{ Magical Illustrations - The Art of Arthur Rackham }

After all this time, I'm still on the fairy tale kick. I'm happy to report that I enjoy both Grimm and Once Upon a Time, plus this season of the BBC's Merlin is absolutely fantastic. I'd forgotten how much I loved that show. I also happened to watch a German comedy that spoofed Snow White, called 7 Zwerge ('seven dwarfs'). I found it hilarious in a Robin Hood Men in Tights sort of way.

Anyway, whenever I get to thinking about fairy tales, my mind automatically goes to Arthur Rackham, the Victorian illustrator behind many beautiful editions of classic tales, including the Complete Brothers Grimm, Alice in Wonderland, the opera cycle The Ring of the Nibelung, and a series of fairy tale books written by CS Evans. 

I first discovered Arthur Rackham in the way that all things seem to be discovered nowadays--poking around the internet. Since then I've collected an illustration treasury, as well as a few illustrated books. I've since discovered that The Everyman's Library has reprinted the CS Evans books and I'm looking forward to getting my hands on those. The silhouette work in Sleeping Beauty looks amazing. 

Arthur Rackham is known by artists for his use of neutral, earthy color palettes, as well as his gritty realism. Giullermo Del Toro has said that Rackham's work was an inspiration behind some of the designs for his movies, Pan's Labyrinth and Hellboy. 

What I love about his illustrations is the attention to detail. Each image is fully formed, with many of the color illustrations having complete backgrounds that create believable worlds for otherwise unbelievable stories. His illustrations are dark and mysterious and sometimes downright grotesque. They're epic and small in scale, relatable and wondrous, just the tales they illustrate.

{ It's a wicked, wicked world }

I saw Laura Jansen on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson (my beloved guilty pleasure) and I really liked the song. It's fun and wickedly catchy. How happy was I to find a fun and wickedly funny video to go along with it? Who doesn't like the idea of fairy tale (Disney) characters sleezing it up in a bar?

Though the song is a couple of years old, it's just one of many little things revolving around the fairy tale trend that's been subtly going on. While it's nowhere as hardcore as the whole vampire/werewolf thing, the trend seems to be coming to a sort of climax with the dueling fairy tale TV shows (see: Once Upon a Time and Grimm, or don't see them, I don't care...) and the two Snow White movie adaptations, called Snow White and the Hunter and Snow White and Julia Roberts as the Evil Queen (that's quite a mouthful, isn't it?). This after movies based on Little Red Riding Hood and Beauty and the Beast. I think the trend was started by the likes of Enchanted and Gregory Maguire's books. And then there was all that Scary Johnny Depp in Wonderland hoopla and Syfy's Alice... There really are more things than I thought now that I think about it... The Looking Glass Wars...etc.

Out of the recent stuff, I've only seen the first episode of Once Upon a Time and it was...eh, all right, I guess. I wanted it to be more whimsical and to not have such a sourpuss of a lead, but Robert Carlyle and the chick playing the evil queen (almost) make up for it. I'm excited to watch Grimm later this week and I'll probably end up seeing both Snow Whites (in about two years once they come along on my Netflix queue...).

I've even fallen victim to the whole fairy tale trend myself, though it was probably something like six years ago. I once toyed with a story based on the classic Thousand Furs tale (which falls under the Cinderella tale type, according to my folklore professor). I remembered watching a little cartoon of it when I was a kid and I loved the story. My version was called Allerleirauh (after the original German name of the Grimm version) and I of course added a few tweaks of my own. Instead of having the girl wear a cloak of a thousand furs, I just made her furry, kind of like the Beast. The prince was a complete tool bag (vain and egotistical, etc). This just led to a funny kind of tension between them, because she was by no means a simpering princess. I still might revisit that story one day. Who knows?

So, what's your favorite fairy tale?