Who's afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?

From the cover of 'Wolfie' by Emma Barnes, illustrated by Emma Chichester Clark

Children's author Emma Barnes writes about the enduring appeal of a favourite fairy tale 'baddie'.

A few years ago I was lucky enough to spend some time in southern California. The skies were gloriously bright. The ocean sparkled. And yet, every morning, after I had walked my daughter to school along streets lined with hibiscus trees, I sat down with my laptop and my mind was possessed by winter, snow-filled woods...and wolves.

Wolves. They have always had a special place in the human imagination.

There is something wild and mysterious about the wolf. They live on the fringes of human civilisation, in the far north, the deep forest, the mountain range, the frozen wilderness. They are hunters who roam in packs or alone. Their toothy grins are deeply sinister. And what is more eerie that a wolf’s howl? In stories, they have always meant, above all – danger. 

The Big Bad Wolf of fairytales, who eats the grandmother, who blows the house down, who is determined to eat the little pigs. Who can be defeated only by trickery or the ferocity of the hunter. The dangerous, predatory wolf who lurks on the edge of the forest, and almost eats the little boy in Prokofiev’s opera, Peter and the Wolf. Or the wolves who howl in the big woods outside the little house of the pioneer child, Laura Ingalls Wilder, during the long, long winters of nineteenth century Wisconsin.

Then there are the ferocious 'wargs' of the Misty Mountains, who howl and prowl and sit beneath the trees in which twelve tasty dwarves, the wizard Gandalf and a fat little hobbit called Bilbo Baggins are sitting.  Those wolves are only kept at bay by Gandalf’s staff and flaming pine cones. Their eyes glow in the darkness, but several of them end up flayed and nailed to the door of the bear-man, Bjorn. In The Lord of the Rings, it is their howls that send the ring-bearers up the Misty Mountains, and, with fatal consequences, into the Mines of Moria. (A more modern, dystopian version of the wargs are surely the computer-generated 'muttant' creatures of The Hunger Games, who pursue the combatants into high places in order to force them into a fight to the death. And then, of course, there are werewolves, still prowling through the pages of Young Adult fiction, in close company with their vampire cousins...)

And yet...wolves are not only, or always, dangerous predators. They live in packs, where they show marked loyalty to each other. The adult wolves take turns to babysit the cubs of the pack. They kill, as most wild animals do, for the purpose of satisfying their hunger. They are intelligent animals, with complex hierarchies and means of communication.

They don’t deserve their evil reputation with regard to humans, either. Ever since they first encountered each other, it is the wolf that has been on the run. Wolves, once common in Britain, have been extinct for over 200 years. Even in the Big Woods of Wisconsin, it was the family in the Little House that had the upper hand: every time Pa Ingalls staggered off to town, it was under the weight of the animal skins that he had trapped or shot with his rifle. Wolves were all but eliminated from the American West.

Yet the intelligent or vulnerable wolf has rarely shown up in the pages of children’s fiction.True, Mowgli was raised in a litter of wolf cubs. But such examples are rare compared with the archetype of the Big Bad Wolf.

One of the most powerful of all wolf tales is also the most simple. A little girl sets out to visit her grandmother.  She has her basket and red cape. On the way, she meets a wolf. And when she gets to her grandmother’s cottage... 'Oh, grandmother, what big eyes you have!'

Little Red Riding Hood was first written down and published in 1697 (and existed as folklore long before).  Since then it has always been with us. And it has entrenched in us an idea: Little Girl plus Wolf equals Trouble.

Wolfie, my own tale of wolves and snow-filled woods opens on an ordinary Saturday in an ordinary suburban neighbourhood. Lucie (who often wears red) has been longing for a pet dog, and it seems that her wish has finally been granted.

Lucie raised a shaking hand. “What is that?” she whispered, pointing at the creature.
“Oh, that’s your present,” said Uncle Joe. “A new pet!”
“I mean, what kind of pet?”
“Can’t you tell? It’s a dog, of course!”
Lucie, Mum and Dad stared at the “dog”. It stared back at them out of cold, blue eyes. Its long tongue lolled out of the corner of its mouth.
“That’s no dog!” said Lucie.  “That’s a WOLF!” 

Of course, they don’t believe her. But a dangerous element has been introduced into the safe, supervised, conventional household of Lucie’s family. And even when Lucie and the wolf forge a friendship, the wolf’s essential wildness is still there. Wolfie (or Fang, as she is known among wolves) has to be reminded not to eat people, or their pets. She doesn’t see the point of most human conventions and behaviour.  And of course, when they begin to suspect what creature is really in their midst, the adults don’t see the point of her. Their immediate instinct is to destroy her.

Yet times have changed. We still revel in The Big Bad Wolf, yet we can also see that wolves are fascinating and beautiful. There is a human urge to understand, not just to destroy. And this (without revealing too much) plays an important part in my story.

Wolves will always be with us, stalking through the worlds of our imagination. They represent danger and darkness, a wildness beyond the control of humans...but also freedom and possibility. Wolfie joins their ranks: in part Big Bad Wolf, but there is more to her than that.

Emma's favourite books about wolves

• Little Red Riding Hood - First written down by Charles Perrault, this story has never lost its hold on our imagination.
• Clever Polly and the Stupid Wolf - Polly needs all her wit and native cunning if she is to avoid being eaten by the Big Bad Wolf.
• Mr Wolf’s Pancakes - Jan Fearnley reworks the Big Bad Wolf for a contemporary tale.
• The Little House in the Big Woods - Wolves are among the many challenges that face a pioneer family.
• White Fang - The first book to really try and enter the mind of a hybrid wolf.
• The Hobbit - Who can forget the ferocious wargs with their burning eyes?