The children’s story frees us up to generalize: this could be anyone (even me), and it could be anywhere (even here). And distance is one of the hallmarks, the defining characteristics, of the fairytale-the tale that might be true but, safely, is not.Īs for vagueness: that which scares us in real life-the lack of definitions, rules, clearly defined borders and boundaries-is not only unscary but entirely welcomed in the fairytale. And while many of Freud’s teaching have lost favor, few are the psychologists or psychiatrists who would deny the nature of the basic defense mechanism.Īnd in a less psychoanalytic fashion, who hasn’t at one point or another asked for advice “for a friend”? How many detective stories have used the trope of the client who acts ostensibly on someone else’s behalf-all the while being interested in himself alone? And who hasn’t experienced the realization that it seems far easier to play therapist and see the trends in someone else’s problems than to understand and deal with one’s own?ĭistance makes possible what immediacy cannot accomplish. Sigmund Freud referred to projection, sublimation, reaction formation, displacement-all tools of self-distancing from problems that touch the ego too profoundly. In emotionally charged moments, we tend to do reflexively what the fairytale does for us: we put distance between ourselves and what we are experiencing in order to see it and deal with it better than we otherwise could. For an adult, it means much the same thing-a freedom of fantasy and reflection that we rarely give ourselves as we grow older. For a child, this means the possibility of comprehending far more about reality than can come from reality itself. You can say and think things from far away that you can’t say and think up close. We are able to see a reality that is broader and deeper than the one we can perceive up close.Īt a distance, the world is less threatening. Things that were concrete and specific become abstract and broad. In that movement, we change our construal, our representation of the world. If we take a step back-in time, in space, in the hypothetical mind (here, I am borrowing from the definition of psychological distance offered by NYU psychologist Yaacov Trope)-we can discern elements that are invisible from up close. It can allow us to process things that we would otherwise be unable to deal with-and I mean this in both a literal and a more metaphorical, emotional sense-and it frees up our mind in a way that immediacy does not. And it is to these two elements, distance and vagueness, that I propose we look in trying to describe, if not altogether explain, the power that once upon a time holds over its audience.ĭistance is a psychologically powerful tool. Not a land or a place you can locate, but some kingdom, some land, some place that cannot be tied to a map or a ready-made travel plan.
We are not speaking of a defined time, a time you can point to, but rather of a once, an indeterminate moment. And second, there is the vagueness, the deliberate lack of specificity. We are not in the now, but rather in some place in the removed past. Why such lasting and ubiquitous appeal? What is it that the words promise, exactly? Beyond the lure of fantasy and the make-believe, magic kingdoms and talking animals, why that phrase, that turn, that wording?įirst, there is that semblance of distance. (And in between, a 1461 printing of Der Edelstein, a work of German fables.) The central text of Europe’s central religion, followed closely by the tales and fairy spinnings of a Greek storyteller. To put this timing in perspective, consider that the Gutenberg Bible-the first surviving book produced on the new printing press-dates roughly to 1450. The German printing was soon followed by the first English translation, by William Caxton, in 1484. It’s worth noting that one of the earliest known books to have been printed on the original Gutenberg press, in 1476, was Aesop’s Fables. While I can only vouch for a handful of languages through my own experience-in the Russian, the phrase translates loosely to in some kingdom, in some land in the Romance languages, to some variation of there was once-if I’m to believe this elaborate list, few if any cultures stray from the general contours of the phrase.Īnd its appeal, too, is of the most enduring kind. The formulation is as near to universal as they come. You are ready to succumb to the world of the story. But you are ready all the same to take on all of these unknowns, the uncertainties, the ambiguities. You may have little notion of the exact action that is about to unfold. You may not recognize the specific characters. I don’t need to say anything more, and yet you know at once what it is you’re about to hear.
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