The New Yorker, December 8, 1975 P. 50
REFELECTIONS about fairy tales. Writer thinks that nothing in children's literature, with rare exceptions, can be as enriching & satisfying to child & adult alike as the folk fairy tale. For a story to enrich a child's life it must stimulate his imagination, help him to develop his intellect & to clarify his emotions be attuned to his anxieties & aspirations, give full recognition to his difficulties, suggest solutions to problems that perturb him, promote confidence in him self & his future. The fairy tale does all this. The child needs a moral education that subtly, by implication only, conveys to him the advantages of moral behavior, not through abstract ethical concepts but through that which seems tangibly right & therefore has meaning for him. This meaning is found through fairy tales. In fairy tales, as in life, punishment is a limited deterrent to crime. The conviction that crime does not pay is much more effective as a deterrent, & in fairy tales the bad person always loses out. Writer compares a child's development to situations represented in fairy tales. The child identifies with the heroes of the stories & is encouraged because they usually have happy endings. Fairy tales underwent severe criticism with the new discoveries of psychoanalysis & child psychology. Writer tells of the shortcomings of the realistic stories with which many parents have replaced fairy tales. Bowdlerized versons of tales are not effective. A child wants to see a villain justly punished & justice done. Writer gives examples of effects certain tales have.