The Uses Of Enchantment: The Meaning & Importance

Of Fairy Tales by Bruno Bettelheim

A Review by David Edwards

This fascinating book by Bruno Bettelheim investigates the

psychology and cultural benefits of fairy tales on developing minds,
and by extension into adulthood and more mature thinking. The
author demonstrates the importance of these folk narratives within
any civilisation and its advancement by analysing various versions of
popular fairy tales.

"In order not to be at the mercy of the vagaries of life, one must
develop one's inner resources, so that one's emotions, imagination,
and intellect mutually support and enrich one another. ... nothing is
more important than the impact of parents and others who take care
of the child; second in importance is our cultural heritage, when
transmitted to the child in the right manner. When children are
young, it is literature that carries such information best. ... For a story
to hold a child's attention, it must entertain him and arouse his
curiosity. But to enrich his life, it must stimulate his imagination; help
him to develop his intellect and clarify his emotions; be attuned to his
anxieties and aspirations; give full recognition to his difficulties, while
at the same time suggesting solutions to the problems which perturb
him. In short, it must at one and the same time relate to all aspects
of his personality - and this without ever belittling but, on the contrary,
giving full credence to the seriousness of the child's predicaments,
while simultaneously promoting confidence in himself and in his
future.

In all these and many other respects, of the entire "children's

literature" - with rare exceptions - nothing can be as enriching and
satisfying to child and adult audiences alike as the folk fairy tale."

The book is rumoured to have been studied by Stanley Kubrick whilst

considering approaches to his film adaptation of The Shining. One
can certainly see its influence in his final project AI, which he did not
have the chance to complete personally. The marvellous ambiguity in
Kubrick's work has led to his cult status, as his films speak so deeply
to one's internal makeup, and are so open to subjective
interpretation.

Similarly, the intuitive aspect to fairy tales and their allegorical

ambiguity leads to varied interpretations and idiosyncratic effects on
the psyche, when one is considering them and their themes. Of
course, the primary intended audience for these variations on folk
tales is children; as they are intended to help to structure a child's
imagination and its chaotic subconscious workings into some
semblance of order and focus to help with their emotional and
intellectual expansion.

"In a fairy tale, internal processes are externalised and become

comprehensible as represented by the figures of the story and its
events. ... the paramount importance of fairy tales for the growing
individual resides in something other than teachings about correct
ways of behaving in this world - such wisdom is plentifully supplied in
religion, myths, and fables. Fairy stories do not pretend to describe
the world as it is, nor do they advise what one ought to do."

The subjective morality lessons of fairy tales are dependent on the

child's inner state, life problems, and the telling of the tale. The
author asserts quite accurately, that a child will usually identify with
the themes of a specific fairy tale, and request its frequent re-telling
throughout their childhood in order to grapple with the distinct
allegorical teaching of the tale. These repeated requests for the re-
telling of a tale is a sign that the child has identified with that
particular inner problem, and the re-telling helps children integrate
their personality better.

"... the imagery of fairy tales helps children better than anything else
in their most difficult and yet most important and satisfying
task: achieving a more mature consciousness to civilise the chaotic
pressures of their unconscious."

"... the form and structure of fairy tales suggest images to the child by
which he can structure his daydreams and with them give better
direction to his life.

In child or adult, the unconscious is a powerful determinant of

behaviour. When the unconscious is repressed and its content
denied entrance into awareness, then eventually the person's
conscious mind will be partially overwhelmed by derivatives of these
unconscious elements, or else he is forced to keep such rigid,
compulsive control over them that his personality may become
severely crippled. But when unconscious is to some degree
permitted to come to awareness and worked through in imagination,
its potential for causing harm - to ourselves or others - is much
reduced; some of its forces can then be made to serve positive
purposes."

Bettelheim stresses that it is important that an adult never attempts to

explain a fairy tale to a child, let them figure the deeper themes out
for themselves. This is the stark contrast between these type of
stories and simple cautionary tales, or even modern children's
literature, which offers a less subtle, more overt and even patronising
attempt to instruct children about issues of childhood, somewhat less
effectively.

"Though the fairy tale offers fantastic symbolic images for the
solution of problems, the problems presented in them are ordinary
ones."

"The child who is familiar with fairy tales understands that these
speak to him in the language of symbols and not that of everyday
reality. The fairy tale conveys from its inception, throughout its plot,
and by its ending that what we are told about are not tangible facts or
real persons or places. As for the child himself, real events become
important through the symbolic meaning he attaches to them, or
which he finds in them."

"Fantasy fills the huge gaps in a child's understanding which are due
to the immaturity of his thinking and his lack of pertinent information."

