From Rags to Witches - the grim tale of children's stories
Once upon a time, fairy tales were not for children - and some were even banned by the church as a threat to faith or morality. Using original archives and rare books from the University of Nottingham's Manuscripts & Special Collections, a new exhibition - From Rags to Witches: the Grim Tale of Children's Stories - will explore a range of children's stories and traditional tales, from the beloved to the forgotten tales that never got a happily ever after. From bloodthirsty stories set in sinister European forests, to the benign bedtime tales set in comfortable Victorian nurseries, this brand new exhibition traces the development of children's literature through the generations. Kathryn Steenson, Academic & Public Engagement Archivist and curator of Rags to Witches, said: "This exhibition has been a wonderful opportunity to discover the darkness in some of the classic fairy tales, and uncover some Victorian stories that have been forgotten. "Told and retold by countless storytellers, the versions we are familiar with today can be very different from the ones that entertained our ancestors by the fireside. These were stories of sex, death and curses, and were so morally outrageous that in 1604 the Catholic Church placed one Italian fairy tale collection on its Index of Forbidden Books. The 16th century copy on display was published just before the ban was enforced, and contains some of the earliest surviving written versions of fairy tales." Fairy stories began to be seen as a threat to children as new theories about childhood and education developed.
