Codes And Conventions Of A Folk Tale

The folktale or fairy tale has its origin in ancient beliefs – originally a word of mouth tradition, told by women to their family. These tales came into being mainly as adult tales (mainly female) being exchanged orally throughout the ages, in more recent times in order to preserve their integrity they have been collected and written down by ethnographers, linguists etc., these tales are used as an instrument to show how society looks to itself how it identifies itself in it landscape, its customs and how social expectations regarding morality, social justice and honesty are perceived. People who display selfishness, greed and dishonesty are often made to pay the consequence of their actions. Folk tales tell of our history, our society, where we are in the world and really what makes us who we are.
The Fairy or Folk tales has been in existence since 200-300 AD –known as the Panchatantra it is believed these 87 stories were created by a court scholar to educate the royal princes, Tuan ch’eng-shih wrote down the first version

He confesses that he ate the pigs but maintains it was after he had sneezed and their house fell down and they accidentally died. It is more of a court case statement illustrated along the way. He tries all kinds of excuses mainly surrounding his granny and her need for a cake, however finally he exposes his anger management issues and total disregard for the dead pigs – The illustrator for this tale is Lane Smith who limits his colours to toning browns and ochres and is rendered in oils – it has a shadowy grainy quality and enhances the story of the con man wolf the darkness of the images reflect the dark world the wolf