Academic book from 2013 in the field of education - reading education, language: German. Abstract: And if they haven't died, then they have been lucky again! In the battle of good against evil, fairy tale characters go over corpses. There is torture, murder, burning, and dismemberment. A cannibalistic witch is finally pushed into the burning oven, an evil queen must dance in red-hot slippers, and a lazy girl is punished by being plunged into boiling tar. Fairy tales are full of detailed depictions of violence. How cruel are fairy tales really? What effects do these depictions of violence have on child development? In this book, you will find answers to these questions. Contents include: Original function of fairy tales, legal history and cultural-historical relativity of cruelty, cruel facts, subtle and context-dependent cruelty.