Fairy stories present an allegorical message which gives guidance in

relation to personality integration between the unconscious and
conscious mind, and the three aspects of mind referred to in
Freudian psychoanalysis: the id (self-gratification, and pleasure
principle), regulated by the superego (higher understanding of baser
desires, rationality and morality), to integrate and help form the ego
(the essence of self in reality). The structure of three trials or tasks
undergone in many tales reflects this.

Of course these three ideas of how the mind functions are

themselves allegorical personifications to help us to understand the
mind.

"Giving the inner processes separate names - id, ego, superego -

made them entities, each with its own propensities. When we
consider the emotional connotations these abstract terms of
psychoanalysis have for most people using them, then we begin to
see that these abstractions are not all that different from the
personifications of the fairy tale. ...

... Many errors in understanding how our minds work could be

avoided if modern man would at all times remain aware that these
abstract concepts are nothing but convenient handles for
manipulating ideas which, without such externalisation, would be too
difficult to comprehend. There is in actuality, of course, no
separation between them, just as there is no real separation between
mind and body."

Interestingly Bettelheim states that adults who believe in magic,

animism, etc. are adults who have been forced into this process of
adulthood too soon, and that this process must be allowed to grow
more organically to enable thought to engage healthily with
abstraction to 'master reality' in a rational way.

"I have known many examples where, particularly in late

adolescence, years of belief in magic are called upon to compensate
for the person's having been deprived of it prematurely in childhood,
through stark reality having been forced on him. It is as if these
young people feel that now is their last chance to make up for a
severe deficiency in their life experience: or that without having had a
period of belief in magic, they will be unable to meet the rigours of
adult life. Many young people who today suddenly seek escape in
drug-induced dreams, apprentice themselves to some guru, believe
in astrology, engage in practicing "black magic," or who in some
other fashion escape from reality into daydreams about magic
experiences which are to change their life for the better, were
prematurely pressed to view reality in an adult way. Trying to evade
reality in such ways has its deeper cause in early formative
experiences which prevented the development of the conviction that
life can be mastered in realistic ways. ...

... In intervening periods of stress and scarcity, man seeks for

comfort again in the "childish" notion that he and his place of abode
are the centre of the universe. Translated into terms of human
behaviour, the more secure a person feels within the world, the less
he will need to hold on to "infantile" projections - mythical
explanations or fairy-tale solutions to life's eternal problems - and the
more he can afford to seek rational explanations."

Whilst Bettelheim stresses the importance of keeping the distinction

between reality and fantasy clear, the effect that allegory working
through imagination when applied with this perception in mind to
sensibility can be personally enriching. There is also an important
contrast between myth and fairy tale which is brought to the reader's
consideration.

A myth presents a unique feeling of awe-inspiring grandiose events,

which could not have happened any other way, to anyone else, or in
any other place. Fairy tales, in contrast, present more unusual and
improbable events, but that are situated within the realms of
ordinariness, they could happen to anyone out on a walk in the
woods, for example, and these encounters are relayed in a casual
fashion, as if they could be everyday occurrences.

Myths are generally pessimistic, whilst fairy tales are generally more
optimistic; the former present tragic conclusions versus the gratifying
catharsis of fairy tales.

"Myths and fairy stories both answer the eternal questions: What is
the world really like? How am I to live my life in it? How can I truly
be myself? The answers give by myths are definite, while the fairy
tale is suggestive: its messages may imply solutions, but it never
spells them out. Fairy tales leave to the child's fantasising whether
and how to apply to himself what the story reveals about life and
human nature.

The fairy tale proceeds in a manner which conforms to the way a

child thinks and experiences the world; this is why the fairy tale is so
convincing to him. He can gain much better solace from a fairy tale
than he can from an effort to comfort him based on adult reasoning
and viewpoints. A child trusts what the fairy story tells, because its
world view accords with his own.

Whatever our age, only a story conforming to the principles

underlying our thought processes carries conviction for us. If this is
so for adults, who have learned to accept that there is more than one
frame of reference for comprehending the world - although we find it
difficult if not impossible truly to think in any but our own - it is
exclusively true for the child. His thinking is animistic."

Despite his emphasis of the benefits of fairy tales over myths to aid in
the formation of a child's ego personality, the semiotic and archetypal
nature of both have great value to adult and child, as their themes
and analogies are drawn from the deep well of the prevalent Jungian
concept of the collective unconscious. As a result the subtextual
messages in both have universal benefit in making sense of the
world, regardless of age.

"Myths project an ideal personality acting on the basis of superego

demands, while fairy tales depict an ego integration which allows for
appropriate satisfaction of id desires. This difference accounts for
the contrast between the pervasive pessimism of myths and the
essential optimism of fairy tales."

