Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale The Princess and the Pea initially appears almost ironic—superficial, even sexist in its suggestion that a “real” princess is defined by her fragility. Yet a closer reading reveals a different layer, one that speaks less about...
“And as she stood there, having not a single thing left, suddenly some stars fell down from heaven, and they were nothing else but hard, smooth pieces of money.” The fairy tale The Star Money tells the story of a poor nameless girl who owns nothing except the clothes...
Transformation is always connected to death, something that may scare us but also catches our attention. It’s not only about the physical death of our body; it’s about the death of who we were told to be, the projections that society pushed us into. Transformation is...
In her first contribution to Beyond Psychology, Raya Goldstein takes us into the myth of Mother Hulda. Through the lens of fairy tales, she explores the wild woman archetype and the primordial mother, revealing how stories preserve women’s wisdom while also exposing...