Wooden Tony

Taken from Beyond the Looking Glass, edited by Jonathan Cott. "Wooden Tony" was written by Lucy Lane Clifford and tells the story of an autistic child, which is especially relevant to my work, as several of my students have autism. The story is very sad and moving. I find it strangely beautiful, and yet it's more like a horror story than a traditional fairy tale. As always, you can read my summary, but the original story is infinitely better.

Tony was a lazy boy who would sit by the fire. He never did chores, and his eyes often had a blank expression, and the neighbors would call him "Wooden Tony." He noticed that, when people were far away, they were smaller, and he told his mother he wished he could be far off so that he would be small again and people would stop demanding things of him and scolding him when he didn't do them.

But Tony loved to sing. When he would go out to pick eidelweiss, he would come back with no flowers but with a new song no one had heard before. Tony also liked to watch his father carve little figurines out of wood during the winter; these he would sell in town for money.

One morning a dealer came to buy Tony's father's figures. He had heard Tony's song and wanted to share it with the world. He took Tony with him to Geneva. He told Tony to sing, and he did, and as Tony sang, the dealer wrote down the notes of his song. As they walked past mountains and trees, Tony sang and sang, and the dealer copied. Yet as he went, "his song was different, it seemed no longer to come from his heart but only from his lips, and as he sang he heard the notes repeated. The song was going out of him and on to the dealer's wire. He did not look towards it, he did not care; he felt nothing keenly. His legs were growing stiff and his feet were hard...He was not tired, or warm, or cold, or glad, or sorry, but only in a dream."

Tony and the dealer arrived at the town, but the town felt strange to Tony, who was used to nature. He could no longer sing anything. The dealer put Tony in a little wooden house and told him to go upstairs. He did, and saw a wooden figurine his father had carved before, that he had been afraid of, but no longer was. Tony waited in the dark with the woman figurine. Sometimes he would hear the notes of his song, twanged back on wire, and he and the woman would catch a glimpse of light.

One day, Tony's mother and father were in town. His mother saw a cuckoo clock and Tony as the wooden figurine. His father insisted that could not be Tony, but his mother knew him. "His song has gone into the world, but Tony is there," she insisted. His father wondered if, since Tony's head had been wooden, the rest of him had turned wooden too.

His mother wanted him back, but when the song was finished, Tony was jerked back into the darkness.

"Life is not only in nodding heads, and work is not only for hands that move and feet that walk; it is in many other things."

Undine Sonata

My musical selections will tend to be more flute-centric because I'm a flute player, but here's an excellent example of more classical music inspired by a fairy tale-Carl Reinecke's "Undine" flute sonata.

John William Waterhouse


An Undine, or Ondine, was a water nymph. The German legend goes that she married a man to gain a soul, but he was unfaithful, and she cursed him to stay alive only as long as he stayed awake; when he fell asleep next, he would die. Friedrich de la Motte Fouque turned it into a novel in the nineteenth century which became very popular.


The first movement depicts Undine as a water nymph. Eventually she comes to land, and is raised by human parents, who don't understand her. The fast, chase-like notes of the second movement describe her relationship with her foster parents., who perceive her as impulsive and naughty.

The slow third movement is when Undine finds love. Yet her naivete leads her to bring her husband's former fiancee into their home. He is drawn back to his former love, and Undine is unwillingly forced to give him the curse of death, yet comes secretly to attend the funeral-all this is portrayed in the fourth movement.

I find it interesting-traditional fairy bride tales such as this usually consist of human men kidnapping supernatural female characters, who escape as soon as they find a chance. These fairy creatures are other than human, and cannot be happy when confined to human life. Yet in two very popular water spirit tales written by men-Fouque's Undine and Andersen's Little Mermaid-the supernatural female will do anything for the love of the man. This Undine still mourns for her unfaithful husband, unlike the folkloric Undine who curses her husband of her own will.

Disney Couture

Beauty and the Beast Cogsworth Pendant Necklace



Magic Castle Necklace


Beauty and the Beast class ring

Snow White "Fairest of them all" necklace

Snow White two-sided cameo necklace

Snow White Mirror necklace (you could also say this was the Beast's magic mirror)

Beauty and the Beast Lumiere necklace

I would like all of the above, please. There's more where they came from at amazon. Just search for "Disney Couture."

Items here are priced between $40 and $85.

