![]() After examining how fairy tales were converted into children's literature, the author investigates the acculturation of heroines in such stories as "Cinderella" and "Beauty and the Beast" and concludes with meditations on violence, cannibalism, and conflicts between parents and children. ![]() Authorities such as Bruno Bettelheim, for example, focus on "Hansel and Gretel" as a story about the "destructive desires," "uncontrolled cravings," and "ambivalent feelings" of the protagonists rather than as a story about adult hostility toward children. ![]() Tatar finds that when we read and interpret fairy tales today, we often fall into the trap of positioning children as the real villains of the tales. In this book she explores how Perrault, the Grimms, and others reshaped fairy tales to produce conciliatory literary texts that dedicate themselves to the project of socializing the child. From its inception, it has openly endorsed a productive discipline that condemns idleness and disobedience along with most forms of social resistance. ![]() Children's literature, Maria Tatar maintains, has always been more intent on producing docile minds than playful bodies. When fairy tales moved from workrooms, taverns, and the fireside into the nursery, they not only lost much of their irreverent, earthy humor but were also deprived of their contestatory stance to official culture. ![]()
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