GRAFTON — Cinderella bored the hell out of me. Sleeping Beauty, too. My mother recalled that I didn't ask to hear those stories. I wasn't interested in seeing them animated on the big screen either.
“Those stories aren't real,” I said.
Although I don't remember saying that, my opinion hasn't changed.
I thought of this story a couple of weeks ago, when I heard Peggy Orenstein on NPR discussing her new book Cinderella Ate My Daughter: Dispatches from the Front Lines of the New Girly-Girl Culture.
She recounted how, at two years old, her daughter Daisy went off to preschool in her favorite overalls, and “within a month, she threw a tantrum when I tried to wrestle her into pants. As if by osmosis, she had learned the names and gown colors of every Disney Princess.”
At the grocery store the checkout clerk addressed Daisy as “Princess.” At their neighborhood breakfast spot, the waitress delivered “princess pancakes,” and at the dentist's office, Daisy was invited to sit in the “special princess throne.”
Children are often society's strictest conformists, and odds are that Daisy will outgrow her love of polyester “gowns” and plastic high heels.
But I sympathize with Orenstein's dismay.
What's up with the Disney marketing team? Are they a bunch of predatory carnys turning girls into rubes in the capitalist carnival? Is there an evolutionary advantage in raising girls as decorative objects? Let's get real - it's tough to run from an attacker if you're wearing stilettos while holding up your gown in one hand and securing your tiara to your head with the other.
“Pretty girl currency” is overinflated, and it fades. It transmutes to soulful beauty only when accompanied by substantial character, panoramic intelligence, and competence in the material world. Not one Disney princess can change a tire, climb a mountain, plow a field, or get down and dirty in the shadow side of life and emerge victorious.
Disney should expand its repertoire. Open any collection of traditional folk tales from anywhere in the world, and turn the pages. You'll discover stories about independent, resourceful, brave girls and women who can rescue themselves and, when necessary, their paramours and families, too, offering proof that feminism isn't a modern concept devised by a motley crew of uppity women from the West.
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When I began telling stories in the 1980s, I found the sparky girls and plucky women I was looking for in Ethel Johnston Phelps's fine collections of traditional stories; - Tatterhood and Other Tales and The Maid of the North: Feminist Folk Tales from Around the World - and in Jack Zipes' stellar collection of contemporary fairy tales, Don't Bet on the Prince: Contemporary Feminist Fairy Tales in North America and England.
In the Iraqi story “The Chain of Truth,” a woman fools God and causes him to abandon his harsh, simplistic justice system.
In the Turkish story “Aina-Kizz and the Rich Man,” the precocious 9-year-old daughter of a poor woodcutter uses her wits to foil a swindler who has cheated her father out of his wood and his only mule.
In the Japanese story “The Old Woman and the Rice Cakes,” the protagonist is captured by the terrible oni, giant blue monsters with clawed hands, gaping mouths, and insatiable appetites. She is forced to live in their spooky, labyrinthine cave, and cook and serve rice cakes 24/7. A paragon of “grace under pressure,” her agile mind and the rice cakes eventually become her salvation.
If we must have princesses, let them be renegades like Janet in the Scottish tale “Janet and Tam Lin.” She braves the wrath of the fierce Fairy Queen to free her lover, Tam Lin, from the queen's spell so that he may once again live a mortal life.
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In the Egyptian story “The Prince and his Three Fates,” the princess falls for a prince who is burdened by a dire prophecy. At his birth, the fairies reluctantly tell his parents that he “will not live to die old,” and that he will meet his demise by way of “a dog, a serpent, or a crocodile.”
They were wrong about the dog; he becomes the prince's faithful companion, but when the serpent slithers across the couple's bedroom in the dark of night, it is the princess who wakes and lops off the serpent's head with her husband's sword.
One early morning, the prince and his dog are duck hunting along the river. The prince trips on what he mistakes as a log, but it is the crocodile, who raises his head and says, “I am your fate. But then, you know that.”
“Yes, and I know that no man can elude his fate, but I wish you'd reconsider. I'm married now, to an exceptional woman, and I love her very much, and I'm so hoping to grow old with her.”
The crocodile gazes at the prince and after long, silent minutes, he says, ”If you can dig a pit in the dry sand that will hold water, you can change your fate. If not, you won't live to see another sunrise.”
The prince hurries home to his wife and says, “Beloved, I'm done.”
“Not so! Go back to the river, dig a pit, and fill a large water pot. I'll meet you there before sunset.”
The princess vaults onto her husband's horse and gallops into the desert in search of an herb that allows sand to hold water. Around noon, she notices four delicate leaves waving in the breeze at the top of a high outcrop of rock. Leaving the horse in the cool shadow, she begins to climb.
Over and over again, she gains a foothold, only to fall back and make another attempt. Her hands and feet are scraped and bloody, and her clothes are torn. A sandstorm blows up and stings her eyes,and still, she climbs.
At last, she reaches the top and gently plucks the plant from its roots. Then, she gallops back full speed o the river, where the prince and the crocodile wait beside the pit. The evening sun, blazing red and ominous, is low on the horizon.
“Pour the water in the pit,” she shouts to her husband. She slides off the horse and tosses the herb in the water. A tense hour passes. The water level in the pit remains constant, and at last, the sulky crocodile slinks into the reeds and returns to the river.
Everyone in the land celebrates the princess who proved to be stronger than her husband's fate.
What a movie! Stunning landscapes, romance, adventure, danger, and a heroic quest, preferably not sugar-coated via cutesy animation.
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In these stories and others with similar themes, it's rare to read mention of the princesses' skin, hair, or eye color. No reference is made of their svelte figures or fabulous wardrobes.
Their beauty is manifested in intelligence, practicality, determination, and courage in enduring uncertainty and hardship, and do what must be done. These heroines mirror the attributes of real-life women all over the world.
Disney, dash for the bus! It left without you centuries ago, but if you try, you just might catch it.