As Maria Tatar states in the anthology The Classic Fairy Tales, few fairy tales have a “single, univocal, uncontested, meaning” (The Classic Fairy Tales, xiv). Fairy tales can be analyzed through several different methods which attribute to why fairy tales can have multiple meanings. These methods look at different aspects of the fairy tale and based on those aspects, formulate a conclusion of what the meaning of the fairy tale is. According to Vanessa Joosen in her dissertation entitled New Perspectives on Fairy Tales, three of these methods are “feminism, psychoanalysis, and the socio-historical” (New Perspectives on Fairy Tales) approaches. In this essay, I will analyze Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont’s version of “Beauty and the Beast”
…show more content…
The psychoanalytical theory focuses on psychological concepts and applies these concepts to elements in the fairy tale. The Oedipus complex is the psychoanalytic theory that a child has an unconscious desire to have a sexual relationship with the parent of the opposite sex. In his book, The Uses of Enchantment, Bruno Bettleheim suggests that fairy tales, especially “Beauty and the Beast”, help children understand his or her “oedipal difficulties” (Uses of Enchantment, 307) and offer them hope that they will be able to “master” (Uses of Enchantment, 307) these difficulties. “Beauty and the Beast, according to the psychoanalytical perspective, is about Beauty maturing from a child into a woman and overcoming the psychological problems that children face. Beauty has an oedipal attachment to her father. When asked for her hand in marriage Beauty told suitors that she planned to stay with “her father for years to come” (The Classic Fairy Tales, 32). Beauty’s attachment to her father is the reason she continues to reject the marriage proposals. She is so attached to her father that she does not want to leave him to be married. According to Karen Rowe in her book Women’s Studies, Beauty’s bond with her father impedes her “rite of passage” (Feminism and Fairy Tales, 215). She is not able to assimilate into adulthood because her oedipal attachment to her father keeps her as an
The psychoanalytical theory focuses on psychological concepts and applies these concepts to elements in the fairy tale. The Oedipus complex is the psychoanalytic theory that a child has an unconscious desire to have a sexual relationship with the parent of the opposite sex. In his book, The Uses of Enchantment, Bruno Bettleheim suggests that fairy tales, especially “Beauty and the Beast”, help children understand his or her “oedipal difficulties” (Uses of Enchantment, 307) and offer them hope that they will be able to “master” (Uses of Enchantment, 307) these difficulties. “Beauty and the Beast, according to the psychoanalytical perspective, is about Beauty maturing from a child into a woman and overcoming the psychological problems that children face. Beauty has an oedipal attachment to her father. When asked for her hand in marriage Beauty told suitors that she planned to stay with “her father for years to come” (The Classic Fairy Tales, 32). Beauty’s attachment to her father is the reason she continues to reject the marriage proposals. She is so attached to her father that she does not want to leave him to be married. According to Karen Rowe in her book Women’s Studies, Beauty’s bond with her father impedes her “rite of passage” (Feminism and Fairy Tales, 215). She is not able to assimilate into adulthood because her oedipal attachment to her father keeps her as an