Morality And Ethics In Fairy Tales

Once upon a time fairy tales were born. Many of the fairy tales we have learned were first written between 17th and 18th century, even though their real origins could be traced further back1 in myth, stories, and legends passed down orally. Some first known authors are Giambattista Basile in Italy, Charles Perrault in France, and the Grimm Brothers in German. The two last authors being considered more collectors or such stories2. Interestingly each one created their own versions based on their reality and the audience they were writing for, and such tales had a content highly politic and violent in some cases. Nevertheless, such tales were not the sweetened version we have been exposed to because they were created in a different time in which

In Perrault 's version of Little Thumbling for example, when he and his brothers are lost find shelter in an ogre 's home, and he fools the ogre to not get eaten making the ogre eat his own daughters. In some endings, the evil ones are punished in a really strong way as a way to show in a very descriptive way how people 's bad behavior or bad choices can have terrible consequences. The Little Mermaid tale tells how the Mermaid had to kill her loved prince to survive, but she does want to do that, so she is converted into sea foam. That is because she wanted to go against her nature and be something different in order to be with her loved prince, but she had to pay with her life for the bad decision of trusting in a witch. The Booted Cat highlights the importance of being clever and sharp in order to move up in society, even when you have to cheat people. Given that these original stories changed through the years softening their content, and adapting it to each period behaviors, they are now more accessible to children, and can help them to improve their communication skills and creative thinking. However, in order to teach them such skills is not necessary to only rely in ancient fairy tales with ambiguous moral, nowadays there is a large amount of new fantasy books that can fit better for our times and help them develop their