Don't play with matches

A cautionary tale.

Today’s dilemma is a poem about Pauline and a box of matches. Left to her own devices, she’s tempted to light a match or two in spite of injunctions from her mother, nursie and two philosopher cats called Minz and Maunz. Pauline runs around the room with the lit match in hand until her clothes catch on fire and she’s burnt to ashes, leaving behind her scarlet shoes.

Did Pauline really deserve this fate?

Isn’t it the pattern of cautionary tales that the fate of the person who violates some injunction is usually fairly unpleasant? In other words, any child being told the story is being told that there will be extreme consequences, which is obviously seen as a deterrent.

In fact, a lot of fairy tales are violent affairs, although there has been a certain amount of bowdlerisation. In the versions of Cinderella I was told whenI was young, they all lived happily ever after, but there are also versions in which the Ugly Sisters hack bits of their feet off so that the slippers will fit and one where pigeons peck out their eyes. In Snow White, the Evil Queen is forced to wear red-hot iron shoes and dance until she drops dead.

Tomorrow we have a tale of boat people. To sink or not to sink. That is the question.