[Registration for Enchantments is now available at California State University - East Bay's Osher Lifelong Learning website. Click HERE.]
In my last post (Enchantments and Villains) about my upcoming online lecture series on fairy tales (Planning Ahead: "Now for Something Completely Different"), I wrote that one of the concerns that people have
about reading fairy tales to children is that the stories are often too scary
and gruesome for young children.
There are fairy tales that tell a different story. In "Hansel and Gretel," Gretel slays the witch and rescues Hansel. In "Beauty and the Beast," Belle frees the prince from his curse. In the lesser-known "Princess Belle-Etoile," the princess dons her armor and saves the prince. Rapunzel herself concocts the escape plan from the tower, actively participating in her liberation. Although her role involves the stereotypical woman's activity of knitting, she proactively avoids waiting for the prince to devise a plan. Moreover, in the often-overlooked conclusion of the tale, Rapunzel, as a single mother fending for herself and her child in the wilderness, rescues the prince.
The struggle between the hero/heroine
and the villain—between good and evil—is often at the center of the fairy tale.
The hero/heroine and the villain are at odds with each other. They each want a
different outcome, producing conflict and competition which drives the action
in the story. What would fairy tales be
without their villains?
According to some psychological theories, the telling and hearing
of stories can support emotional health and have therapeutic benefits - and perhaps engaging the dark side of fairy tales
is actually good for children—and for adults.
Another issue of concern is the recurring theme of the damsel in distress within fairy tales. The term 'damsel' refers to a young woman of high social standing who is often depicted as beautiful and popular. These damsels find themselves in various forms of danger, such as being kidnapped, imprisoned, cursed, or otherwise oppressed, and require the aid of one or more male heroes to save them. The portrayal of these women as weak, helpless, and passive victims awaiting a male rescuer has been a staple in Western storytelling, with the nature of their adversaries evolving over time to reflect societal fears and tastes, ranging from witches to aliens. Iconic characters like the unconscious Snow White and Sleeping Beauty, who depend on a prince's love to free them from a witch's curse, continue to promote outdated and condescending views of women. Similarly, even the diligent Cinderella is depicted as needing a prince to liberate her from her abusive household.
Food for Thought
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| Princess Belle-Etoile rescuing Prince Cheri by English artist and book illustrator Walter Crane (1845-1915) |
More Food for Thought
There are other ways of relating to fairy tales than a literal reading. Both Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung considered fairy tales to be symbolic communications from - and to - the unconscious mind akin to dreams. They held that the telling and hearing of fairy tales is an active experience, involving a powerful dynamic. The narration of and reflection on the stories promote the resolution of internal, unconscious, and often self-defeating conflicts.
Freud and Jung had contrasting views on the symbolic significance of characters in dreams and fairy tales. Freud posited that while a character in our dreams or fairy tales does represent the self, other characters symbolize other people—typically mothers, fathers, siblings—who are the source of our internal and unconscious conflicts. Jung, conversely, believed that every character embodies different facets of the self. Both the feeble, defenseless victim and the potent, ingenious savior are representations of "me," irrespective of the character's gender. Of course, then so is the villain.
