Lecture 2 (part ii)
The History of Children's Literature

folk tales, fairy tales, and the big four (or five)

Four names stand out in western folk and fairy literature: Charles Perrault, The Brothers Grimm (maybe that's two names, which would bring the total to five), Hans Christian Andersen, Joseph Jacobs. It would be odd not to take a closer look at their works, since their folk and fairy tales are among the most widely known and remembered stories read to children.

Charles Perrault & The Brothers Grimm

Perrault's works are very different from those collected by the linguists Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm. They are grouped here because they are close in time (17th and 18th centuries for the most part) and because their stories overlap a great deal. Both, for example, have versions of "Snow White," "Cinderella," "Sleeping Beauty," "Red Riding Hood," and others. Still, the content and style of the tales is often very different.

Bettleheim applies psychological criticism and gives us his thoughts about the striking differences in Red Riding Hood stories in his The Uses of Enchantment. Jack Zipes in his Breaking the Magic Spell applies feminist criticism to various versions of the Cinderella story, and he's not too impressed with Perrault's version. Here is a cinderwench who is quiet, long-suffering, submissive, accepting, and Zipes believes the role it sets for child (and adult) readers is demeaning and sexist. He asks,

• Why is the stepmother shown to be wicked and not the father?

• Why do girls have to quarrel over a man?

• How do children react to Cinderella who is industrious, dutiful, virginal and passive?

• Are all men handsome?

• Is marriage the end goal of life?

• Is it important to marry rich men?

By contrast, Aschenputtel, in the Grimm version is, in the words of Griffith and Frey,

is much more active, assertive and human. She hates having to do all the dirty work, and does not voluntarily spend time sitting among the ashes. She helps the stepsisters prepare for the dance only under duress, and she insists that she be allowed to attend it as well as they. She meets the dishonest stepmother's challenges head-on; and, when the stepmother reneges, she invokes the power of the hazel tree and the white bird to override the stepmother's orders. To demand gold and silver finery is all her idea, as is her behavior at the dance. She leaves because she wants to, she hides in the pigeon house because she wants to, she makes the prince come looking for her because she wants to. There is little doubt that Aschenputtel is intentionally playing hard to get ....

One final major difference from the Perrault version is in the nature of Aschenputtel's magic helpers. For Aschenputtel, strength and help come unambiguously from the early love she has had from her good mother and her father, and from her present adversity: a hazel tree brought by the father, growing out of the mother's grave, watered with her own tears ....

"Aschenputtel" ... is a sharp and intense fantasy of an embattled girl in conflict with a cruel family. Its assumption is that such cruelty can be overcome with he resources one draws from parental love going back to one's earliest years, and with the incentive which adversity gives to fight back.

Perrault's "Cinderella," on the other hand, is about a girl who waits to be rescued. The idea is wittily satirized in Ann Sexton's poem "Cinderella". She borrows material from both versions of the folk tale, but she concludes by blasting the notion that a handsome prince is likely to come and save women from all conflict and work and dissatisfaction and trouble; in her estimation the odds are about as likely as winning the lottery.

In the two sets of tales compared, Perrault's versions come off as less complex, more didactic, comparatively unsatisfying. But that's not always the case. Perrault's "The Sleeping Beauty in the Woods" (which is not on our reading list) is a much richer tale with unusual plot twists and greater psychological depth than the Grimm "Sleeping Beauty" (which inspired the lovable but bland Disney movie).

Perrault's tales are uneven. Perrault was writing for the French aristocracy, not for children, and certain tales, such as "Blue Beard," deal in subjects that many parents would object to. Yes, the tale was based in part on historical events, but the story of a man murdering his wives for disobeying his one command (not to open the closet) sends mixed messages. The wife has to die when she discovers the remains of the previous wives. But why was the first wife killed? Blue Beard is testing the wives' loyalty and obedience, and they fail again and again, but the test is cruel, psychotic. Still, it's hard to feel great sympathy for the wife who mocks the ugliness of the blue-bearded man (and what's wrong with that!?) at first; after being wined, dined, treated to lavish parties, surrounded by his great riches, she decides perhaps he's not so ugly after all. She seems a classic gold digger. In the end, however, she does use Blue Beard's wealth to bring happiness, not as a snare. It's a complex, and maybe even perplexing, little story.

The folk tales collected by the Brother's Grimm are also often disturbing to current readers (especially parents). They read the stories that were read to them as children, and they just don't remember them being so politically-incorrect. Parents (and, of course, step-parents) are murderously abusive, cannibalism shows up routinely, and "good" and "bad" behavior often seem confused.

Taken literally, "Hansel and Gretel" is disturbing on many levels. Again, children won't be disturbed, but their parents might. Abandoning the children to starve in the woods is bad enough, but the story's climax has Gretel shoving an old woman into an oven. Louise Gluck's "Gretel in Darkness" is a haunting look at what nightmares a real child might experience having participated in the killing, even a killing in self-defense.

"Rumpelstiltskin" seems to send odd messages:

• It's OK to reneg on a deal.

• It's OK to promise something as long as you think it will never come to pass, and if it does come to pass, you can ignore the promise (see above).

• A funny-looking little man is necessarily more evil than a father who jeopardizes his daughter's life for his own benefit or than an unjust king who will execute a young woman who won't perform miraculous tasks to make him rich.

• It's not enough to just "win"; you have to torment the loser (even if he saved your life).

Again, the story probably shouldn't be taken too literally. The young woman is desperate and a victim. Rumplestiltskin should not be asking for her first-born child.

"The Frog Prince" raises some of the same issues as "Rumplestiltskin," and it surprises readers with its passion. The princess does NOT kiss the frog to turn him into a prince, she flings him with all her might against the wall. The violence of her emotion, not her generous behavior, causes the transformation.

In the end, they're not real, they're stories. But all of these stories, whether we approve or disapprove of them, have the power to entertain and the power to engage us in thought.

This lecture is continued in Part III -- click here!