When I first learned about the tradition of the Kunst-Märchen - 'art fairy tale', a newly-written fairy tale - in a Goethe Institut class I must admit I was surprised a bit. With a bit of thought I could see how it obviously existed in various European traditions (Hans Christian Andersen, obviously). But not so much from English literature. Is it just the environment, I wonder? Is it easier to imagine oneself in the world of the Märchen when you're sitting in a room overlooking the Altstadt of some storied city, with its crazy houses going up at weird angles, sitting snugly side by side one another on those wiggly-woggly cobbled streets, with pubs that have doorways that only a dwarf could go through - and a tower overlooking the whole town that might at one time have been used for brewing, might have been used for making bullets, or might have been used for keeping Rapunzel in? But then again, I'm not sure that's quite right either - because if you came upon a Baba Yaga House (a house standing on chicken feet that hops about its yard all day) or a Hexenhaus (like the house made from candies and gingerbread in Hansel and Gretel) it would look just as bizarre and out of place in a river redgum forest or next to a Smithy's IGA as it would in the Urwald of the Märchen.
In conclusion, I have no conclusion, but it just makes you think, doesn't it, unless it doesn't, in which case, fine.
Fig 1: Typical German people doing typical German things
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