ARCHETYPAL FEMININE FIGURES IN FAIRY TALES. A STUDY IN ARCHETYPAL PSYCHOLOGY
ARCHETYPAL FEMININE FIGURES IN FAIRY TALES. A STUDY IN ARCHETYPAL PSYCHOLOGY

Summary/Abstract: Our study is not an old-fashioned mythological interpretation of the feminine figures present in fairy tales. It is a study in archetypal psychology, whose aim is to identify the universal archetypal feminine figures, both positive and negative, present in fairy tales and analyze them as symbols of different feminine psychological forces. Working with stories and fairy-tales implicitly means experiencing the deep unconscious. Asking patients to make-up their own fairy-tales that would mirror the conflict submerged in their unconscious life is a modern technique used in psychotherapy, especially by Jungian analysts. The solution that the patients find when working with their imaginary, creative forces of the unconscious in the land of fairy-tales is actually their own inner guide to profound physical and emotional healing in the real world. Though they may be known under different names in different folklores of the world, the ‘evil stepmother,’ the ‘witch,’ the ‘old hag,’ the ‘wise old woman,’ the ‘fairy’ are archetypal figures of the feminine forces of the psychic that are present in everybody’s ‘personal fairy-tale,’ spoken or unspoken. They provide only the image of our ‘feminine psychic forces’ that cannot be complete without the ‘masculine psychic traits.’

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