SOURCE: Mitchell, Jane Tucker. “Style and Humor.” In A Thematic Analysis of Mme. d'Aulnoy's Contes de fées, pp. 110-23. University, Miss.: Romance Monographs, 1978.

In the essay below, Mitchell outlines the major characteristics of d'Aulnoy's style in her fairy tales, including the personification of animals and other aspects of the natural world, wordplay, and the use of rhythmic repetition.

The themes of love and metamorphosis, coupled with an insight into the manners of seventeenth-century France as revealed in Mme. d'Aulnoy's Contes des fées, are enhanced by her imaginative style, her unusual vocabulary and her natural flow of language. Edmond Pilon, in his Muses et bourgeoises de jadis, compares Mme. d'Aulnoy with other women fairy tale writers of her era and concludes that her contes “l'emportaient encore en charme et en malice.”¹ It is this ambiguity that intrigues the reader and makes him plead for more.

A part...