Why were the old non-Disneyfied fairy tales so dark?

First, you have to consider the predominantly European culture in which these stories circulated. Centuries ago when these stories were orally passed down and later when they were first recorded on paper, children were considered to be somewhat evil (Catholic idea) little adults expected to deal with very adult issues. read more

These stories aren’t your happy endings but rather sometimes gruesome and shocking tales. Fairy tales used to be stories aimed at both adult and child alike and the grown-up themes they portray is good evidence of that. We dug deep with this list to find where our common stories come from and what the original dark (very dark) stories really were. read more