A fairy tale is an English language expression for a kind of short story. It has the same meaning as the French expression ' or ', the German word ', the Italian ', the Polish ', the Russian ' or the Swedish "". These stories are not all directly about fairies, but they are different from legends and traditions (which usually say that the stories are true) and directly moral stories. There are usually fairies, goblins, elves, trolls, giants or gnomes in fairy tales, and usually magic.