""Suppose my child ask me what the fairytale means, what am I to say?" If you do not know what it means, what is easier than to say so? If you do see a meaning in it, there it is for you to give him. A genuine work of art must mean many things; the truer its art, the more things it will mean. If my drawing, on the other hand, is so far from being a work of art that it needs THIS IS A HORSE written under it, what can it matter that neither you nor your child should know what it means? It is there not so much to convey a meaning as to wake a meaning. If it do not even wake an interest, throw it aside. A meaning may be there, but it is not for you. If, again, you do not know a horse when you see it, the name written under it will not serve you much."
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Original Language: English
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Sources
George MacDonald‎, in "The Fantastic Imagination" (1893)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Fairy_tale
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Fairy tale
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