"There is general agreement that myths and fairy tales speak to us in

the language of symbols representing unconscious content. Their
appeal is simultaneously to our conscious and unconscious mind, to
all three of its aspects - id, ego, and superego - and to our need for
ego-ideals as well. This makes it very effective; and in the tales'
content, inner psychological phenomena are given body in symbolic
form."

Bettelheim argues that watered down versions of fairy stories are not
as effective in terms of the subtleties of their lessons, and frequently
arguments for the sanitisation of the narrative omit vital details, and
subsequently the deeper insight to be gleaned in the telling or
reading becomes lost. Contemplation of the overall tale in its purest
form is vital, and authors such as Perrault tended to butcher the tales
in this fashion to appeal to the sensibilities of his audience in the
French royal courts of the late 15th Century. In a similar fashion, the
frequent demands for sanitisation of fairy tales by modern parents, in
a vain attempt to protect the perceived sensibilities of their children,
ends up damaging the intention of the tale, and ends up stunting a
critical aspect of their offspring's integration into the mindset of
adulthood. After all, most of these stories lead to a satisfying and
positive outcome, however monstrous some of their contents of
characters appear to be when taken merely at face value.

"In childhood, more than in any other age, all is becoming. As long
as we have not achieved considerable security within ourselves, we
cannot engage in difficult psychological struggles unless a positive
outcome seems certain to us, whatever the chances for this may be
in reality. The fairy tale offers fantasy materials which suggest to the
child in symbolic form what the battle to achieve self-realisation is all
about, and guarantees a happy ending. ... the central figure of the
fairy tale lives happily ever after on earth, right among the rest of
us. Some fairy tales conclude with the information that if perchance
he has not died, the hero may still be alive. Thus, a happy though
ordinary existence is projected by fairy tales as the outcome of the
trials and tribulations involved in the normal growing-up process."

An interesting observation the author makes, beyond the use of fairy

stories to aid children in the development of their personality, is that
fairy tales are often prescribed in Hindu culture as therapeutic
meditations for psychological ailments. A patient is given a fairy tale
to ruminate on, and internally reflect as to how the subtleties of its
allegory translate to their own inner conflict.

"The fairy tale is therapeutic because the patient finds

his own solutions, through contemplating what the story seems to
imply about him and his inner conflicts at this moment in his life. The
content of the chosen tale usually has nothing to do with the patient's
external life, but much to do with his inner problems, which seems
incomprehensible and hence unsolvable. The fairy tale clearly does
not refer to the outer world, although it may begin realistically enough
and have everyday features woven into it. The unrealistic nature of
these tales (which narrow-minded rationalists object to) is an
important device, because it makes obvious that the fairy tales'
concern is not useful information about the external world, but the
inner processes taking place inside an individual."

This is why fairy tales can be so beautifully suited for forms of

contemplative therapy, and also why they fascinate psychoanalysts
so much, and are seen as so vital to the experience of
childhood. Fairy tales can very effectively help a person to
individuate into a well-adjusted personality, able to understand and
cope with life.

The telling of fairy tales to children as opposed to reading them offers

the adult imparting the tale to judge the child's reactions to the
narrative and the inner process of understanding taking place in the
child, whether it is the resolution of oedipal conflicts, coping with
personality integration, or a deeper perception of intimate morality
and embracing one's own strengths and virtues.

However, encouraging children to read fairy tales usually encourages

further interest in literature. The combination of nurturing a child's
imagination through metaphorical fairy tales and
more "realistic" forms of literature is emphasised as giving a
beneficial psychological balance in the child's psychological
development.
"When realistic stories are combined with ample and psychologically
correct exposure to fairy tales, then the child receives information
which speaks to both parts of his budding personality - the rational
and the emotional."

The process of externalising the unconscious in order to gain

mastery over it is an extremely constructive aspect to a child's
immersion in a fairy tale. The abstraction of characters in the story
which represent facets of the personality which need to be integrated
as one grows up, are useful tools in nurturing the establishment of
the budding psyche. In some ways fairy tales come from a similar
place of the unconscious as dreams, but the cathartic resolution in
fairy tales presents an easier decoding for the child.

"While a fairy tale may contain many dreamlike features, its great
advantage over a dream is that the fairy tale has a consistent
structure with a definite beginning and a plot that moves toward a
satisfying solution which is reached at the end. The fairy tale also
has other important advantages when compared to private
fantasies. For one, whatever the content of a fairy tale - which may
run parallel to a child's private fantasies whether these are oedipal,
vengefully sadistic, or belittling of a parent- it can be openly talked
about, because the child does not need to keep secret his feeling
about what goes on in the fairy tale, or feel guilty about enjoying such
thoughts."

