Joybell, could you point me to your book online? I can't find a link that works from Google.

Another thing we need to remember is that people don't necessarily have to believe in fairies to enjoy telling fairy stories. It seems to me quite probable that many of the ballads were passed on from parents to young children in much the way that fairy stories always were. As Art Theime said, a good story is a good story.

And what keeps people gripped is not necessarily what you'd expect - singers through the ages have been unaccountably fond of the talking birds in 'The Outlandish Knight' and 'Young Hunting', whilst allowing other (arguably more exciting) elements of the story to slip away in the process of transmission.