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‘Little Red Riding Hood’ is not only an intertext for the first story in Little Red and Other Stories but for the entire volume. An iconic fairy tale, known primarily in the version by the brothers Grimm, it is also one of the most commented on and reworked stories. While most retellings give precedent either to Little Red Riding Hood or the wolf, Ní Dhuibhne’s revisiting of the tale accords importance too to the role of the grandmother. She counters the tendency to appropriate fairy tales and sideline their enticement and wisdom by excavating their deep content especially the affects and primal predicaments that they depict. Fairy tale motifs in her short story collection allow the articulation of emotions that could not otherwise be voiced, provide a means of parsing everyday experience, and open a portal onto the magical and the numinous.
Anne Fogarty (Wed,) studied this question.