Cinderella has got to be the most well-known fairytale in the world. It is also incredibly old and has thousands of variations...That being said, there is no way that I can possibly do full justice to the rich and fascinating history of this tale type. But I'll do my best to give a suitable overview of the Grimm version.
Tag: gender roles
#FairytaleTuesday: A Story About a Brave Tailor
Ostensibly, this is a story about a little dude who overcomes great odds through his wit and cunning and manages to achieve great fame and fortune, and a princess. The character of the tailor is essentially a Jack, the one fairytale archetype for whom the story will always work for and not against. No matter how lazy and foolish he is, a Jack will always win.
#FairytaleTuesday: Hansel and Gretel
The fact that the woman who willingly marries the widowed father was most likely doing so because she literally had no other options--due to poverty, age, or suspected infertility--is never considered because her feelings are of little value. The potential for being resentful at having a husband and children forced upon her for reasons out of her control is is great, but it doesn't matter, given that women are expected to be motherly, no matter the situation.
#FolkloreThursday: Lilith
There are reams of lore and academic texts and hypotheses and theories about who she was, where she came from, and what she became. But in studying the fragments, it's not hard to see how women would find a kindred spirit in her. All the stories seem to agree that Lilith was passionate and wanted to be independent.
#FairytaleTuesday: Nasty Flax Spinning
The queen summoned the three spinsters to the castle, and on the day that the king was supposed to return home, she sat them down next to one another in her room, gave each of them a spinning wheel, and ordered them to spin. Moreover, she told each of them what to answer when the king questioned them. As soon as the king arrived, he heard the humming of the wheels from a distance and was so glad that he intended to praise his daughters.
#FairytaleTuesday: The Three Little Men in the Forest
This story came to the brothers by way of Wilhelm Grimm's future wife, Dortchen Wild. It is believed that Charles Perrault's The Fairies was a source of inspiration, given that similar punishment/reward systems were used for the kind and unkind girls. Some variants have the queen asking the king that mercy be shown to her stepmother and stepsister, who are then banished instead of executed.
#FairytaleTuesday: Good Bowling and Card Playing
[CW: animal cruelty] Now, there was a young man from a poor family who thought to himself, “Why not risk my life? I’ve got nothing to lose, and a lot to win. What’s there to think about?”
But Seriously, Look At Those Pants, Y’all
This is an ad for pants, y’all, literally. It’s advertising men’s pants. That’s it. And for some reason, someone in that ad meeting thought “What if we show a man from the waist down, wearing these pants, and have him standing on a tiger-skin rug with a woman’s head…” and someone else said “Brilliant!”
Bluestocking Writes... 