[UA] Darkening Children's Tales

[Timothy Ferguson]

----- Original Message -----
From: James McGraw <pdytjem at nottingham.ac.uk>
To: <ua at lists.uchicago.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, February 14, 2001 6:07 AM
Subject: Re: [UA] Darkening Children's Tales


> >>> mrteapot at disinfo.net 02/13/01 01:15pm >>>
> >>Actually most modern children's stories go the other way.  Each of the
> >>national book councils has recently complained that for some reason
> >>publishing houses are churning out teen angst filled with manipulative,
> >>ineffective pschyoterapists.  Thank God for Harry Potter...  Can you be
a
> >>character in a modern children's novel and have well-adjusted, present
> >>parents who you like?  No, you can't.  If you go through the children's
> >>bestsellers for the last three years, everyone's parents are mad, dead,
> >>divorcing or piously conservative.
> >
> >Try naming a Disney movie where the main character has both parents.
>Most are orphans or missing a parent (typically the mother), often for
>unexplained reasons.
>
> Ditto Harry Potter and Roald Dahl.

Not so on Potter.  We see his parents die and are given a motive for their
murder.  Lily Potter's maiden name is said to be the big secret of the next
book.


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