to sexual practices. The song's title itself is ambiguous and can be deemed sexually suggestive as it contains a pun in French alluding to spanking: in French, the title "L'Histoire d'une fée, c'est..." could be phonetically understand as meaning "L'Histoire d'une fessée..." (translation: "The Story of a Spanking"). Release In Europe the soundtrack release was postponed until 7 February 2001 because Farmer had bought the song's royalties and finally decided to release it as a single, 14 days later. It was only released as a digipack CD single, in which the song's lyrics are written inside, and there was no promotional format. For the second time in the singer's career – after the song "XXL" – the single cover does not show her, but a drawing of a fairy from the film by Tom Madrid. The song began circulating online a month before the soundtrack's release and was well received by many fans who felt that it could be a hit. The song did not receive much radio airplay, with only Europe 2 playing it regularly. "L'Histoire d'une fée, c'est..." was also released on the soundtrack of the film in a longer version than the CD single version, and was later included on Mylène Farmer's greatest hits album Les Mots. It was also released as the third track on the European CD maxi "Les Mots", released in the Switzerland on 4 September 2002. Critical reception The song was generally well received by critics, who particularly noted the puns. According to author Erwan Chuberre, the lyrics are "as funny as disillusioned" and Farmer uses puns that "highlight her immoderate pleasure for impolite pleasures", with a music he deemed "effective". Author Thierry Desaules said that the song appears to be a childish fairly tale, but is actually structured in a perverse enough way to address the adult public, as the allusions to the spanking can be seen as references to sadomasochism. Journalist Benoît Cachin wrote that her puns are "of the funniest" and that the singer included in the lyrics "some very personal thoughts", including sadness; he added that Farmer appears to be "fun, dynamic and delightfully mischievous" on this song. Chart performance On 3 March 2001, the single debuted at a peak of number nine on the French SNEP Singles Chart, providing Farmer her 22nd top ten hit. In the following weeks, the song fell steadily and remained in the top