"Life like a fairy tale" : fairy tales as influence in the life and works of Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

The purpose of this study is to establish fairy tales as a major influence in the life and works of Mary E. Wilkins Freeman and, further, to show how fairy tales helped shape Freeman's literary evolution. Primary and secondary sources are analyzed to show how trends developed in Freeman's children's literature continued to evolve in the adult fiction she produced both simultaneously with the children's literature and later independently throughout her career. A close exploration of her work and the scholarship on her life, along with fairy tale scholarship, demonstrates that Freeman's life itself had many fairy tale elements. Further analysis suggests that Freeman's children's literature uses fairy tale themes and motifs in two distinctly different ways: to instill a Christian pedagogy within children or to suggest that magic is an accepted part of a child's imagination. Also, Freeman's use of fairy influences in her work places her in the great feminine tradition of tale-weaver. Finally, Freeman can be considered a proto-feminist fairy tale revisionist as well, linking her to yet another literary tradition. The thesis concludes by demonstrating that Freeman might have manipulated her literary market to make the most of her early influences and shows that Freeman was more aware of the fairy tale aspects of her work, to her distinct economic advantage, than ever before thought.