What would you do if you fell in love with a prince on a boat who ate oysters and fell overboard? Since you're a mermaid, you'd save him and fall madly in love with him, right? What would you do if you sold your singing voice to the sea witch and her flesh-eating eels to become human? What would you do if your husband kidnapped a mermaid and kept trying to feed her fish and potatoes when all she wanted to eat was human flesh? We explore these fascinating questions as we analyze the connection between food, horror and fairy tales in Hans Christian Andersen's classic tale The Little Mermaid, along with two other modern fish-female films The Lure and She Creature. So please jump on into the water and join us!

References:

Ondine (2009), directed by Neil Jordan.

The Lure (Córki dancingu) (2015), directed by Agnieszka Smoczyńska.

She Creature (2001), directed by Sebastian Gutierrez.

Books

Anaya, Rudolfo. Bless Me, Ultima. Berkeley: TQS Publications, 1972.

Gabaldon, Diana. Outlander (Outlander Book 1). New York: Delacorte Press, 1991.

Jarvie, Gordon (ed.). Scottish Folk and Fairy Tales. London: Penguin Books, 1992.

Mother Earth, Father Sky: Native American Myth. Alexandria, VA: Time-Life Books, 1991.

What would you do if your horrible mother married a dude with a beautiful daughter and made you and your plain sister feel terrible about yourselves? What would you do if your beautiful stepsister became the house servant and went around in ugly clothes with ashes in her hair and no shoes? What if your mother tried to make you pretty and didn't allow you to eat? What if you found out there was a ball in your village and a handsome prince would be choosing a bride from the local young ladies? You'd probably starve yourself by swallowing a tapeworm and allowing your nose to be broken and reshaped, right? We'll be exploring these ideas and discussing the connection between food, fairy tales and horror in the classic story Cinderella and some more recent iterations, including the highly visceral The Ugly Stepsister film as well as others, so please join us!

Winterset Hollow by Jonathan Edward Durham

Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister by Gregory Maguire

Cinderella - 1950 film by @Disney

The Ugly Stepsister - 2025 film by Emilie Blichfeldt

Into the Woods - 2014 film by Rob Marshall

Ashputtle by Peter Straub

What would you do if you were a young lady with hair black as ebony, lips red as rubies, and skin white as snow? You'd probably be called Snow White, right? What if your father married a woman who hated you and she tried to have you killed so she could eat your heart and absorb your beauty? What would you do if you were rescued by dwarves and a wicked witch tried to kill you AGAIN by making you eat a poisoned apple? You'd probably be off apples for awhile after that. We explore these fascinating questions as we analyze the connection between food, horror and fairy tales in the classic tale Snow White and some of its modern iterations, so please join us!

Links to references below:

Snow White: A Tale of Terror Dir. Michael Cohn https://share.google/bXj2R16ezdcSzaW1S
The Grimm Reader: The Classic Tales of the Brothers Grimm
by Maria Tatar: https://archive.org/details/grimmreaderclass0000unse
The Young Slave by Basile, Giovanni Batiste. Il Pentamerone, or The Tale of Tales. Sir Richard Burton, translator. London: Henry and Company, 1893.
https://surlalunefairytales.com/s-z/sleeping-beauty/stories/youngslave.html