The Canary Prince (

Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance language *** Regional Ita ...

: ''Il Principe canarino'') is an Italian

fairy tale A fairy tale (alternative names include fairytale, fairy story, magic tale, or wonder tale) is a short story that belongs to the folklore genre. Such stories typically feature magic (paranormal), magic, incantation, enchantments, and mythical ...

, the 18th tale in

Italian Folktales ''Italian Folktales'' (''Fiabe italiane'') is a collection of 200 Italian folktales published in 1956 by Italo Calvino. Calvino began the project in 1954, influenced by Vladimir Propp's '' Morphology of the Folktale''; his intention was to emulat ...

Italo Calvino Italo Calvino (, also , ;. RAI (circa 1970), retrieved 25 October 2012. 15 October 1923 – 19 September 1985) was an Italian writer and journalist. His best known works include the ''Our Ancestors'' trilogy (1952–1959), the '' Cosmicomi ...

. He took the tale from Turin, making various stylistic changes; he noted it developed a medieval motif, but such tales as

Marie de France Marie de France ( fl. 1160 to 1215) was a poet, possibly born in what is now France, who lived in England during the late 12th century. She lived and wrote at an unknown court, but she and her work were almost certainly known at the royal court ...

's ''

Yonec "Yonec" is one of the ''The Lais of Marie de France, Lais of Marie de France'', written in the twelfth century by the French poet known only as Marie de France. ''Yonec'' is a Breton lai, a type of narrative poem. The poem is written in the Anglo-No ...

'' produced a rather different effect, being tales of adultery. A variant on

Rapunzel "Rapunzel" ( , ) is a German fairy tale recorded by the Brothers Grimm and first published in 1812 as part of ''Children's and Household Tales'' (KHM 12). The Brothers Grimm's story developed from the French literary fairy tale of ''Persinette ...

, Aarne–Thompson type 310, The Maiden in the Tower, it includes many motifs that differentiate it from that tale. Other fairy tales of this type include

Anthousa, Xanthousa, Chrisomalousa ''Anthousa, Xanthousa, Chrisomalousa'' or ''Anthousa the Fair with Golden Hair'' is a Greek fairy tale collected by Greek folklorist in ''Folktales of Greece''. Other variants were collected by Michalis Meraklis and Anna Angelopoulou.Soula Mit ...

Petrosinella "Petrosinella" is a Neapolitan literary fairy tale, written by Giambattista Basile in his collection of fairy tales in 1634, ''Lo cunto de li cunti'' (''The Tale of Tales''), or ''Pentamerone''. It is Aarne–Thompson type 310 "the Maiden in the ...

, Prunella, and

Synopsis

A jealous

stepmother A stepmother, stepmum or stepmom is a non-biological female parent married to one's preexisting parent. A stepmother-in-law is a stepmother of one's spouse. Children from her spouse's previous unions are known as her stepchildren. Culture Ste ...

persuades her husband, the king, to lock his daughter in a castle in the forest. One day, a king's son goes by, hunting, and is astounded to see the abandoned castle in use. He sees the daughter, but they are unable to communicate except by gesture. A witch, to help them, tricks the ladies-in-waiting into giving the princess a book. When she ruffles the pages forward, her lover turns into a canary; when she ruffles them back, he is restored to his human form. After some time, the queen arrives and sees a young man by the window, and puts pins on the window sill so that if the daughter leaned on it to flirt, she would be stabbed. These pins stab the prince in his canary form, and even when the princess restores him, the prince lies on the ground, bleeding, and his companions must bear him back to his father. The princess escapes by cutting up her sheets for a rope, and overhears witches talking of things; one describes how to heal the prince. She does so, and asks for his coat-of-arms, his standard, and his vest as her reward. He goes hunting, and she turns him into a canary. When he flies to her room and she turns him back, he reproaches her for his injury. She produces her reward to prove that she saved him, and tells him that it was her stepmother's doing. They marry, and the daughter reveals to her father how wicked her imprisonment had been.

Analysis

Tale type

In a review of Calvino's work, folklorist Walter Anderson classified the tale, according to the international Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index, as type AaTh 432, "

The Prince as Bird The Bird Lover, also known as The Prince as Bird, is a type of narrative structure in folklore, no. 432 in the Aarne–Thompson classification system. In the typical version of story, a woman acquires a bird lover—a nobleman in the shape of a bir ...

Motifs

The episode of the heroine overhearing the animals that talk about how to cure the ailed prince occurs in tale type ATU 432, "The Prince as Bird".Aarne, Antti; Thompson, Stith. ''The types of the folktale: a classification and bibliography''. Folklore Fellows Communications FFC no. 184. Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica, 1961. pp. 146-147.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Canary Prince, The Canary Prince Canary Prince Canary Prince Canary Prince Canary Prince Stories within Italian Folktales ATU 300-399

Synopsis

Analysis

Tale type

Motifs

See also

References