Annotation 1

Heiner, H.A., 2007a, ‘What is a Fairy Tale’, SurLaLune [website], Available at:

http://www.surlalunefairytales.com/introduction/ftdefinition.html, Accessed at:

11/02/11

Heidi Anne Heiner is the creator of SurLaLune website, a website dedicated to fairy

tales and their analysis (Heiner, 2007b). Heiner has a Bachelor of Arts Degree in

English with a Speech and Theatre Minor from Middle Tennessee State University

and Master of Information Science degree from the University of Tennessee,

Knoxville (Heiner, 2007b). In 1998, Heiner created SurLaLune website as an

Information Science class project (Heiner, 2007b).

According to Heiner (2007a), fairy tale is a subgenre of folktale although when it is

written down, it is not folklore anymore but literature. Heiner explained if a story is

told orally, it will keep changing over time; however, when it is written, the story

becomes static, therefore, is literature (Heiner, 2007a).

A fairy tale does not necessarily have fairy in it because the reason it is called fairy

tale is because of the 17th-century women writers in French Salon’s influence who

called their writing ‘contes de fees’ which can be translated as ‘fairy tale’ in English

(Heiner, 2007a; Wikipedia, 2011a). At that time, French writing was widely popular

so the term was widely applied to other popular works such as The Little Mermaid

and Hansel and Gretel (Grimm & Grimm, 1903; Heiner, 2007a; Wikipedia, 2011a).

Heiner (2007a) listed some definitions of a fairy tale starting with The New Lexicon

Webster's Dictionary of the English Language (1990) which defines fairy tale as a
story for children. In John R.R.Tolkien’s1 definition, which states fairy tale as a wide

subject that should be taken seriously and is not based on fairy but rather Faerie , a

word that can almost be defined as magic of mood and power (Tolkien, 1972) .

Another definition of fairy tale by Lane (1993), a story that has a numinous sense,

happens in the past tense, and is not tied to any specifics such as myth which starts

with “at the beginning of the world”, a legend with a “real” person in it or a fantasy

that happens in “future”. Fairy tales can also be spiritual, but never religious. In

Heiner’s opinion, The New Lexicon Webster's Dictionary of the English Language’s

definition is too narrow, and she prefers Tolkien’s or Lane’s definitions (Heiner,

2007a).

This website article is about defining a fairy tale, though Heiner does not give the

exact answer to the big question ‘What is a Fairy Tale?’. Heiner covers this subject

completely by researching the professionals’ opinions and definitions in fairy tales

such as Tolkien (1972) and Lane (1993), as well as giving her own opinion and

conclusion making this article a credible article. In terms of the writing style, Heiner’s

article is easy to understand, because she does not use complicated words and also

because she organized her writing logically. This writing is intended for everyone,

whether it is English Language and Literature students, teachers, or simply common

people who are interested in this subject.

1
A n English poet, writer, philologist, University of Oxford professor, and writer for The Lords of the Rings
trilogy (Wikipedia, 2011b)
References:

Davis, B., 2009, ‘Fairy tales as children stories’, Beverly’s Treehouse [website],

Available at: http://infohost.nmt.edu/~beverly/writings/fairytales.html, [Accessed:

16/11/2010]

Grimm, J. & Grimm, W., 1903, Grimm's Fairy Tales, Maynard Merrill, New York

Heiner, H.A., 2007b, ‘About Heidi Anne Heiner’, SurLaLune [website], Available at:

http://www.surlalunefairytales.com/introduction/heidi.html, [Accessed: 11/02/2011]

Lane, M., 1993, Picturing a Rose: A Way of Looking at Fairy Tales, Wilson, New

York

The New Lexicon Webster's Dictionary of the English Language, 1990, Lexicon

Publication, New York

Tolkien, J.R.R, 1986, The Tolkien Reader, Perfection Learning Cooperation, Des
Moines

Wikipedia [website], 2011a, ‘17th-century French Literature’, Available at:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/17th-century_French_literature, [Accessed: 11/05/2011]

Wikipedia [website], 2011b, ‘J.R.R. Tolkien’, Available at:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._R._R._Tolkien, [Accessed: 11/05/2011]