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Brothers and Beasts: An Anthology of Men on Fairy Tales
Despite the availability of several eloquent gender studies of fairy tales, a popular reference on men and fairy tales has so far been nonexistent. Brothers and Beasts offers a new perspective by allowing twenty-three male writers the chance to explore their artistic and emotional relationship to their favorite fairy-tale stories. In their personal essays, the contributors who include genre, literary, mainstream, and visual media writers offer new insight into men s reception of fairy tales. Brothers and Beasts, the follow-up to Kate Bernheimer's influential Mirror, Mirror on the Wall: Women Writers Explore Their Favorite Fairy Tales, offers new avenues for research in fairy-tale studies.
216 pages, Paperback
First published October 8, 2007
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
November 18, 2008
Absolutely brilliant. Initially I was drawn because of Zipes and Tatar. I haven't read Bernheimer's sister/companion book, though it's on the vast list. Each essay was marvelously interesting. I'm not going to bother going through one by one and pointing out why or why not, it would take far too long. But, overall, I think the theme that comes through is that fairytales catch children on a deep level and there they remain to do what the stories (and most stories in my opinion) are meant to do. To sooth, to give hope, to share a lesson, to provide an outlet, to give us magic back and that fantastic moment of seeing a thing purely, without really asking why. An easy read. And while it might get slated to as something as a "gender study" as all the essays are by men, I'm not sure that is. I think it's just the princes and the shepherds and the lost boys telling the other side.
June 12, 2015
I liked the other volume better. I can't figure out if it is because I'm a woman or because it was simply better. However, there a few essays that are worth it, like the one about Jack and the Beanstalk.
If you like Neil Gaiman and/or Jeff Vandermeer, you should know each has an essay in this.
If you like Neil Gaiman and/or Jeff Vandermeer, you should know each has an essay in this.
April 28, 2023
Inventive anthology! I especially love the essay by Ilya Kaminsky.
January 25, 2011
The essays in Brothers and Beasts are a great mix of funny, sad, introspective, and critical. I especially liked Michael Martone's "Seven Dwarf Essays," Richard Skien's "Hansel," and Neil Gaiman's "Four Poems." But editor Kate Bernheimer, who has also put together other anthologies of essays on fairy tales, really missed an opportunity here.
I'm eager to read her other anthologies, one of which is a bunch of great authors retelling and reinventing fairy tales, and the other of which is the precursor to this volume, a collection of essays on fairy tales by women authors. I suspect, especially from Bernheimer's introduction to Brothers and Beasts, that Mirror, Mirror on the Wall asked pointed questions about gender and how these writers related to fairy tales as women.
In Brothers and Beasts, she does no such thing. She even says that her prompt to the authors was super vague -- "do you want to write about fairy tales?" -- and then she celebrates the fact that hardly any of them explicitly address gender, which she takes as proof that fairy tales transcend all borders and these great writers find the universal appeal of fairy tales. But women had to focus on that in the other anthology? Meaning that women writers are still niche writers, that they don't get to speak for humanity or the universal appeal when they talk about fairy tales? Again, I'll have to read Mirror, Mirror to see how many of them really get into gender, but this left a sour taste in my mouth.
Besides which, the essays I liked best in Brothers and Beasts did actually talk about what it means to be a boy who enjoys fairy tales. Interesting, no?
I'm eager to read her other anthologies, one of which is a bunch of great authors retelling and reinventing fairy tales, and the other of which is the precursor to this volume, a collection of essays on fairy tales by women authors. I suspect, especially from Bernheimer's introduction to Brothers and Beasts, that Mirror, Mirror on the Wall asked pointed questions about gender and how these writers related to fairy tales as women.
In Brothers and Beasts, she does no such thing. She even says that her prompt to the authors was super vague -- "do you want to write about fairy tales?" -- and then she celebrates the fact that hardly any of them explicitly address gender, which she takes as proof that fairy tales transcend all borders and these great writers find the universal appeal of fairy tales. But women had to focus on that in the other anthology? Meaning that women writers are still niche writers, that they don't get to speak for humanity or the universal appeal when they talk about fairy tales? Again, I'll have to read Mirror, Mirror to see how many of them really get into gender, but this left a sour taste in my mouth.
Besides which, the essays I liked best in Brothers and Beasts did actually talk about what it means to be a boy who enjoys fairy tales. Interesting, no?
February 13, 2017
Anthologies are so difficult to review because, of course, some essays are going to be better than others. That's just the way of it. This has some big names in Brothers & Beasts: Neil Gaiman, Gregory Maguire, and the like. Men aren't often asked how they feel about fairy tales, so there are some interesting perspectives here.
Three Stars: Not bad, but not fantastic either. I'll still recommend it, if I think that person might like it more than me.
Three Stars: Not bad, but not fantastic either. I'll still recommend it, if I think that person might like it more than me.
November 23, 2011
I didn't really know what to expect from it but I actually really enjoyed it, it was a really good read, really interesting, part fiction, part non fiction, part critical. Very enjoyable, entertaining and instructive.
November 17, 2023
i really liked this!! it makes me want to read fairytales… or write a fairytale. I could be the next grimm. the next hca (hans christian andersen).
i’ve been trying to reflect a bit on my own interactions with fairytales. aside from the How To Storm A Castle (maybe the title?) book series i’m not sure there’s that much there. The Nutcracker is the only thing that is sticking out to me. i staged a recorded my own production of it as a 5? year old perhaps. I also a had a book that went through the story but it was more focused on the sugar plum fairy. I would resolve to look for this book next time i return home but i was extremely firm about donating books rather quickly after i was done with them to younger people who would enjoy them more. only books that were specific gifts survived my purge. But other worlds and going somewhere at night in a semi-dream capacity, and being a strange child separate from many peers all spoke to me as kid.
i’ve been trying to reflect a bit on my own interactions with fairytales. aside from the How To Storm A Castle (maybe the title?) book series i’m not sure there’s that much there. The Nutcracker is the only thing that is sticking out to me. i staged a recorded my own production of it as a 5? year old perhaps. I also a had a book that went through the story but it was more focused on the sugar plum fairy. I would resolve to look for this book next time i return home but i was extremely firm about donating books rather quickly after i was done with them to younger people who would enjoy them more. only books that were specific gifts survived my purge. But other worlds and going somewhere at night in a semi-dream capacity, and being a strange child separate from many peers all spoke to me as kid.
September 14, 2025
A quirky collection of essays on fairy tales. While the subtitle leaves the reader to assume a certain cohesive exploration of the male perspective, the work is a much looser collection of essays by male writers on whatever they choose to remark on regarding fairy tales. The most memorable essays comes from those authors who are able to revive what reading fairy tales felt like as a boy, what it allowed them to see in themselves and what they impact they recognize looking back.
April 12, 2023
Super solid. Felt like most of these essays were lukewarm, but some were amazing. (read for school)
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews