FAIRY TALE STUDIES — AI AND YOU
Fairy Tales vs fAIry Tales (I)
I asked ChatGPT to write me an original fairy tale, analyze it, then adapt it per the Great Fairy Tale Tradition
AI generation is everywhere, and it’s threatening to take over stories. I don’t believe AI tech will ever create like humans, but it’s going to do well enough — very soon — to fool a lot of people.
Readers of human-written books (I can't believe that’s a phrase we have to use now), can quickly pick up on the telltale flattened blandness of AI-generated writing. What concerns me is that the fewer people read real books, and the more they get used to reading AI text, the more they’re going to let AI-generated writing of all forms dominate.
It’s a little alarming to see so many writers using programs like ChatGPT to write their stories. Programs like Ghost Writer have emerged in which you can have AI generate, or adapt, a passage of text in the style of famous dead authors; from Shelley to Austen, and Dickens to Hemmingway. (Unlike much of AI-generated writing, at least this site credits those dead writers.)
You’d think fairy tales — still best when they include the original memetic and oral components — would slip under the radar. After all, many of them are old and classic, yet one of the first indicators that people are turning storytelling over to machines was when a company asked a program called Botnik to write a fairy tale, back in 2018.
It made headlines.
There’s a reason fairy tales were targeted first. They appear to be simple. They seem to be flat. It’s part of many people’s definitions of them. Writing a fairy tale should be simple. At least that was the idea. What a lot of people don’t realize though, is that defining a fairy tale is a difficult thing.
Although many early elementary children are given the exercise of writing a fairy tale via a formula and seem to be successful, these stories don’t tend to catch on and leave the classroom. The fairy tale bots on Twitter, that generate a simple, two-sentence premise based on the “fairy tale formula” are more often than not nonsensical and boringly repetitive. Reading the ATU index list of categories is far more entertaining. (Seriously — it’s pretty awesome!) The fact that Disney — who employs some of the most talented creatives in the world — cannot seem to reliably re-create, let alone create an original new fairy tale that resonates with folks and enters the traditional canon, should be a huge clue that this is one of those glass mountain-type tasks — not truly impossible but it can certainly feel that way.
Fairy tales are deceptively simple but in actuality they are anything but, which makes them an excellent litmus test for AI story-generating!
So I did an experiment.
I asked the most popular writing-generator, ChatGPT, to write me an original fairy tale, analyze it, assign an ATU index number, then adapt it as various French fairy tale salon writers, again as the Grimms, then as Disney the man, and finally as the Disney Company today might. It was a tough assignment for ChatGPT.
Then I asked it to rewrite for inclusivity and diversity… oof!
Do you remember the buzz not so long ago when it was announced AI had written an original fairy tale?
I’m referring to the so-called “Lost Grimm’s Tale”, reportedly written by the AI story generator Botnik, mentioned above. The year was 2018, which is eons, or “a long, long time ago”, in tech-time, so I thought I would see how far AI has come in terms of creating a real fairy tale — not just a formulaic, cookie-cutter idea of what a fairy tale is, that required quite a bit of “hands-on” by writers to make it work.
Cue me logging into ChatGPT (Chat Generated Pre-trained Transformer). I asked it a LOT of questions — though I did try hard to refrain from creative input — to get ChatGPT to formulate something better and evolve its story, but my opinion is it would have taken hours and hours of refinement, and guidance to really get there.
Confession: I am brand new to ChatGPT. Last week was the first time I have ever used it. I’m not certain that this is a tool I personally want to use for anything much at the moment but its use is widespread and only getting more popular, so I feel that being informed is the 2023 version of “forewarned equals forearmed”.
An issue surfaced recently, in which it’s become apparent ChatGPT — and any other AI-generating program — doesn’t like idiosyncracies. It also has a habit of removing anything that doesn’t fit a predictive pattern when asked to recreate real people’s biographies. That is, if your life doesn’t fit a typical pattern of, for example, success, the program will both omit certain details (was a traveling chef for a year) and add fake ones (valedictorian) to make the pattern fit. The idea that the program tends to ignore variations and so-called aberrations, and likes to smooth everything and everyone out to homogenize them, is fascinating to me because it’s those things that make people — and stories — unique. I’ll quote an extract to bring you up to speed (emphasis in bold is mine):
“I grew up in the Bay Area, and I’m a Professor holding a chair at a large, highly regarded research university. But my road there doesn’t ‘fit’ the mold, so ChatGPT changed my story to make it fit; to erase my difference.” Shannon Vallor (source)
The article I read this quote in went on to say the following:
It’s paradoxical — How is it that the only entity (for lack of a better word) that has “memorized” the whole internet is, at the same time, unable to faithfully retrieve the very details that make so precious the hidden written jewels no one else will ever encounter? It’s from this perspective that I’ve found the description of ChatGPT that I like the most. It’s not the most precise, but the most poetic: ChatGPT is a “messer” of worlds. An averager of stories. An eraser of the implausible. … And what are we without our idiosyncrasy? Copies of copies. …. ChatGPT isn’t really taking originality from us. But it definitely “may homogenize our lives and flatten our reality.” — Alberto Romero (source)
Fairy tales are generally considered flat and formulaic but I’ve never truly seen them that way. To me it’s more like they appear simple on the outside, so are very accessible to everyone, but can be inexplicably complex once you crack them open. They are full of jewels to me. I understand why fairy tales are described as flat — it is a very valid term in some aspects — so if ChatGPT likes flat things, it should have no problem writing, then adapting, its own, right?
I have read that, as far as ChatGPT goes, you get a better result if you put in a basic tale framework, to begin with. That is, prompt ChatGPT with a basic “Twitter summary” of the sort of tale you’d like it to generate, or at the very least, give it some basic elements to work with. That feels too specific to me — especially if you want to see what the program is capable of by itself without human intervention. It does, after all, have access to everything ever published on the internet. So I kept it very simple: “can you tell me an original fairy tale?”.
The following text is basically my questions for ChatGPT, its answers, and my prompting for it to generate better ones (my criticism of certain answers will likely be clear by my next questions).
I found I had to repeat a lot of information in my questions (in court it’s called “leading the witness”, in AI terms it’s “training”), including informing it of facts so it would generate less general answers and focus on more specific, and better information, a.k.a. “dig a little deeper”.
This resulting article has turned out to be lengthy — mainly because I am including the unedited short story answers from ChatGPT, and I am attempting to fact-check the main things along the way. Although I am using bold headings and a question-answer format that should be fairly easy to scan and scroll through, it’s still a LOT, so I’m going to publish this in multiple installments.
My hope as you read is that, along with seeing the results of this exercise and where fairy tales and AI currently stand, you’ll learn some interesting facts about fairy tales and fairy tale writers along the way. It’s been interesting and a bit weird! I’ll add my post-experiment summary thoughts at the very end of it all.
Enjoy!
(An unedited transcript of questions by me (in bold) and answers by ChatGPT follows. Anything in italics is my commentary/notes written and added after the fact. Any links have been inserted by me.)
Let’s start generating:
ChatGPT, can you tell me an original fairy tale, please?
Once upon a time, in a kingdom far away, there was a beautiful and kind-hearted princess named Lilia. Lilia lived in a castle with her father, the king, and her mother, the queen. Lilia was loved by all who knew her, but she was very lonely because she had no friends her age.
One day, Lilia decided to take a walk in the woods near the castle. As she was walking, she stumbled upon a small, injured bird. Lilia picked up the bird and took it back to the castle to care for it. Over time, the bird healed and became Lilia’s best friend. They spent all their time together, talking, playing and exploring the kingdom.
One day, Lilia and her bird friend were playing in the woods when they heard a strange noise. Suddenly, they saw a group of goblins approaching them. The goblins were mean and cruel, and they wanted to capture Lilia and take her away. Lilia and her bird friend tried to run away, but the goblins were too fast.
Just as the goblins were about to capture Lilia, her bird friend started to grow. It grew and grew until it was a giant bird, with feathers as black as night and wings as wide as a house. The giant bird lifted Lilia onto its back and flew away with her, leaving the goblins behind.
Lilia and her giant bird friend flew high above the clouds and landed on a magical island. On the island, there were other magical creatures, like unicorns and mermaids. Lilia was amazed and delighted to be in such a magical place, and she made many new friends.
Lilia and her giant bird friend spent many happy years on the magical island, but eventually, Lilia started to miss her family and her home. The giant bird, who had become very fond of Lilia, offered to fly her back to her castle. Lilia was sad to leave her new friends behind, but she knew it was time to go home.
When Lilia arrived back at her castle, she was greeted with open arms by her family and her people. They had been so worried about her, but when they saw her with her giant bird friend, they knew that she had been on a grand adventure.
