Brian and I were talking today about the Humpty Dumpty nursery rhyme. No, we had nothing better to do than analyze this oh so important rhyme. We had a question. Why is Humpty Dumpty always portrayed as an egg? The rhyme never says he was an egg. Rather, we got the impression that Humpty Dumpty was a statue instead of an egg. If you think about it, why would an egg be sitting on the king's wall? Wouldn't it make more sense if Humpty Dumpty was a statue?
Another nursery rhyme that we had been analyzing was Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater. What a morbid little man! Brian thinks that Peter Pumpkin Eater's wife was cheating so he put her in a pumpkin shell and turned cannibal. I have to admit, I laughed at that assumption because I thought he was kidding around until he said, "think about it. If he's a "pumpkin eater," why would he be putting her in a pumpkin shell?" Hmm.....I'll have to think about that one. Maybe instead of calling them nursery rhymes they should call them Grimm's Rhymes.
A while ago my sister and I were talking about Peter Pan.....yes that also came up in our oh so important discussion today with Brian. I was telling Brian how my sister had told me that Peter Pan is kind of morbid if you think about it. Tinkerbell's constant attempts to kill Wendy (getting the lost boys to shoot her down, plotting with Captain Hook, etc.), Peter Pan throwing Captain Hook to the crocodile, the mermaids trying to drown Wendy, etc. Yeah, it kind of ruined the movie for me. Thanks Miss. Don't get me wrong, I still LOVE Disney movies and will continue to watch them. These were just some random thoughts that Brian and I were discussing.
What are your thoughts? Are Disney and Nursery Rhymes a little too morbid for your children? Was Humpty Dumpty really an egg? I'm not trying to turn this into a political thing, I just thought it was kind of funny and interesting.
Another nursery rhyme that we had been analyzing was Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater. What a morbid little man! Brian thinks that Peter Pumpkin Eater's wife was cheating so he put her in a pumpkin shell and turned cannibal. I have to admit, I laughed at that assumption because I thought he was kidding around until he said, "think about it. If he's a "pumpkin eater," why would he be putting her in a pumpkin shell?" Hmm.....I'll have to think about that one. Maybe instead of calling them nursery rhymes they should call them Grimm's Rhymes.
A while ago my sister and I were talking about Peter Pan.....yes that also came up in our oh so important discussion today with Brian. I was telling Brian how my sister had told me that Peter Pan is kind of morbid if you think about it. Tinkerbell's constant attempts to kill Wendy (getting the lost boys to shoot her down, plotting with Captain Hook, etc.), Peter Pan throwing Captain Hook to the crocodile, the mermaids trying to drown Wendy, etc. Yeah, it kind of ruined the movie for me. Thanks Miss. Don't get me wrong, I still LOVE Disney movies and will continue to watch them. These were just some random thoughts that Brian and I were discussing.
What are your thoughts? Are Disney and Nursery Rhymes a little too morbid for your children? Was Humpty Dumpty really an egg? I'm not trying to turn this into a political thing, I just thought it was kind of funny and interesting.
5 comments:
I do not think Disney stories and nursery rhymes are too morbid for children because in order to see the "morbidity" in the story or nursery rhyme, you would have to have a mature/advanced sense of reason and logic. Children do not have that, and by the time they do they have a pretty good sense or real and fiction. I mean think about the road runner and wile coyote, or bugs bunny and elmer fudd. It's just a bunch of silliness I think.
Ha ha. Maybe it was a statue of an egg. I wonder where that came from for reals. Why would we always learn it was an egg? Dumb. I think nursery rhymes are weird.
Definitely morbid -- many of them! Did you ever read "Goosey, Goosey Gander"? The goose grabs her master's left leg and throws him down the stairs. I always skip that nursery rhyme when I read them to my kids...Always!
From what I understand, many of the nursery rhymes were intended to teach moral lessons. I personally think the English (back then) were absolutely obsessed with exactness in everything -- and death.
That's funny about Humpty Dumpty. I never thought about that.
ha ha, good point. most fables/stories the disney shows are based on are even more morbid than the movies make them. Disney cheered them up a bit. But I agree with laura, kids don't really get it. luckily.
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