Fairy Tale

The fairy tale is an epic genre of oral folk creativity and literature, a narrative of invented, fantastic events in which magical forces and helper-animals act and good invariably triumphs over evil. The folk tale is divided into magic tales, tales of everyday life, and animal tales; it has an established composition (the opening 'once upon a time', threefold repetitions, a happy resolution) and expresses the people's moral ideal. From the folkloric tale descends the literary (authorial) fairy tale developed by Hans Christian Andersen, the Brothers Grimm, and Charles Perrault. In the Ukrainian tradition, fairy tales were collected and reworked by Ivan Franko (When the Animals Could Still Talk), Marko Vovchok, and Lesia Ukrainka; a philosophical authorial tale was created by Lesia Ukrainka in the drama-fairy-play The Forest Song, which draws on Volhynian mythology.