Can I read Off with Their Heads! : Fairy Tales and the Culture of Childhood on EtoBox?

Off with Their Heads! : Fairy Tales and the Culture of Childhood by Maria Tatar is a book available to read on EtoBox.

What is Off with Their Heads! : Fairy Tales and the Culture of Childhood about?

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.

Author

Maria Tatar

Publisher

Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press

Published

1992

Language

EN

ISBN

9780691069432

Subjects

History, Literary Criticism, Folklore

Rating

3.97 / 5 (196 ratings)

Updated

2026-03-14