Darnton vs. Bettelheim

The more I read Darnton's article, the more convinced I am the Bettelheim has some truly crazy arguments. Although I understand his point that fairy tales can transcend the conscious mind and that children's books need to be more than entertaining, I find a few major flaws in the rest of his arguments. Firstly, Bettelheim seems to be too broad in what he is trying to argue (either that or I don't see much organization). For example, his article is titled "The Struggle for Meaning" and yet only briefly does he touch on how fairy tales can provide a child with a sense of meaning in his/her life. Rather, Bettelheim seems to focus more on how fairy tales can be used to teach children that the world is not fair and that they will always face difficult situations that can (and eventually will) be overcome. Also, Bettelheim appears to relate fairy tales too closely to reality. As another example, Bettelheim states that a fairy tale must "at one and the same time relate to all aspects of his personality"; I believe this to be an absurd and unrealistic claim. Many, if not most, fairy tales will deal with magic and other unrealistic situations that can in no way relate to a child's personality. Thus, I find it unacceptable to think that a child can learn a proper "way of life" or even meaning for living based on a fairy tale. Also, I can understand Darnton's perspective more because of his believable take on what a fairy tale really is. It is not often fancy literature; the tales are derived from common folk and thus they can be viewed as highly historical. Especially since the fairy/folk tales are mixtures of many different sources and stories, there is no way that one can break down the meaning of a fairy tale into the minutest details. This would be a false attempt to make a common story into a literary masterpiece. Thus, with Bettelheim's exaggeration of the reasons for fairy tales, I find Darnton's argument to be more convincing.