Liana Mora
Professor Kyle Hoehne
Fairy tales and Rewritings
12 November 2019
Male Dominion
Growing up watching Disney movies I have witnessed an increase in female activity. Females in fairy tales are no longer what they used to be before. Female characters whether they are villains or heroines have taken on characteristics such as courage, determination, and ambition. These are character traits that would have never been used to describe classical female characters such as Aurora or Cinderella. Female characters not only have taken new personas but are not necessarily saved by a prince’s kiss. Current fairy tales portray messages such as the importance of sisterhood or letting out your true colors. Many of these messages do not relate to prince charming, diminishing the impact male characters have on the overall plot of the story. Regardless of what fairy tales have become it is not what it always used to be. In classic fairy tales, heroines revolve their decision-making around what male characters might find convenient causing female passivity and vulnerability which leads to the lack of rebellion that readers seek in a heroine.
Female characters are bound to be influenced by male ideology. As soon as the early 19th-century western male authors utilized writing as their platform to express women as domesticized and delicate. Films of fairy tales such as Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty “come from a time when family values had been solidified by successive world wars and the housewife was commonplace in American society” (Higgs 2). Both protagonists remain passive and unaware of their surroundings which resembles what was thought about women. Society had depicted women as someone who stayed at home doing housework and awaited the return of their husbands. Their day revolved around the man of the house as they woke up to prepare breakfast to send him off to work and then greeted him with a spotless house and a warm dinner. Similar to Walt Disney’s Cinderella who performs under her stepmother’s command, endless exhausting chores, however, she seems to enjoys it as she whistles and sings while doing so. There is an evident trace of delicacy amongst female characters names such as Cinderella which is “a reference to ash, suggest[ing] something that could blow away in a stiff breeze”(Higgs 2). Reflecting how easy it is to command her to do something as well as looking down upon her as she slept next to the fireplace where she will get covered with cinder.
There is an importance on women’s appearance in fairy tales as it becomes a factor that men take into account when looking for a princess. It influences women’s actions on wardrobe style to “dress to impress”. It is argued that “an individual’s appearance is composed of physical features such as makeup and wardrobe” (Reagan 5) which occurs to Cinderella. Cinderella is magically granted a luxurious dress by her godmother and with that comes a brand-new person whom we see as more “heroine like”. She goes to the ball and catches the prince’s eye. He claims to have fallen in love with her due to who she was, however, in versions different from Disney such as the story “Yeh-Shen – A Cinderella Story from China”retold by Ai-Ling Louie the prince doubted that Yeh-Shen was the girl he fell in love with at first sight when she was dressed in rags. It is not until the slipper fits her that he receives concrete evidence that convinces him that she was his mystery girl. We witness a brave and reckless Cinderella when she is not in rags as she rebels against her stepmother by disobeying her by going to the ball which fulfills what is expected of a heroine (Stone 44). To appeal to a male, she changes how she looks and acts with the hopes to grasp the prince’s attention something that her rags would have never done.
Passivity can be spotted throughout numerous fairy tales. It has been criticized by feminists “for [it’s] narrow portrayal of women as passive objects [and] romanticized innocents” (Stone 1). Passivity affects the development of the character as it restrains them from getting out of their comfort zone and encountering new opportunities. In many scenarios, males might be the ones who do not allow women to flourish and learn what they are truly capable of. In tales such as “Sun, Moon, and Talia” by Giambattista Basile the protagonist Talia is doomed to fall into a deep sleep for hundreds of years. While asleep a king finds her and “his blood course[d] hotly through his veins [as] he carried her to a bed, where he gathered the first fruits of love (Basile 1). Talia who is in her most innocent moment is not only being taken advantage of, but she is also seen as a sexual object that is up for grabs. The idea of consent does not cross the king’s mind as he becomes selfish and works to please his needs rather than considering Talia’s.
Many may argue that a male figure does not spark passivity on a heroine. In scenarios such as “Briar Rose” by Brothers Grimm the protagonist Briar Rose is awoken by the prince and chooses to marry him that same day. Briar Rose goes into a stage of passivity as she goes to sleep, but this only happens because of the 13th fairies gift which was to “prick herself with a spindle and fall dead”(Grimm 2). Briar Rose being in a passive stage when she encounters the prince does not plot him as the cause of her passivity. However, Briar Rose encounters the prince in a very vulnerable time in her life. She had just awoken from a deep sleep and was very disoriented. She seeks refuge in the prince as he seems to be her savior since magical elements accompany him as the “hedge of thorns [turned to] flowers that separated and made a path for him”(Grimm 3). Even though Briar Rose was not placed into the passive stage that the prince found her in she remains vulnerable after she awakes. The story does not include dialogue for her and therefore, we cannot determine if she in the midst of vulnerability was marrying the prince due to gratitude or because she truly loved him.
Eliminating the influence males have over women in fairytales is nearly impossible. It is inevitable for women to not fall into the ongoing cycle of pleasing men. To please a man heroine, change who they are and where they come from rather than embracing their beginnings. Passivity comes in different forms. Heroines may not even notice what they have gotten themselves into until it’s too late to back out. Remaining passive does not offer the bravery and rebellion that readers seek in heroines which can put up for debate whether they are heroines or not. Regardless of their passivity fairy tale heroines still manage to find their happily ever after even if it’s next to someone who once taken advantage of them.
Works Cited
Cinderella. (1950). [DVD] Walt Disney Productions: by Clyde Geronimi, Hamilton Luske and
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Giambattista, Basile. The Pentameron of Giambattista Basile, translated by Richard F. Burton
(Privately printed, 1893), day 5, tale 5. Translation revised by D. L. Ashliman.
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Louie, Ai-Ling, and Ed Young. Yeh-shen: A Cinderella Story from China. , 1982. Print.
Regan, Pamela C. “Cinderella revisited: women’s appearance modification as a function of
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Stone, Kay. “Things Walt Disney Never Told Us.” The Journal of American Folklore, vol. 88,
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