Shades of the Nineteenth Century
Stories require a common consensus to become popular and to spread: When the stories in question concern the restless dead, the possibility of an angry past haunting us, what, precisely, does that say?
Helen Pilinovsky
Helen Pilinovsky writes on fairy tales, feminism, and the fantastic. She received her Ph.D. from Columbia University, where her topic was the birth of the genre of fantasy in the 19th century. She has guest-edited issues of The Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts and Extrapolation, and published on topics ranging from Victorian literature to contemporary speculative fiction and interstitiality. She is currently working on her second book.
The Princess is Dead, Long Live the Princess!
From word-of-mouth storytelling to printed texts to cinematic adaptations, the princess has been defined and redefined in remarkable ways.
The Unicorn Tapestries and Other Depictions: Beyond the Obvious Symbolism of the Unicorn’s Horn
At present, when one hears the word “unicorn,” the associations are obvious: a horned white horse, representing purity; a similarly chaste and pristine young woman; a series of single entendres.