Lilia never forgot her magical island or her giant bird friend, and every time she looked up at the sky, she thought of him and smiled. The end.
[Ed. — Rather than analyze line by line, let’s just go through the next set of questions and ChatGPT’s answers. Issues will become apparent fairly quickly.]
In your original fairy tale, what tropes did you use?
In my original fairy tale, I used several tropes commonly found in classic fairy tales, including:
- The kind-hearted and beautiful princess as the main character.
- The magical creature (in this case, the bird) as the princess’s friend and helper.
- The villainous goblins as the main antagonists.
- The magical island as a place of wonder and enchantment.
- The return to the princess’s home and family as the conclusion of the story.
While these tropes are common in fairy tales, I tried to add my own twists and unique elements to create an original story. For example, instead of a prince or knight saving the princess, it was her friendship with the bird that helped her escape danger. Additionally, the magical island and its inhabitants were not just there for decoration, but played a significant role in the story. [Ed. fact-check: rather than go through each one, I am directing you to the more commonly recognized fairy tale tropes so you can make your own comparisons, though please note this list does differ from the more complete compilation of elements and tropes per the ATU motifs.]
If your fairy tale were to be given an ATU index number and tale type (ATU meaning the Aarne–Thompson–Uther Index), what would it, or those, be?
My fairy tale would likely be classified under the ATU index as type 400, “The Magic Flight.” [Ed. fact-check: Magic Flight is tale type 313, not 400] This tale type involves a protagonist who is helped by a magical creature to escape from danger, and they travel to a magical land or otherworldly realm. In this type of tale, the protagonist often has to leave the magical realm and return to their own world, as in my fairy tale. [Ed. fact-check: in The Magic Flight tale type 313, the hero escapes with a female helper either with the use of a magical object or by transforming — see section on analysis at link]
Additionally, my fairy tale includes elements of type 451, “The Three Stolen Princesses.” [Ed. fact-check: Three Stolen Princesses is tale type 301. not 451] This type of tale involves princesses who are kidnapped by an ogre or other villainous character, and a hero must rescue them. [Ed. fact-check: This could pass as a description. In The Three Stolen Princesses tape type 301, three heroes or brothers go to rescue three princesses from a monster or ogre lair, with one brother being sent down to do the work.] In my tale, Lilia is not actually kidnapped, but is in danger of being captured by the goblins, and is ultimately saved by her giant bird friend.
It’s worth noting that while my fairy tale shares similarities with these ATU tale types, it also contains unique elements that make it a distinct and original story. [Ed.: Hmm. Let’s just humor the machine for now.]
Even original fairy tales tend to be a variant, or remix, of other tales, along with having unique and original elements. Can you name older fairy tales yours might be considered a “new variant” of?
Certainly! My fairy tale draws inspiration from several older fairy tales, including:
- “The Goose Girl” — [Ed. ATU 533 “Speaking Horsehead”] This is a classic German fairy tale. (Ed. fact check: technnically true, although, according to the Gimm’s notes, it appears to have roots elsewhere — may now be considered a German classic in 2023) collected by the Brothers Grimm [Ed. fact-check: told to the Brothers Grimm by Dorothea Viehmann an educated and cosmopolitan tavern owner’s daughter, exposed to tales from many places and consisdered to “have enriched German fairytale culture with the influence of French storytelling tradition”.] In this story, a princess is betrayed by her maid and has to work as a goose girl until she can reclaim her rightful place as queen. Like my fairy tale, “The Goose Girl” features a kind-hearted princess and a magical bird (in this case, a talking horse — [Ed. fact-check: techically true — Falada is a horse who can speak; the head continues to speak to the princess after the horse has been killed as well]) who helps her on her journey.
- “The Three Feathers” — This is another German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm. [Ed. ATU 402 The Animal Bride] In this story, a king tests his three sons to see which one is worthy of inheriting the throne. The youngest son is helped by a magical bird [Ed. fact-check: helped by a magical toad -this story is a variant of the Russian tale , The Frog Tsarevna and the Finnish tale, The Mouse Bride] who gives him three feathers [Ed fact-check: in The Three Feathers the King throws three feathers into the air, three time. Each time his sons have to follow the direction they’re blown, to complete tasks] that help him complete the tasks set before him. Like my fairy tale, “The Three Feathers” features a helpful bird and a protagonist who must complete a series of challenges.
