Notes on Distressed Genres

This essay is designed to contribute to an understanding of the role of Enlightenment aesthetics in the founding conceptions of the study of folklore forms. It surveys the ways in which a number of oralforms-epic, fable, proverb, fairy tale, and ballad-have been antiqued and reproduced by literary culture from the late 17th century forward. In creating such distressed genres, the literary culture attempted to invent a domain of authenticity and originality just as literary culture was itself undergoing dramatic changes in its modes of production and reception.