Many versions of The Three Little Pigs have been recreated and modified over the years, sometimes making the wolf a kind character.

[4] The story in its arguably best-known form appeared in English Fairy Tales by Joseph Jacobs, first published on June 19, 1890, and crediting Halliwell as his source.

[5] The earliest published version of the story is from Dartmoor, Devon, England in 1853, and has three little pixies and a fox in place of the three pigs and a wolf.

Finally, the infuriated wolf resolves to come down the chimney, whereupon the pig lights a fire under a pot of water on the fireplace.

The story uses the literary rule of three, expressed in this case as a "contrasting three", as the third pig's brick house turns out to be the only one which is adequate to withstand the wolf.

[8] Variations of the tale appeared in Uncle Remus: His Songs and His Sayings in 1881, in which the pigs were replaced by Br'er Rabbit.

Writer Bruno Bettelheim, in his book The Uses of Enchantment, interprets the tale as a showcase of the capacity for anticipation and courage in the face of adversity, symbolized by the wolf.

According to him, the individual who is content to prepare themself as the first two pigs will be destroyed by the vicissitudes of life, and only a person who builds a solid base can face such hazards.