White snow, Snow white, Grimms, and Bruno Bettelheim
by Bob on February 26, 2007
I was in the countryside this weekend in Massachusetts. At my longtime friend's home and his family. Since it snowed recently, the snow was brilliantly white out there and pristine even though it was weeks. This is in contradistinction to the way snow looks in a cosmopolitan city, like Boston or my hometown, New York City. It turns black and slushy there. Hardly a great place for a romantic sleigh ride. I was just so impressed with how beautiful snow looks when it keeps pretty and serene.
So we have white snow.
Now, on that same thought, we have Snow White. Amazing tale which is still relevant in our day and age. Whiteness is purity for ages now. That does make things a little complicated when we get to the back attire that is worn by Christian priests and clerics. Black. Unclear as to the origin there of its usage.
Anyway, Snow White was an amazing story as are many of the fables and fairy tales. And they are not so simple in symbolism.
Years ago I was taken to a Broadway show in NYC by relatives, by now long lost and disconnected relatives, and the show was called "Into the Woods". It was essentially a Boradway musical which was enjoyable. But its deeper sense it was about a pastiche of fairy tales and how everyone seems to go into the woods in the story. So there's a beginning, then into the woods, then ususally a happy ending when one gets out of the woods. Hence the modern expression, being "in the woods" as being in a sticky situation. Dante knew that. He opened his work with saying that he is in the middle of his life's journey and lost in the woods. Sounds very familiar metaphorically.
So we get to the brothers Grimm, who were hardly trivial figures but prominent folklorists and linguists (one recalls Grimm's Law) and traveled about collecting local stories and fairy tales. I actually read through their many volumes. Amazing work. Such stories, like grandmother's medical remedies which are being re-discovered by medical experts today as perfectly valid and effective, have a lot of important truths in life in them. And fables, too.
Dr. Bruno Bettelheim wrote an amazing opus, "The Uses of Enchantment: The Meaning and Importance of Fairy Tales" published in 1976 on the very deep symbolism of fairy tales and such folklorical stories. It's a magnificent study. Dr. Bettelheim was and remains a very controversial figure, especially in his theories.
When Bettelheim was at university he had to study Jungian archetypes in art which must have been fascinating and laid a heavy foundation for his later work.
Some of Dr. Bettelheim's theories on Autism are very controversial. Some people even discredit him intensely. However, his work in symbolism, from this author's perspective, is brilliant.
Sadly, Dr. Bettelheim suffered from depression all his life and exited this world prematurely by his own hand in 1990 at the age of 86 which is very sad for the rest of us, although his works survive.
So we gain knowledge and wisdom from such fairy tales and their symbolism.
It's got to be better than simply watching another "idol" show on TV.