Vendor
	Mohrbooks Literary Agency Sebastian Ritscher
Original language
English

DISFIGURED

Amanda Leduc

On Fairy Tales, Disability, and Making Space

In fairy tales, happy endings are the norm - as long as you're beautiful and walk on two legs.

By examining the ways that fairy tales have shaped our expectations of disability, Disfigured will point the way toward a new world where disability is no longer a punishment or impediment but operates, instead, as a way of centering a protagonist and helping them.

From examinations of disability in tales from the Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Andersen through to modern interpretations ranging from Disney to Angela Carter, and the fight for disabled representation in today's media, Leduc connects the fight for disability justice to the growth of modern, magical stories, and argues for increased awareness and acceptance of that which is other - helping us to see and celebrate the magic inherent in different bodies.

AMANDA LEDUC is the author of the novels The Miracles of Ordinary Men and the forthcoming The Centaur's Wife. She has cerebral palsy and lives in Hamilton, Ontario, where she works as the Communications Coordinator for the Festival of Literary Diversity.

Available products
Book Published 2020-03-03 by Coach House Books
Book Published 2020-03-03 by Coach House Books

Comments

Leduc persuasively illustrates the power of stories to affect reality in this painstakingly researched and provocative study that invites us to consider our favorite folktales from another angle.

Historically we have associated the disabled body image and disabled life with an unhappy ending.

Each chapter is a gem, but the kind of gem that turns into a knife, into a mirror, into a portal. Leduc's real magic? That she transforms her readers as surely as any world.

A unique and dazzling study... a revolutionary approach to understanding why we are drawn to fairy tales and how they shape our lives.

She [Leduc] argues that template is how society continues to treat the disabled: rather than making the world accessible for everyone, the disabled are often asked to adapt to inaccessible environments.

Leduc peels the flesh from the fairy tales we grew up loving and strips them down to their skeletons to skilfully reveal how they influence the way we think about disability. She contrasts the stories we have with the ones we wish we had, incorporating her own life. Her wisdom lands like a punch in the heart, leaving a sizable dent that reshapes how we see tales we've been telling for centuries. She also --and this is the best part-- suggests how we might tell new fairy tales, how we can forge new stories.