ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses historical and critical effects involving fairy tales and translation, tracking tales as stepping stones in a dissemination process initially shaped by oral dispersion across linguistic and cultural borders. It documents how prominent written collections and their translation contribute to developing the form from early oral and literary versions to children’s tales and the international canon of fairy tales we are familiar with today. The chapter explores how translations of texts spark interest in storytelling to influence the textualization of fairy tales in various countries and times with distinct cultural and national variations and considers how the interpretation of fairy tales as children’s literature shapes content and form in line with what is deemed appropriate, expurgating offensive material both in terms of which tales are selected for translation and what content is maintained or adapted.
