Charles Perrault was a 17th century French author and literary figure whose collection of fairy tales became the foundation for numerous anime and manga adaptations centuries after his death. Born in Paris on January 12, 1628, Perrault worked as a lawyer and government official before dedicating himself to writing. He played a significant role in the literary Quarrel of the Ancients and the Moderns, arguing for the superiority of contemporary literature over classical works. In 1697, at the age of 67, he published a collection of eight stories under the title Histoires ou Contes du Temps passé, with the subtitle Tales of Mother Goose. This collection included enduring classics such as Cinderella, The Sleeping Beauty, Little Red Riding Hood, Bluebeard, and Puss in Boots. Perrault did not invent these stories from scratch; rather, he drew upon existing oral folklore traditions and refined them into polished literary works, effectively creating the new genre of the literary fairy tale. He is widely recognized as the father of the French children's literary tradition, and his versions of these tales have proven more influential than later adaptations by collectors such as the Brothers Grimm.

Perrault’s stories became source material for Japanese anime productions several decades after his death, with Japanese animation studios turning his 17th century plots into feature films and television series. The most prominent example is the 1969 film The Wonderful World of Puss n Boots, produced by Toei Animation and directed by Kimio Yabuki. This film adapted Perrault’s story of a clever feline who helps his master win fortune and love, and it featured an anthropomorphic cat hero named Pero after the author Perrault. The film proved highly successful, and the character Pero became the official mascot of Toei Animation, appearing in the studio’s logo for decades. The success of this adaptation led to two direct sequels: Nagagutsu Sanjūshi from 1972, which reimagined the character in an American Old West setting, and Nagagutsu o Haita Neko 80 Nichikan Sekai Isshū from 1976, which blended the Puss in Boots character with elements of Jules Verne’s Around the World in Eighty Days.

Beyond the film series, Perrault’s influence extended to Japanese television animation. The 1992 television series Nagagutsu o Haita Neko no Bōken, also known as The Adventures of Puss-in-Boots, ran for 26 episodes and presented an expanded adaptation of his original fairy tale. Additionally, the 1996 Italian-Japanese co-production Cinderella Monogatari, or The Story of Cinderella, was directly based on the fairy tale by Charles Perrault as well as the version collected by the Brothers Grimm. This 26-episode series was produced by Tatsunoko Productions and aired on NHK, adding new characters and plot twists to the basic Cinderella framework.

Perrault’s significance to the anime and manga industry rests on his role as a foundational source of narrative material. His stories provided Japanese animators with instantly recognizable plots and characters that required no additional licensing fees, as the works had entered the public domain. The 1969 Puss n Boots film is particularly notable for the involvement of a young Hayao Miyazaki, who worked as a key animator on the project and created a promotional manga adaptation of the film that was serialized in newspapers in 1969. Miyazaki’s work on this Perrault adaptation predated his later masterpieces such as Lupin III: The Castle of Cagliostro and the founding of Studio Ghibli, meaning that Perrault’s 17th century fairy tale directly influenced the early career of one of anime’s most celebrated directors. The character of Pero, named after Perrault, remains one of the most enduring symbols in Japanese animation history as the face of Toei Animation. Charles Perrault died in Paris on May 16, 1703, but his literary legacy continues to shape animated storytelling in Japan and around the world.