In this elegant and thought-provoking collection of original essays, Kate Bernheimer brings together twenty-eight leading women writers to discuss how these stories helped shape their imaginations, their craft, and our culture. In poetic narratives, personal histories, and penetrating commentary, the assembled authors bare their soul and challenge received wisdom. Eclectic and wide-ranging, Mirror, Mirror on the Wall is essential reading for anyone who has ever been bewitched by the strange and fanciful realm of fairy tales. Contributors include: Alice Adams, Julia Alvarez, Margaret Atwood, Ann Beattie, Rosellen Brown, A. S. Byatt, Kathryn Davis, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, Deborah Eisenberg, Maria Flook, Patricia Foster, Vivian Gornick, Lucy Grealy, bell hooks, Fanny Howe, Fern Kupfer, Ursula K. Le Guin, Carole Maso, Jane Miller, Lydia Millet, Joyce Carol Oates, Connie Porter, Francine Prose, Linda Gray Sexton, Midori Snyder, Fay Weldon, Joy Williams, Terri Windling. |
Contents
3 | |
Of Souls as Birds | 21 |
ANN BEATTE | 37 |
ROSELLEN BROWN | 47 |
And then there was The Little Mermaid far more complex | 53 |
A S BYATT | 60 |
Science and reason are bad kindness is good It is a frequent | 67 |
Dont Like Reading Fairy Tales | 80 |
FERN KUPFER | 190 |
The Wilderness Within | 203 |
Exquisite Hour | 211 |
Midnights | 233 |
The Wife Killer | 244 |
What is troubling about the fairy tale world and its long associa | 266 |
Rapunzel Across Time and Space | 284 |
Maybe that is why I dont expect questions about baldheaded | 287 |
The Princess in the Palace of Snakes | 90 |
Any child who considers herself a candidate for expulsion from | 106 |
MARIA FLOOK | 115 |
Little Red Cap | 133 |
Taking a Long Hard Look | 148 |
The elusive right man became our obsessive preoccupation | 155 |
To Love Justice | 167 |
Fairies | 174 |
FRANCINE PROSE | 293 |
ing The surest route to a mans or to some mens heart | 300 |
The Monkey Girl | 325 |
The beastly bride while she may shed her skin or commit herself | 331 |
The effect of these tales so far as I could see was to fill the heads | 344 |
Baba Yaga | 347 |
dont speak | 355 |
Common terms and phrases
Andersen asked beautiful become begin believe bird blood blue body brother called child childhood collection comes course dark daughter dead death desire door dream dress eyes face fact fairy tale fairy tales fall father feel felt friends Gerda girl give glass Grimms hair hand happened happy head hear heart human imagine John kind knew leave light lives look lost magic married mind mirror mother moved nature never night novel once parents perhaps person Prince princess remember seems sister sleep Snow Snow Queen speak standing stepmother story sure talk tell things thought tion told transformation tree turn voice walk wife woman women writing young