Breaking the Magic Spell

Folk and fairy tales pervade the everyday world to such a degree that we are sometimes unaware of their enormous influence on our behaviour. In the seven essays in this collection, Zipes discusses historically and critically the evolution of folk tales as fairy tales, their influence on popular beliefs, the politics behind them and the way they are used in mass media culture today. He looks at how a wide range of authors, including the Brothers Grimm, Perrault, the German romantics, Hans Christian Andersen, Wilde and Tolkien used fairy tales as he assesses their enduring importance.