Perrault: Histoires ou contes du temps passé

Close analysis of your tales

As you prepare your tales, consider the following points for discussion:

• What is specific about Perrault's version of these tales? Do they differ from those you know? What do you make of this?
• Visions of mothers and motherhood in the tales
• Depictions of father and father figures
• The figure of the child
• The didactic value of the tales: the moralités. What message(s) do they convey?
• Use of the merveilleux
• A text for adults or children (look out for uses of irony, burlesque, inuendo, etc...)

Support your discussion with reference to AT LEAST ONE critical source. A very useful point of introduction to the collection comes in the form of Christopher Bett's Introduction in: Charles Perrault, translated with an introduction and notes by Christopher Betts. The complete fairy tales .Oxford [England] ; New York: Oxford University Press, pp.ix-xiviii, which can be accessed from the Family Way extracts page here

 

Wider analysis

Think again about the space of the salon:

• What kind of values does the salon promote?