Bettelheim Questions


1. Bettelheim's ideas help us to understand the purpose of fairy tales as they relate to us the fact that all characters and people have a certain 'dark side' within them capable of committing unagreeable acts, but this is seen as acceptable as they are generally good people. This can be seen in Cinderella when she disobeys her stepmother and sneaks out to go to the ball to meet her Prince Charming, however this behaviour is not scorned by the reader as Cinderella is the Heroine of the story, and thus the reader wishes to see her endeavours succeed.


2. Bettelheim's ideas help us to understand the purposes of gothic as it indicates to us that it enables children to acquire a firmer grip on problems in their purer form, as the tales and problems presented are often simple and therefore easily dissected by children. As explained by Bettelheim, in typical gothic literature, the villains and their acts are plain and obvious and all details unless they are significant are eliminated for easier understanding. The immense polarities between the characters and their characteristics displayed by gothic enables the child to male choices about who he would rather be, and they make personal identifications of their own.


3. Carter blatantly mixes fairy tale and gothic genres within the Bloody Chamber to display, as Bettelheim mentions, the obvious villains and heroines as they are easily seen throughout the plots of Carters stories. However the gothic elements added help to bring an element of more grown up themes such as oppressive male dominance, sex, seduction and the loss of innocence, the gaining of knowledge and secrets. These are arguably all elements seen subconsciously within fairy tales and so Carter has both genres so that we as readers can see more sinister elements to the tales we were told as children from a more sinister point of view, perhaps changing our opinion of them.,