Editing Fairy tale (section)

==Interpretations==

Many fairy tales have been interpreted for their (purported) significance. One mythological interpretation saw many fairy tales, including ''[[Hansel and Gretel]]'', ''[[Sleeping Beauty]]'', and ''[[The Frog Prince (story)|The Frog King]]'', as [[solar myths]]; this mode of interpretation subsequently became rather less popular.{{Sfn|Tatar|1987|p=52}} [[psychoanalysis|Freudian]], [[analytical psychology|Jungian]], and other [[psychology|psychological]] analyses have also explicated many tales, but no mode of interpretation has established itself definitively.{{Sfn|Bettelheim|1989}}{{Page needed|date=July 2023}}

Specific analyses have often been criticized{{by whom|date=May 2016}} for lending great importance to motifs that are not, in fact, integral to the tale; this has often stemmed from treating one instance of a fairy tale as the definitive text, where the tale has been told and retold in many variations.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Dundes |first=Alan |date=1988 |chapter=Interpreting Little Red Riding Hood Psychoanalytically |editor-first=James M. |editor-last=McGlathery |title=The Brothers Grimm and Folktale |publisher=University of Illinois Press |isbn=0-252-01549-5}}</ref> In variants of ''[[Bluebeard]]'', the wife's curiosity is betrayed by [[Bluebeard|a blood-stained key]], by [[Fitcher's Bird|an egg's breaking]], or by [[How the Devil Married Three Sisters|the singing of a rose she wore]], without affecting the tale, but interpretations of specific variants have claimed that the precise object is integral to the tale.{{Sfn|Tatar|1987|p=46}}

Other folklorists have interpreted tales as historical documents. Many{{quantify|date=May 2016}} German folklorists, believing the tales to have preserved details from ancient times, have used the Grimms' tales to explain ancient customs.{{Sfn|Zipes|2002a|p=48}}

One approach sees the topography of European Märchen as echoing the period immediately following the [[Last glacial period|last Ice Age]].<ref>
{{cite book
| last1             = Maitland
| first1            = Sara
| author-link1      = Sara Maitland
| chapter           = Once upon a time: the lost forest and us
| editor1-last      = Kelly
| editor1-first     = Andrew
| title             = The Importance of Ideas: 16 thoughts to get you thinking
| chapter-url       = https://books.google.com/books?id=7pabBAAAQBAJ
| series            = Guardian Shorts
| volume            = 10
| publisher         = Guardian Books
| date      = 2014
| isbn              = 978-1-78356-074-5
| access-date        = 22 May 2016
| quote             = As the glaciers of the last ice age retreated (from c. 10,000 BC) forests, of various types, quickly colonised the land and came to cover most of Europe. [...] These forests formed the topography out of which the fairy stories (or as they are better called in German – the ''märchen''), which are one of our earliest and most vital cultural forms, evolved.
}}
</ref>
Other folklorists have explained the figure of the wicked stepmother in a historical/sociological context: many women did die in childbirth, their husbands remarried, and the new stepmothers competed with the children of the first marriage for resources.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Warner |first=Marina |date=1995 |author-link=Marina Warner |title=From the Beast to the Blonde: On Fairy Tales and Their Tellers |publisher=Farrar, Straus and Giroux |page=213 |isbn=0-374-15901-7}}</ref>

In a 2012 lecture, [[Jack Zipes]] reads fairy tales as examples of what he calls "childism". He suggests that there are terrible aspects to the tales, which (among other things) have conditioned children to accept mistreatment and even abuse.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://ias.umn.edu/2012/11/15/zipes-jack/ |last=Fischlowitz |first=Sharon |archive-url=https://archive.today/20121212173344/http://ias.umn.edu/2012/11/15/zipes-jack/ |archive-date=2012-12-12 |title=Fairy Tales, Child Abuse, and "Childism": Presentation by Jack Zipes |date=2012-11-15 |publisher=University of Minnesota Institute for Advanced Study}}</ref>