Yes, those very same that you might have been asking about
last week when I defended happy endings… What about the girl who’s seen as a
beauty only after her fairy-godmother gives her a magic make-over? What about
the girl who changes herself for the man she fancies and even gives up her
power of speech to have a shot with him? What about the girl who loves a man
even though he is dark and violent as a beast? What about, in short, all the
times when we’ve all been told that if we’re not looking pretty and laughing
all the time we won’t be loved in return?
Sigh, oh, sigh, we’ve all been given a very wrongful example
to follow in that sense! That doesn’t mean that all of those stories are wrong
in themselves, but they’re nevertheless erroneous for contemporary psychology
and our new understanding of human relations and self-love. The messages of
virtue, patience and resignation that might have been important at the time those
stories were originally written have taken a new shape in today’s world of
speedy races towards success and multiple definitions of feminism. Everyone uses phrases such as that there is
no magic cure or magic shortcut to obtain something, that we should love
ourselves as we are, and that yes, patience is a virtue, but that’s rather more
associated with Zen than with accepting the abuse of others. Keeping quiet so
that we don’t look stupid is not very well seen, either, since most people
claim for free speech and prefer to speak up and show their opinion to the
world (whether they’re intelligent or not, that’s another matter, but that’s
not the point. Although I do not think
that because Ariel didn’t know the difference between a comb and a fork that
meant she was stupid – she was only misinformed).
Taking all of that into account, of course there is such a
great anti-princesses movement going on in the world! I admit, out of all those
classic stories, the only one that I utterly dislike is Cinderella. I don’t dislike it for the thing about the
use of magic to solve her problems (I want that
part to be real!), but rather because her problem was “not looking pretty”.
That and because there was no inner-change made within either her or the
prince; it was just “Oh, I show up, looking prettier than everyone else, not
because of my natural beauty but because of my magic dress and accessories, you
fall in love with me and so you look for me around the kingdom, yay!” – Wait, I
can hear you say “The other princesses are also pretty, so?” (ahem, drum roll,
please).
In every other case, even the dreaded Disney versions, every
one of the girls have shown their natural beauty in one way or another: Snow
White and Aurora (Thalia for some) were seen as country girls by the wandering
princes, Belle was kept in the Beast’s castle and thus never really dressed up
that much (and by the time of the ball they were already in love with one
another), Ariel was found floundering about (pun intended) in a sailcloth for
God’s and the Goddess’ sakes, and even Jasmine was walking about dressed as a
townswoman. I know I’m missing plenty of Disney examples, but I don’t want the
list to go too long, and I don’t want to stick to the Disney versions, either. I
will say, though, that I believe this particular detail should be taken as a
very encouraging one, because it shows that being natural is an important
factor in falling in love. With
Cinderella, however, the point of her only seen as a beauty when she’s been
dressed up, for me seems to be the most damaging one: as I previously
mentioned, the current knowledge of psychological issues can determine how much
a young girl’s confidence is determined by her belief in her own beauty and the
things that she might do to conceal or enhance certain attributes of herself;
the thing is, if we’re constantly being told that we should love ourselves but
we’re also being told that we should look pretty and be happy all the time in
order to be loved in return, those mixed
messages can really mortify a great deal of people, and watching a story in
which the girl is already pretty but is not being seen because she hasn’t got
pretty clothes or makeup on, and only when she does wear all of that then she
wows the world, is definitely not my idea of a good example.
I have previously talked extensively about my insights on
beauty on previous entries, which you’re more than welcome to read, too. As of
now, though, I’ll only say two things about it: 1) we’re all beings of beauty,
because a strict measure of what’s beautiful and what’s not cannot truly exist,
given that 2) we all have a different taste and we all consider different
people beautiful… even those who are considered “Universal beauty icons” can
seem unattractive to some of us, because we all have a different perception of
what we believe is beautiful. Having
said that, changing things in us to fit in with what “the world” says is
beautiful will only lead us into a never-ending cycle of never being happy with
ourselves.
Let’s get back to the literary aspects of the story. Given
that I’ve already stated that there is no character progression or depth in
Cinderella and that’s an important literary quality for me in order to like or
dislike a story, I’ll just point out that’s one more reason for my disapproval
of it and move on to the next one… I had a very interesting conversation with
my husband some time ago about Ariel, because she’s the other example within
fairytales which involves the changing oneself to get the other person to fall
for you. As opposed to Cinderella, I actually defend Ariel because she had
always wanted to be part of our world, even before she cast eyes on Eric, so he
was basically just the excuse for her to try it out. There are a couple of
things that are very wrong in the situation, however, and one is Ariel’s
resignation to the loss of her voice (read: to the loss of her opinion!), and
the other is the fact that she still clung to him even though he was unable to
recognize her just because she was mute now – especially after all he claimed
to be in love with her… The benefit of
the doubt that we could give him is that the gorgeous red-headed girl he had in
front of his eyes now was in fact voice-less, whereas the gorgeous red-headed
girl that rescued him had sung a heart-melting song, jumped into the sea, then
popped out her head to make her point clear before disappearing once again…
yet, why didn’t HE give the benefit of the doubt to HER, and realised that she
was in fact the same girl and that something had gone wrong? Still, my defence
of her lies in how she gave up a piece of herself to belong in a place where
she’d always wanted to belong anyhow, and to take the chance of finding true
love as well – a situation that all of us expats understand only too well! On the other hand, my husband said that her
original desire was that both worlds could understand each other and that she
intended to belong here without having to let go everything that meant being a
mermaid. This only happens towards the end, when she’s given the chance to
change back and forth at leisure – well, at least in the Disney version! In the
original version she is not successful in getting the prince to recognise her
in time and she turns to foam, so, as much as it pains me, I must agree with my
husband and say that Ariel gave everything up for a man, and this includes
herself in every way: not just her voice but her freedom, essence and even life
in the end, and all for someone who never recognised her as someone worthy of
loving. Scary as it sounds, a lot of women go through that so often and so
quietly that we don’t see even half of them… The case of the woman who loves
too much is frequently in the spotlight, leaving the case of the woman who
tries too hard way back, alone to her luck to turning to foam all by herself…
That being said, The Little Mermaid is also misunderstood in
another way: why is the loss of Ariel’s voice seen as the loss of her opinion? Back
then maybe yes, back when the story was originally written, because mute people
were frequently thought as unintelligent – but not today! It’s unfair to make
it seem that children will grow up with the idea that if they don’t say
anything then their opinion won’t count, both because the mute and the introvert
have a thousand ways to show their opinion nowadays, and at the very least that
should be taught from home, even if what the children watch is somewhat lacking
in information or technique. The Disney version has both good and bad things, but
I think that one of the good things that the creators of this version did was
focus on how Ariel not only becomes part of the human world, but also about the
psychological changes that overcome her once she’s able to experience all that
she had only but imagined, and how that stimulates her to truly understand this
world instead of quitting and letting go out of fear… that, and the original
desire and intention of helping both worlds understand each other and grow and
evolve in friendship are another couple of things that we expats can understand
only too much!
I will leave you with that, kind readers, for you to mull
over and create your own opinions on these stories – I could be terribly wrong
or terribly right about either one of them, who knows? One thing is for sure, there are many more
elements to study within the dissections of all stories, and the older the more
content of wisdom or revulsion we can find… the choice to continue fragmenting
these stories is yours alone.
I will return next week with a final instalment – for now –
in the fairytale theme. Then we’ll go
off on an adventure of some sort, but I haven’t yet decided on our destination.
Love and happy reading,
Sandra Tena ≈ Writer, dreamer, seeker, lover
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