We are told that the ‘Tales of Beedle the Bard’ have been translated from the original runes by Miss Hermione Granger and have now been published anew for both magical and muggle (non-magical) audiences alike.
The five tales – ‘The Wizard and the Hopping Pot’, ‘The Fountain of Fair Fortune’, ‘The Warlock’s Hairy Heart’, ‘Babbitty Rabbitty and the Cackling Stump’, and ‘The Tale of the Three Brothers’ – are as dear to the wizarding world as fairytales such as Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty are to ours.
The five tales have been met with great excitement as the last, ‘The Tale of the Three Brothers’, is of great significance in the seventh Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
The tales are in many ways similar to our fairy stories, however a few noteworthy differences strike the reader. One of the most interesting of these is the role and stature of women in Rowling’s tales. The witches are arguably much more attractive to a modern reader as they seek their own fortunes.
‘Rather than taking a prolonged nap or waiting for someone to return a lost shoe,’ they take fate into their own hands. In her introduction Rowling also points out that, unlike muggle stories, magic can be both the cause and cure of the characters problems, whereas in our fairy stories, magic is almost always just the cause.
However, despite the presence of magic, it is made clear that the characters face the same problems as muggles, thus making their lessons relevant for both magical and muggle readers.
Each tale promotes a moral lesson. One which causes all Harry Potter readers ears to prick up is that of racial equality. A huge theme across the Harry Potter books is that of blood purity. Rowling continually damns the prejudices of some of her less-liked characters such as the Malfoys who promote ideas about racial purity as all-important.
Her heroes and heroines, both in the Harry Potter books and these tales, are those who challenge the prejudices, prove them to be evil and invalid, and thus promote morals which condemn racism in every form.
The theme which unlocks all five tales is seen most clearly in that of the Three Brothers. It is found in each story, but it is unpacked by Dumbledore in his commentary on ‘The Warlock’s Hairy Heart’. He states that the tale "addresses one of the greatest, and least acknowledged, temptations of magic: the quest for invulnerability".