Donna Jo Napoli's Beast

I feel ashamed to admit I had never read Donna Jo Napoli's Beast before now. My mom had read it and told me it wasn't good. I can see why she wouldn't want me to read a story where the enchanted Prince has sex with a lion. I kept thinking about Beauty and wondering if she would ever know that the man she would eventually marry had once "recieved a lioness," as Napoli puts it.

Overall I liked it. The writing style is a bit choppy, and in present tense, which at first takes some time to get used to. Plus, in the beginning section, she throws a lot of foreign words in which she has to then define, or spends a lot of time describing Persian culture or aspects of the Mulsim religion. It bogged down the reader a bit because the action was slowed down and it was harder to picture in my head.

The story starts in Persia and the Prince is named Orasmyn-taken from the Charles Lamb poem. So I expected the story to be more original than the traditional details of the French version, but it was actually really cool how everything made sense in the end and became the story we all know.

This story is unique for taking the perspective of the Beast. He starts off as the Prince of Persia, a very disciplined and religious man, who seems almost too much like a woman's ideal of a "perfect man" to be realistic-he doesn't like violence or hunting, he likes roses instead, etc. But then when the fairy curses him (for making an improper sacrifice in a religious ceremony) he becomes a lion. And not just a man in a lion's skin, as if he were wearing a costume he couldn't take off-like we often think of the Beast-but the mind of a man conflicting with the mind of a lion, inside a lion's body, with all of a lion's instincts and desires. This aspect of the plot helped deepen his character a lot. As disciplined and perfect as he was before, even he has trouble keeping the human side of him in tact. And it's a lesson we could all learn-we all tend to put our stomache, or our lust or other instinctive desires before what we know is good for ourselves, or for others.

I chose to illustrate this post with pictures from Vogue of Drew Barrymore as Beauty because that version also has the Beast as a literal lion. Most Beasts tend to be a conglomeration of animals (bears are common for the Beast though), but Orasmyn became fully lion. He couldn't even talk or walk on his hind legs, like most Beasts.

The middle section of the book deals with Orasmyn trying to live as a lion-adapting to his new body and living in the wild. I can't imagine the research that went into this book, but aside from the educational value, I kept wanting it to get to the part where Beauty would show up.

She finally did. And like Orasmyn's original character, she also came off as a bit too perfect to me. Yet it also made me realize how Beauty-centric most versions are. Everyone loves to imagine themselves in a castle that immediately grants every desire. Since the Beast also has invisible magical servants, there's no need for Beauty to do anything for him. In Napoli's version, there are no magical servants. He has to feed himself as well as creates gardens suitable for Belle's food and provide for her human needs, which is difficult enough for a human, more difficult for a lion. In fact I kept wishing I could hear the story from Belle's perspective, and then being like, oh yeah...that's pretty much every other version.

But, each author gives Beauty and the Beast their own unique spin, and I wouldn't mind reading Napoli's Beauty's backstory too. Though it isn't my favorite version (no one can hold a candle to Robin McKinley's Beauty in my opinion,) it gives the reader a lot to think about and chew on long after the book is finished, which is one thing I really like in a book.

Excerpt:

"Belle is human. I am lion. Belle is human. I am lion. Belle is human. I am lion.
The chant rolls in my head.
She hums.
The chant dissipates.
Belle hums as she eats.
Like a lioness.
Is this the work of the pari [fairy] who distorts every moment, makes every moment a source of temptation?"

Persephone

While reading Donna Jo Napoli's Beast, which I will have a full post on shortly, I came across a reference comparing Beauty and the Beast to the Greek myth of Persephone.

Leighton painting

Persephone was the goddess of the Underworld-but not by choice. While out picking flowers one day, she was abducted by Hades. Her father Zeus demanded her return, but before he returned her, Hades tricked Persephone into eating six pomegranate seeds. Food from the Underworld is powerful and will keep the eater there (much like fairy food). So Persephone spends six months of the year in the Underworld, as payment for the six seeds she ate.

The flowers Persephone was picking reminds us of Beauty's innocent request for a rose, which ultimately brought her to the Beast. Donna Jo Napoli's Beast makes the observation that Belle probably thought she was going to live with someone who was more or less the lord of the Underworld. And Beauty does go back and forth between her strange lover and her family- though not as much as Persephone.

