As everyone (or almost), I always believed that I knew by heart the tales of Perrault. Because I thought you read them when I was a child. Because I had seen Disney cartoons. Because my final philosophy professor had told us the real purpose and the true meaning of the tales as an introduction to his course. I thought that was enough. But almost 25 years, I had the opportunity to make many discoveries: Perrault wrote some of his tales in verse, not prose (and it is not at all the same effect in playback), writings are rich in humor and double meaning phrases, and finally the moral is very explicit at the end of each tale. These "morality" as the author calls them, are even clearer than in the fables of La Fontaine, they take in a few sentences and are often given in a paragraph entitled "morality" or "another character" to the tales which we can draw several lessons. Difficult râter them in the original version. And yes, because our problem at all (or almost) is that we have never read the original version of these tales, we stuck transcripts and inspirations. So of course these stories and their morals were all something a little older (and somewhat misogynist too): the girls are beautiful and stylish (and sometimes even "smart like angels!"), And they are taught virtue. Do not forget, these stories have an educational aim: girls, beware of the big bad wolf, do not succumb to the vice (the incestuous father in Peau d'Ane eg wolf "suave"), be nice and pure. Fight for your virtue, for it is well known, it is extremely painful, but paying. And yes, if one preserves, despite increasingly difficult temptations and efforts would yield a prince in exchange. Yahoo! I refer you to a feminist slogan of the 1970s quoted in "Thank you girls": "do not expect Prince Charming, learn to read and become who you are." Joking aside; old fashioned or not, these stories are part of our cultural heritage. We were all brought up with without knowing exactly what it was, then it is, for me, time to go through and read these stories in their original version. The editions for pupils and students of the tales have the advantage of being full of comments and information on the time, the tales in general, and the origin of these stories (not always read the same time as the Text otherwise spoil the reading). The one I read additionally contained the engravings of Gustave Doré, which does not spoil anything. Comments explaining these engravings are also extremely useful if you do not want to miss something. I recommend reading a story time to time to enjoy them or even to rediscover the family!
