For Pratchett, the child-hero is someone who uses First Sight (seeing beyond the gothic illusion to what's really there) and Second Thoughts (thinking beyond the first impression) in this way the child-victim learns self-reliance and agency. However, Tiffany's self-assurance and self-assertion subvert the story typically associated with the passive fairy tale heroine. Like most fairy tales, Tiffany's story reflects the vicissitudes of the transition from girlhood to early adolescence: the struggle to define oneself, the fear of responsibility (and its doppelganger, the fear of separation), the fear of taking up one's place in the adult economies of desire and consumerism – all of which Pratchett equates, in some way, with death. This paper considers Terry Pratchett's sophisticated use of dark fairy tale motifs in his Tiffany Aching quartet: The Wee Free Men (2003), A Hat Full of Sky (2004), The Wintersmith (2006) and I Shall Wear Midnight (2010).
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