Download or read book Off with Their Heads! written by Maria Tatar and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 1993-10-24 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When fairy tales moved from workrooms, taverns, and the fireside into the nursery, they not only lost much of their irreverent, earthy humor but were also deprived of their contestatory stance to official culture. Children's literature, Maria Tatar maintains, has always been more intent on producing docile minds than playful bodies. From its inception, it has openly endorsed a productive discipline that condemns idleness and disobedience along with most forms of social resistance.