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The tale of Beauty and the Beast is at least 4,000 years old, perhaps second in popularity only to Cinderella. It has generated many print versions, animated films, a Broadway show, and a Disney film. What about this tale continues to ensure its popularity? And what is this tale really about?

\\xa0Beauty and the Beast is a metaphor for the development of the feminine, symbolized by an animal bridegroom\\u2014who, of course, is an enchanted prince. It\\u2019s tempting to see this tale as an example of women treated as chattel by misogynistic males, but as our archetypal bones, fairy tales show us universal problems, patterns, and psychic realities. Beauty\\u2019s task is to relate to her instinctual self, represented by the beast. Each of us has an inner other, often imaged as opposite sex, who possesses qualities that seem utterly foreign yet compel attention and interaction.

\\xa0The tale begins with Beauty\\u2019s father stealing a rose for his favorite daughter from the beast\\u2019s garden. Outraged, the beast demands retribution: either the father or one of his daughters must agree to live with the beast. Beauty, described as \\u201cloyal and modest,\\u201d loves her father and insists on sacrificing herself to the beast, who they believe will kill her. A seemingly simple rose comes at a high price, and representations of masculine figures are negative: feckless father and fiend. However, the rose is a mandala. It opens like the lotus from a center and holds the promise of wholeness.

\\xa0We see the interplay of opposites at the outset and throughout: Beauty\\u2019s innocence and self-sacrifice contrast with the beast\\u2019s domineering will. Beauty\\u2019s seemingly loving father is powerless and unable to protect her, but the beast provides for her every want despite her nightly refusal to wed him. In the beast\\u2019s domain, na\\xefve and compliant Beauty discovers her power of self-determination: she stands up to the beast as she did not do with her father, and the beast agrees to let her visit her family. Given freedom from obligation, she chooses to return to the beast.

\\xa0Beauty\\u2019s realization reflects her newfound ability to base loyalty on character and consciousness rather than reflexive filial duty. She needed to access autonomy, and her primal inner other\\u2014the beast--needed to relinquish control. Beauty and the Beast is a heartening tale of hard-won wholeness\\u2014and at its center is love.

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