Self-Help Books

Sandra K. Dobly has studied more than three hundred self-help books, and she offers an interpretation of why these books are so popular. Using methods associated with folklore studies, Dolby argues that self-help books continue the well-established American penchant for self-education, articulate problems of daily life and supposed solutions for them, and present content in an accessible rather than arcane form and style. The overarching premise of the study is that self-help books, much like fairy tales, take traditional materials, especially stories and ideas, and recast them into extended essays that people happily read, think about, try to apply, and then set aside when a new embodiment of the genre comes along.

Sandra K. Dolby, Director of the Folklore Institute and professor of folklore and American studies at Indiana University, is the author of Literary Folkloristics and the Personal Narrative.