FAIRY TALES ARE GOOD TEACHERS

I recently viewed the movie Sex in the City, and really enjoyed watching the many facets of true friendship among women, despite their differences. There was a scene in the movie, when Carrie Bradshaw ( who had suffered great emotional injury) was reading a Fairy Tale to three-year old Lily, her friend Charlotte's daughter. Carrie told Lily that Fairy Tales were not true - and Lily responded by asking her to read it again.
I have been collecting Fairy Tales from all over the world since my eldest daughter was an infant; which means I have a collection spanning over three decades.
I have Tales from the Punjab, Burmese and Thai Fairy Tales, Russian Fairy Tales, and many more in addition to those by Grimm, Hans Christian Anderson, CS Lewis, and others who blessed the page with their wisdom and hope.
I read many of these tales to my daughters, who listened attentively as good battled evil and perilous journeys were faced with bravery and stamina by men, women and fantastic creatures who believed that goodness would be triumphant in the end, even if the road was long and hard.

Fairy Tales talk to us when we first begin to look around our world, and they assure us that we will encounter strange and often difficult situations, but that despite their strangeness or degree of difficulty, they can be endured and can even serve to make us stronger and wiser at the end of our journey.
They show us the faces as well as the vices and devices of evil doers, that will help us to recognize them as we grow older - even when they are masked or have a pleasing countenance.

They teach us to be patient and to be strong willed and convicted about ourselves and our beliefs, even during the most trying set of circumstances.

They are powerful and stay with us all of our lives.

The following are quotes attributed to Einstein, Hans Christian Anderson, and C.S. Lewis - in that order:

If you want your children to be intelligent, read them Fairy Tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more Fairy Tales.

Every man's life is a Fairy Tale written by God's fingers.

Some day, you will be old enough to start reading Fairy Tales again.

Read Fairy Tales to your daughters every night - even a couple of pages will do on a busy night, until the tale is done, and until that day when your daughter no longer wants one.

The tales will work their Magic indeed.