Off with Their Heads!

Download or read book Off with Their Heads! written by Maria Tatar and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2020-06-30 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Hansel and Gretel try to eat the witch's gingerbread house in the woods, are they indulging their "uncontrolled cravings" and "destructive desires" or are they simply responding normally to the hunger pangs they feel after being abandoned by their parents? Challenging Bruno Bettelheim and other critics who read fairy tales as enactments of children's untamed urges, Maria Tatar argues that it is time to stop casting the children as villians. In this provocative book she explores how adults mistreat children, focusing on adults not only as hostile characters in fairy tales themselves but also as real people who use frightening stories to discipline young listeners.