For the record, nursery rhymes are gruesome

May 20, 2007 21:05

Do parents honestly say these anymore?

Ding, Dong, Dell

Ding, dong, dell,
Pussy’s in the well.

Who put her in?
Little Johnny Thin.

Who pulled her out?
Little Tommy Stout.

What a naughty boy was that,
To try to drown poor pussy cat,

Who never did him any harm,
And killed the mice in his father’s barn.

Goosey Goosey GanderGoosey, goosey ( Read more... )

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Comments 11

misswitch May 21 2007, 01:18:08 UTC
You think those are bad? You should read the original versions of pretty much every fairy tale in existence. They were not so much bedtime stories as stories meant to scare children into behaving. (in Cinderella, the stepsisters cut off their toes and heels in an attempt to fit their foot in the glass slipper.)

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elementalv May 21 2007, 01:20:37 UTC
Oh trust me, I know. I bought an anthology of the original fairy tales as a reference, and they explain a lot of modern horror.

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ruthless1 May 21 2007, 02:38:14 UTC
They did in MY childhood - here's one of the first songs I ever learned to sing.

Oh I had a little chickie
And he wouldn't lay an egg
So I poured hot water
Up and Down his leg
And the little chickie cried
And the little chicke begged
And the little chickie laid a hard boiled egg.

My stepdad (E.V.I.L) thought that was the funniest song ever. It clearly tells you about his personality.

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elementalv May 22 2007, 01:27:27 UTC
So, has your stepfather been outed as a serial killer yet?

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ruthless1 May 22 2007, 04:54:01 UTC
Well - I tried to out his evilness and you know what happened? I got kicked out of the family. And am WAY better off for it.
*looks warily at siblings who are still in the family and kinda batshit crazy*

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secondsilk May 21 2007, 07:09:49 UTC
I never had the second verse of Goosey Goosey Gander or any of Ding Dong Dell.
But I did have Three Blind Mice.
(And once: Three vision impaired rodents.)

My book of nursery rhymes included Who Killed Cock Robin, but we never read that one.

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elementalv May 22 2007, 01:28:26 UTC
I think I need to read the PC version of Three Blind Mice.

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laurie_ky May 21 2007, 16:20:42 UTC
A lot of these rhymes started out as street doggeral with political content. I know Ring Around the Rosie was about the bubonic plague. I think that Mary, Mary Quite Contrary was referring to Mary, Queen of Scots and her habit of sticking her enemies heads on pikes around, I think, the Tower of London. Could be wrong about the location.
There is an old book,by a famous pyschologist, Bruno Bettelheim,(pretty sure it was him, but I didn't check it out)that explores the psychology of fairy tales. I think it's called, The Uses of Enchantment. I read it a lonnnng time ago, and found it interesting.

Laurie

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elementalv May 22 2007, 01:32:18 UTC
I know, but I'm having a hard time understanding how anyone decided that throwing someone down a stair was appropriate for kids. I mean, sure, believe in God or you'll suffer horribly, but isn't there a better way of putting it?

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ruthless1 May 22 2007, 05:01:44 UTC
Oh that's an easy peasy answer. Kids weren't actually considered real human beings when these were written. They were just part of your property.

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primroseburrows May 22 2007, 04:01:26 UTC
There's also:

Alouette, gentille Alouette
Alouette je te plumerai

Pulling feathers off of sweet little birds. How comforting for kids. Or, um, not?

And then there's "Rock A Bye Baby", which is all about a cradle falling out of the top of a tree. That one was definitely political, but still nothing you'd really want to sing to a baby.

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