The author does express a dislike of illustrations in fairy tale books,

because if the child visualises the imagery for themselves, rather
than relying on someone else's vision of elements in the fairy tale,
they will develop their imagination better. Unfortunately there is no
empirical study to back this point up, but I personally would stand by
the author's position on this. My personal aversion towards Disney's
ownership of fairy stories, and their socially engineered, stylised
versions these folk tales, largely stems from a similar feeling on the
danger of prescribing imagination rather than allowing it to grow more
organically.

"The fairy tale ... is very much the result of common conscious and
unconscious content having been shaped by the conscious mind, not
of one particular person, but the consensus of many in regard to
what they view as universal human problems, and what they accept
as desirable solutions. If all these elements were not present in a
fairy tale, it would not be retold by generation after generation."
Opening lines such as the eponymous "once upon a time", suggest
to the listener or reader that the events in the fairy tale are not rooted
in the here and now, but in some ethereal, archaic, vague and
forgotten recesses of our cultural memory, the very core of our being
is stirred by such beginnings. A modern example would be George
Lucas' archetypal "A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away", a
phrase combining the essence of a fairy tale beginning to Star Wars,
fused with the mythical archetypes explored in the work of his mentor
Joseph Campbell. This fusion of fairy tale and myth could explain
the franchise's popularity with adults and children alike, and its
captivating hold over large portions of the modern Western psyche.

The exploration of hierarchies, and the adherence to finding one's

place in them temporarily, is in many tales shown to reap a great
reward. Usually the overlooked lowly protagonist ends up ascending
the hierarchy after tests of character or virtue. This process
frequently takes a threefold nature, echoing the integration process
at work between id, superego and ego previously mentioned.

This motif also consistently manifests with the protagonist being a

third child, denoting the child hearing or reading the story feeling they
are low in the familial pecking order, and overlooked. It is often this
overlooked child in fairy stories who outshines their interchangeable
siblings who have not achieved full integration of their
personality. Sibling rivalry is a frequent theme at play, and again is
an important aspect of a fairy story which a child can find easy
identification with.

The book contains many references to oedipal conflict, not always

where a child sexually fantasises over parents, as many generalised
misconceptions of Freudian psychoanalysis assert, but merely that
between certain ages children fixate on their parents for support and
nurture, and in order to grow into adults and become independent
they have to let go of this dependent fixation.

Whilst Freud, his methods of psychoanalysis, and many of his

followers, such as Bettelheim are heavily criticised for the fixation of
reducing many psychological drives to centring around sexual
repression, this method of criticising Freudianism as an example of
its perversion has itself become a cliché.

The drive to reproduce oneself, however abstracted, is an

overwhelming driver of the human condition. In most people the
desire to pass on one's essence into the future, whether via offspring
or an attempt to be remembered for one's deeds, is an instinctual
one.

Bettelheim's apparent Freudian preoccupation with reading the

resolution of oedipal conflicts into fairy tales in this book, at first
seems like an infatuation; however, as one progresses towards the
close of the book, the chapter on stories centring around the animal
groom leads the reader to appreciate that the author's consistent
references to a child needing to individuate by gaining emotional
independence from the parents in order to find a mate and
companion, seems to be a valid reading of the semiotic subtext of so
many fairy tales.

As he states frequently, the success of the telling of these stories to

children, as opposed to more direct attempts later in life through
education, is their innovative use of allegory to prepare a child's
integration of conscious and unconscious drives for the inevitable
stages of the journey into adulthood, and highly probable progression
into parenthood themselves.

The author highlights that a major aspect of the oedipal conflict in

fairy tales, and the coming to terms with it, is on the part of the parent
the fear of being replaced, and on the part of the child the inevitable
desire to replace the parent. Many of these stories help to show a
satisfactory integration of such a complex psychological problem
within the parent child relationship as it progresses.

Fairy tales frequently reference transitional points in children's lives,

such as adolescence, but as opposed to more reality forms of
literature, enable the child ahead of time to have a more
metaphorical expectation of what is to come later. One could argue
that a child raised with fairy tales as part of their adolescent
experience, may be better prepared to deal with the emotional
rollercoaster of growing up. Thusly, the author emphasises their
importance to culture, as the aim of their telling is to help create
adults who feel properly integrated with the reality of adult life without
the tendency to slip uncontrollably into unbridled fantasy or even
superstition at the first sign of adult conflict. This is of course, a very
prevalent problem in our current time, with the technocratic rise of
emotional and intellectual reliance on the world of the virtual, and the
increasing onslaught of infantilisation and vivification that is
increasingly left in its wake.