Three forgotten women who wrote fairytales which subverted the Grimms’ gender norms

Rapunzel, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty – these well-known stories and others, first published by the Brothers Grimm in Kinder- und Hausmärchen (Children’s and Household Tales, 1812), have become shorthand for what we collectively think of as fairytales. They are stories with a strong moralistic undertone in which humble and obedient women are rewarded while transgressive women suffer – all before an interchangeable background of castles, kings and sorcery.

But these stories…

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