That is Just a Horrible Quote

Now I know I've seen it before and never gave it much thought, but today I saw the quote from G.K. Chesterton:

“Fairy tales do not tell children the dragons exist. Children already know that dragons exist. Fairy tales tell children the dragons can be killed.”

And I understand what this is trying to say, but it is actually a really bad quote and not what you want to teach children.

Some of this may be my love for my characters Georgie and Armand, the two master mage, shape-shifting dragons who run an interdimensional hotel. They are dragons and they are awesome. In the first book I even have Georgie making a comment about how insulting a puppet show was that had a heroic knight slay the evil dragon.

So my problem with the quote is that it seems to imply that all dragons are bad (A something kids should fear) and need to be killed. But even in fairy tales, dragons are not always the bad guys.

Chesterton seems to be implying that all dragons are mindless, dangerous creatures that one only encounters in a 'kill or be killed' situation, which is a very limited mindset that does not reflect the larger picture of fariy tales and dragon stories historically. Yes, there are many stories of vicious dragons taking virgins to feast upon and only a noble knight can slay it and save the girl, but those are not the most common of fairy tales and should not be promoted as such. There are many stories where the dragon was minding its own business, guarding its hoard of treasure and someone or some group tries to steal from it and it attacks, and then the dragon becomes the villain for trying to protect its own property. And yes, there are many, many that treat them like mindless creatures that are just destructive in their ways, although in these case they are often shown to be like any other animal out there, looking for food and trying to survive when they encounter humans.

Even if one is trying for a generalized idea of monsters but doesn't want to use the word 'monster', there are other fairy tale creatures that work far better for this concept than dragons (Trolls is the first one that pops in my head) from just the fairy tale POV.  Or a simple change from 'killed' to 'dealt with' would have made the quote so much more meaningful, since often dragons in fairy tales are intelligent creatures that can be reasoned with.

In some ways it is interesting that the first thought of the quote is that is something scares you, the best solution is to kill it and that it is something we should promote to our children. That is some pretty dark thinking really.

So yes, I admit part of the problem with hte quote most likely comes from my love for my own dragon characters, but it still is a problematic quote beyond that if you really break it down. There are much better lessons that can made using fairy tales.

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