Eco-Friendly Criticism in Folktales

Eco-friendly criticism is considered as a new approach in literary criticism and a response to environmental crises in recent decades. It is believed that attributing exclusive importance to humans has damaged their relations with the environment and humans ought not to be supposed as the apex of the universe; in fact, human is a part of nature not separated from nor dominant over it. One of the main methods of eco-friendly criticism in reaching this aim is encouraging human kind to return to mythology eras; where humans were affable and companions of nature. The reflection of those eras –that they are inhabitants of myth- are found in tales as well. We have selected forty tales in this article and studied them based on eco-friendly criticism. This is a theoretical study and has been done through library research. The role of nature in elements such as: place, content and message, topic and theme and especially characters is more significant. Human relation with nature is indeed close and amiable in these tales. Human and nature are beside one another in these tales.