ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the authors explore fairy tales as a way of reclaiming narratives that reduce and ensnare women as weak or bad. Autoethnography offers a platform by which to share stories of trauma with lived experiences, and for these to provide a form of cultural critique that can offer the writer a pathway to recovery. The autoethnographic possibilities of fairy tales, combined with the feminine legacy of stitching as ‘women’s work,’ inspires a connection with these stories that frames the author own concerns and experiences, whilst offering an imaginative means of voicing them. The Middling Witches were having a meeting when the maidens returned, which was already proving tricky because the echoes from the Great Speech kept interrupting.
