Writing for Kids – Fairy Tales
Using Everyday Fears as Sources for Modern Day Stories
Children often feel very vulnerable. They are totally dependant on adults for their most basic physical needs like food, clothing, shelter and protection, as well as their emotional need to feel loved and valued. These needs can be an endless source of ideas for stories for children.
Fairy Tales are Based on Children's Primitive Fears
Traditional fairy tales deal with common childhood fears. Think of Red Riding Hood, sent to walk alone through the dangerous woods, Cinderella, unloved, emotionally and physically abused, Goldilocks, who does something naughty and nearly gets eaten by bears, Hansel and Gretel, victims of attempted infanticide in a time of famine. These and many more examples are still popular today because they address children’s underlying primitive fears. As the characters overcome their adversity, through their wits or supernatural intervention or luck, their desperate situations are reversed, and they live happily ever after.
Reading Fairy Tales Helps Children to Work through their Deepest Fears
By reading these stories children can give voice to their deepest fears, and find relief from them in reading how other people survived when these fears came ‘true.’
Modern Fairy Tales Serve the Same Purpose
The same process can work equally well for modern fairy tales. Updated to a contemporary setting, the old stories still work extremely well. However, to write a modern day fairy tale you must use extremely strong characterization, have an in depth description of the setting, and work hard to create mood. You need to strike the right balance between being scary and being so terrifying that children stop reading, and create a happy ending that rings true with the reader.
Popular Examples of Modern Day Fairy Tales
A good example is the picture book ‘Pretty Salma’ by Niki Daly, which is a retelling of Little Red Ridinghood, placed in a market place in modern day Ghana.
Another way to work with traditional fairy tales is to bring in a surprise twist. Roald Dahl did this very successfully with his ‘Revolting Rhymes.’
The most famous modernized fairytale is the children’s book ‘Shrek,’ by William Steig, which has been made into one of the most successful animated pictures of all time.
If you want to try rewriting fairy tales in a modern genre consider these points:
- This is a popular genre, and there is lots of competition, so make sure your writing style and plot twists are witty and entertaining.
- Characterisation must be extremely thorough and somewhat ‘lateral.’ Because you are dealing with character stereotypes, you have to breathe life into them.
- Language should be colourful, even florid. Eg. Steig’s sentence, "Pheasant, peasant? What a pleasant present!"
- The setting is very important. But long descriptive passages will not work in books for this age group. The descriptions need to be subtly worked into dialogue and action passages, or carried by the illustrations.
You can read more about finding ideas for books in Finding Ideas for Picture Books and Finding Fresh Ideas.
