Bedtime Reading

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In a 1952 survey of 200 traditional nursery rhymes, Geoffrey Handley-Taylor found that about half were “glorious and ideal for the child.” The others contained:

  • 8 allusions to murder (unclassified)
  • 2 cases of choking to death
  • 1 case of death by devouring
  • 1 case of cutting a human being in half
  • 1 case of decapitation
  • 1 case of death by squeezing
  • 1 case of death by shriveling
  • 1 case of death by starvation
  • 1 case of boiling to death
  • 1 case of death by hanging
  • 3 cases of death by drowning
  • 4 cases of killing domestic animals
  • 1 case of body snatching
  • 21 cases of death (unclassified)
  • 7 cases relating to the severing of limbs
  • 1 case of the desire to have a limb severed
  • 4 cases relating to the breaking of limbs
  • 1 allusion to a bleeding heart
  • 1 case of devouring human flesh
  • 9 threats of death
  • 1 case of kidnapping
  • 12 cases of torment and cruelty to human beings and animals
  • 8 cases of whipping and lashing
  • 3 allusions to blood
  • 14 cases of stealing and general dishonesty
  • 15 allusions to maimed human beings and animals
  • 2 allusions to graves
  • 23 cases of physical violence (unclassified)
  • 1 case of lunacy
  • 16 allusions to misery and sorrow
  • 1 case of drunkenness
  • 4 cases of cursing
  • 1 allusion to marriage as a form of death
  • 1 case of scorning the blind
  • 1 case of scorning prayer
  • 9 cases of children being lost or abandoned
  • 2 cases of house burning
  • 9 allusions to poverty and want
  • 5 allusions to quarreling
  • 2 cases of unlawful imprisonment
  • 2 cases of racial discrimination

“Expressions of fear, weeping, moans of anguish, biting, pain and evidence of supreme selfishness may be found in almost every other page.”