I was lucky in that when I was growing up one of the few household books was a boxed set of the Colored Fairy Books by Andrew Lang. I read these cover-to-cover a couple of times and I still refer to them. They have a bunch of the faddish ones written about a century or so ago (Puss in Boots, etc.), but they also include oddities like Snow White and Rose Red, many of the Kinder und Hausmarchen, and, my favorite, the (close to) original Red Riding Hood (possibly called Little Golden Hood). You know, the one where she gets eaten.

Like outside-one's-genre literature and classics (old and newer), fairy tales are one of those tools that I don't really think about until it comes up in conversation. They're not examples of good writing, but they do show the bones of how people tell stories, the storytelling structures of the collective subconcious, as it were. I know the youngest of three brothers is going to win, that ignoring the old woman who wants a drink is a bad move, that courtesy to dragons and other monsters is a good idea, etc. For a quick collection of these ideas, read Witches Abroad by Terry Pratchett. He has fun with most of them.

For those who wish to browse the Fairy Books by Andrew Lang or classic literature without going to the library or spending money, I recommend two sites. First, if you can/want to download them, there's Project Gutenberg. They're awesome. Second, if you can/want to read online, here's a good site that keeps adding stuff: http://www.online-literature.com/.