By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University) ‘The Remarkable Rocket’ is one of the fairy tales for children written by the Irish author Oscar Wilde (1854-1900). It was published in the 1888 collection The Happy Prince and Other Tales. ‘The Remarkable Rocket’ is about a firework which is set to be […]
Tag: Fairy Tales
A Summary and Analysis of ‘The Ebony Horse’ from the Arabian Nights
‘The Ebony Horse’ is one of the most exciting and enchanting story from the Arabian Nights, also known as the One Thousand and One Nights. Indeed, the tale is interesting because it even borders on being ‘science fiction’ before the genre existed. It sees a cunning inventor design an ebony […]
A Summary and Analysis of Hans Christian Andersen’s ‘The Steadfast Tin Soldier’
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University) ‘The Steadfast Tin Soldier’ is an 1838 fairy tale by the Danish writer Hans Christian Andersen. One of the shortest among Andersen’s well-known tales, ‘The Steadfast Tin Soldier’ is about a toy soldier who falls in love with a paper ballerina, and who undergoes […]
A Summary and Analysis of Italo Calvino’s ‘Apple Girl’
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University) ‘Apple Girl’ is an Italian folktale which was memorably told by Italo Calvino (1923-85) in his 1956 collection Italian Folktales. The story concerns a queen who gives birth to an apple, which the king of a neighbouring kingdom sees and falls in love with. […]
A Summary and Analysis of Hans Christian Andersen’s ‘The Red Shoes’ Fairy Tale
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University) ‘The Red Shoes’ (1845) is perhaps the strangest of all of Hans Christian Andersen’s well-known fairy tales. Divining the meaning of some of Andersen’s other stories for children is relatively easy, but a number of aspects of the meaning and symbolism of ‘The Red […]