Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Out of the Mouths of Nursemaids and Travelers

The Watkins Book of English Folktales by Neil Philip

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England has a great culture of letters, but when it comes to folklore, people often don’t think further than Jack and the Beanstalk. In this collection of English folktales though, we can see that the isles have a great tradition of oral storytelling beyond it. In my ongoing pursuit of folklore from around the world, I never really stopped to consider English folktales until this book reminded me that my knowledge of it was in fact pretty scanty. Over the course of about 400 pages, […]

Fairy Tales: a genre by and for “we the people”

Old Wives' Fairy Tale Book by Angela Carter

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I picked up this fairy tale collection in Tim’s Books, a tiny off-the-path used bookstore in Provincetown, because it had Angela Carter’s name on it, and I’ve been dedicating my book-buying to hoarding collections by the best fairy tale scholars, especially the feminist ones. It has, as you can see, a delightfully dated cover, but its ideas are very radical and timeless. The book is a selection of fairy tales and folktales chosen by Carter (author of the brilliant The Bloody Chamber), highlighting some of the […]

Radicalize your reading through fairy tales

The Castle of Truth and Other Revolutionary Tales by Hermynia Zur Mühlen, Jack Zipes

Smack-Bam, or The Art of Governing Men: Political Fairy Tales of Édouard Laboulaye by Édouard Laboulaye, Jack Zipes

The Dragon Daughter and Other Lin Lan Fairy Tales by Juwen Zhang

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If you ask me “What’s the best thing about fairy tales?” my brain will combust. But in this very moment, I’ll say one of the best things is that there are so many forgotten or “undiscovered” tales to enjoy. In an effort to bring some forgotten folklorists to the forefront, fairy tale scholar Jack Zipes (my nerdiest old man crush) and Princeton University Press came together for a new-ish series called Oddly Modern Fairy Tales. Each volume concentrates on a writer or movement in fairy […]

Land of the Rising Sun

Ancient Tales & Folklore of Japan by Richard Gordon Smith

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Smith, a Victorian traveller to Japan, compiled into this book a number of folktales that he heard from the people around him while there. I have always been interested in mythology and folklore. My great-grandmother used to tell me stories from Hindu mythology when I was four or five (though unfortunately her versions are now lost to the sands of infantile amnesia), and throughout elementary school I branched out to Greek and Norse mythology as well. I’m not sure why I love fairytales and folklore […]

Queer as Folk(tales)!

Tales From Beyond the Rainbow by Pete Jordi Wood

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In pursuit of the idea that queer people have always existed (and therefore will persist), Pete Jordi Wood has put together this gorgeous collection of folk and fairy tales that earlier folklorists chose to “clean up” or dismiss. Tales From Beyond the Rainbow: Ten LGBTQ+ Fairy Tales Proudly Reclaimed is a darling little book with big important stories. While earning his folklore degree, Pete found a Danish folktale “The Dog and the Sailor” that felt undeniably queer. He self-published his translation of the tale, and […]

Blancaflor and all the sh*t wives have to do

Blancaflor, The Hero with Secret Powers: ​A Folktale from Latin America by Nadja Spiegelman and Sergio García Sánchez

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Blancaflor is a folktale with Spanish and Latin American roots from a category of folktales called “Girl helps the hero flee.”  High John the Conqueror is an African-American version you may have read in Virginia Hamilton’s The People Could Fly. In this type of folktale, a man ends up being captured by a devil or magician, and has to complete a series of impossible tasks. But the devil/magician’s daughter falls for the hero, and helps him complete the tasks and escape with his life. TOON […]



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