- “The Magic Swan” — This is a French fairy tale [Ed. fact-check: it’s German] collected by Andrew Lang in “The Blue Fairy Book.” [Ed. fact-check: from the “The Green Fairy Book”] In this story, a princess is turned into a swan by her evil stepmother [Ed. fact-check: Nope. The swan might have been magical but it was not a transformed princess. ATU is 559 Making the Princess Laugh], but is later restored to her human form by a prince who falls in love with her. Like my fairy tale, “The Magic Swan” features a protagonist who is transformed into a bird, and a magical land that they visit. [Ed. fact check: not like The Magic Swan fairy tale at all]
While my fairy tale shares similarities with these older stories, it also contains unique elements and a distinct plot that set it apart as its own tale.
The Brothers Grimm are known for not only collecting tales but editing each tale with regard to their values and societal views. If the Grimms had come across your tale, how might they have edited it to read and sound to be included in their 1812 collection?
If the Brothers Grimm had come across my fairy tale and decided to include it in their collection, they may have made several edits to fit their values and societal views. Here are a few possibilities:
- The character of Lilia: The Brothers Grimm often edited their fairy tales to make the female protagonist more passive and submissive, in line with the societal expectations of the time. In my tale, Lilia is a strong, independent character who relies on her own ingenuity and the help of her bird friend to escape danger. The Grimms may have toned down her agency and made her more passive, in order to fit with their views on gender roles. [Ed. fact-check: although this is vague, there is truth to the girl likely being more burdened with gender roles that reflect patriarchal socialization, and traditional Christian morals, but girls, especially when alone, still tend to be clever and have agency in Grimm retellings. The academic paper “Who’s Afraid of the Brothers Grimm?”, by Jack Zipes, is an interesting and informative read on how the Grimms adapted and edited tales — it will apply to all the points regaring this question. Easier to download & read here: https://tinyurl.com/ym2b5h9d]
- The portrayal of the goblins: In my tale, the goblins are depicted as cruel and villainous, but are not given much backstory or explanation. The Grimms may have added more detail to explain why the goblins are evil, or to portray them as more nuanced characters. [Ed. fact-check: the Grimms were unlikely to exaplin why a goblin would be evil, instead they would more likely have been given characteristics of “outsiders” who were not the German nationalist ideal — for the Grimms’ sensibility at the time this might have included adding anti-Semitic characteristics] They may have also added more violent or graphic descriptions of the goblins’ actions [Ed. fact-check: true — by our standards, the Grimms’ stories were violent — some childhood scholars have argued the Grimms understood children prefer extremes in their stories to easily identify good and evil, so deliberately used this technique — but the Grimms moral leanings also tend to portray the unsavory by using examples of graphic violence and tended in favor of “eye for an eye” types of justice for these characters too], in order to create a stronger sense of danger and suspense.
- The magical elements: My fairy tale includes several magical elements, such as the giant bird, the magical island, and the enchanted berries. [Ed. fact-check: ChatGPT did not include enchanted berries in its story, though now I wish it had. I should have asked it to incorporate the berries and regenerate but I was more interested in getting to the next set of questions.] The Grimms may have added more detail or explanation for these elements [Ed. fact-check: unlikely. The Grimms didn’t tend to go into detail about magic or magical items. Magic and enchanted objects were not complex but existed as part of reality in the fairy tale world and needed no explanation, other than that they existed as part of the story. Recommended read “Disenchanting the Fairy Tale: Retellings of “Snow White” between Magic and Realism” by Vanessa Joosen], or they may have toned down the magical aspects in order to create a more realistic and grounded story.
Overall, if the Grimms had come across my fairy tale, they likely would have made changes to fit their own values and editorial preferences [Ed. fact-check: true]. However, it’s also possible that they may have appreciated the story’s unique elements and chosen to include it in their collection without making major changes. [Ed. fact-check: it’s far more likely they would have edited it quite a bit. There is a distinct style change from classic fairy tale to random fantasy story when Lilia and the bird reach the magical island. The island also serves no moral or story purpose which the Grimms prioritized.]
Stay tuned for the next installment, in which we ask ChatGPT to put on its fashionable seventeenth-century wig, and adapt its “original fairy tale” like one of those French girls.
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Gypsy Thornton (she/her) is the Guardian of a chicken-legged coffee cup with a mind of its own. A night owl forced to get up with larks, she often describes herself as liminal and is forever trying to do impossible things before breakfast. She can only be seen in her true form after midnight.
