Happily Ever After: The Resolution of Trauma in Fairy Tales

Abstract

Many traditional fairy tales have a gruesome quality about them that current society has rejected; yet, the “sanitization” of fairy tales has been questioned by scholars who propose that fairy tales in their original form serve childhood development. In reality, childhood trauma is a widespread problem underlying many leading mental and physical problems in adulthood. Using hermeneutic methodology, this thesis analyzes trauma theory as depicted in fairy tales by examining current trauma research, neuroscience, and attachment theory through a depth psychological lens. A Jungian amplification on a psychosomatic level explores how a few motifs, particularly that of the prince, in a cluster of four famous fairy tales relate to trauma and recovery. This thesis postulates that fairy tales contain and transmit, through an intersubjective field, a wealth of vital information that encodes or activates not only personality development but also physiological development in the young child’s psyche-soma.