More Than True: The Wisdom of Fairy Tales

Acclaimed poet and essayist Bly (Talking into the Ear of the Donkey) meditates on human nature in his erudite but uneven analysis of six fairy tales and the wisdom they contain. Choosing obscure fairy tales such as the Scandinavian “The Lindworm” and the Native American “One-Two Man,” in addition to the well-known “The Frog Prince,” Bly whimsically retells the often idiosyncratic stories in vibrant detail. Not content with discussing the obvious meanings and announced messages of his selections, Bly instead launches into extensive studies of the psychological subtext behind each one, such as how “The Frog Prince” illustrates the process of moving past “the cold-blooded part of ourselves.” He dissects their essences with help from the theories of such thinkers as Jung, Kafka, Shelley, and Wang Wei, and he ornaments these ideas with excerpts from his own poems, many never before published. While beautiful, these poems serve as a distraction at times from Bly’s philosophical insights, emphasizing his own words over the fairy tales themselves. Bly’s many admirers won’t mind, but readers new to his work may find this gorgeously written book less than the sum of its parts. (Mar. 2018)