Tile art by William Morris

Yet the Persephone myth is also similar to the tale of Little Red Riding Hood, who also got into trouble for straying off the path to pick flowers. She and Persephone are punished for this, while Beauty is usually commended for her appreciation of nature over materialistic goods. Yet, as critics have pointed out (Maria Tatar is freshest in my mind,) Little Red wasn't really a story about the importance of obeying parents or staying on the path until the Grimms got ahold of it. In fact, in older versions, Red would often perform a striptease for the wolf instead of the "My, what big (insert body part here) you have!" Not the Little Red we fell asleep listening to...

Every little girl is a Princess

There once was a little princess who-

"But, Mr. Author, why do you always write about princesses?"

"Because every little girl is a princess."

"You will make them vain if you tell them that."

"Not if they understand what I mean."

"Then what do you mean?"

"What do you mean by a princess?"

"The daughter of a king."

"Very well, then every little girl is a princess, and there would be no need to say anything about it, except that she is always in danger of forgetting her rank, and behaving as if she had grown out of the mud. I have seen little princesses behave like the children of thieves and lying beggars, and that is why they need to be told they are princesses. And that is why, when I tell a story of this kind, I like to tell it about a princess. Then I can say better what I mean, because I can give her every beautiful thing I want her to have."

"Please go on."

George Macdonald, opening of The Princess and the Goblin

Underwater symphony

A gorgeous piece of music, "Aquarium," from Camille Saint-Saens' Carnival of the Animals:

Saint-Saens depicted underwater life as mysterious and ethereal.

Does it remind you of anything else?

Some people think Alan Menken was influenced by "Aquarium" when he composed the introduction to Beauty and the Beast. They do sound similar.

Menken (and Sebastian) took underwater life in a different direction in The Little Mermaid:

And one more underwater masterpiece. The Moldau, by Czech composer Smetena, describes:
"the course of the Vltava, starting from the two small springs, the Cold and Warm Vltava, to the unification of both streams into a single current, the course of the Vltava through woods and meadows, through landscapes where a farmer's wedding is celebrated, the round dance of the mermaids in the night's moonshine: on the nearby rocks loom proud castles, palaces and ruins aloft. The Vltava swirls into the St. John's Rapids; then it widens and flows toward Prague, past the Vyšehrad, and then majestically vanishes into the distance, ending at the Labe (or Elbe, in German)."

This video starts at the section that describes the mermaids. Definitely more on the ethereal side of water life, like Saint-Saens.

Designer Princess

One of my favorite fashion bloggers is Alix, The Cherry Blossom Girl. If you go through her archives, she's put together several modern and designer clothes and accessories to create outfits modeled after certain fairy tale characters.

Sleeping Beauty

As a peasant:

As a Princess whose dress color is being fought over by fairies:

Mary Poppins

Alice in Wonderland

Dorothy

Donkeyskin

A dress the color of weather:

A dress the color of the moon:

A dress the color of the sun:

Follow the links for more information on the individual peices, or in some cases, more accessories and outfits.

The Princesses of the Blue Mountain and the Rule of Threes

Things tend to happen in threes in fairy tales, and the Norwegian tale "The Three Princesses of the Blue Mountain" is a perfect illustration.

A King and a Queen longed for children. A beggar woman told them they would have THREE daughters, but must not be out under the open air until they were all FIFTEEN years old. Prohibition=violation-they were let outside just before the youngest one's fifteenth birthday and were carried away by a snowdrift.

The King sets up a reward-half the kingdom and a princess of choice to anyone who could free the Princesses. Many tried and failed. Finally a Captain and a Lieutenant set on their way, followed by a Soldier who had dreamt the way to find the Princesses. His mother told him not to go yet-only if he dreamt the same dream THREE times would he know it was true. However, he did, and set off to find the Princesses.

He met up with the Captain and Lieutenant, making their company THREE. The Soldier had gotten meat from the King before his journey and used it THREE times-twice to distract hungry animals, and once to feed themselves.

While staying at a house, each hero was tricked by an old man who beat them with his crutches, except the Soldier, making it the THIRD time, who tricked the old man into telling him the rest of the way to the Blue Mountain. There were trials of fire and water-the Captain couldn't make it past the water, the Lieutenant couldn't make it past the fire, but the Soldier, the THIRD, made it past both and into pitch darkness-THREE trials. Once out of there, he found the first Princess, spinning copper yarn.

They concoct a plan to save her from the THREE headed monster. He takes a drink from a flask, weilds the Troll's sword, and cuts them off. On to the second Princess, spinning silver, and the same trick to cut off the SIX headed monster, but only after taking two sets of THREE draughts of drink. The THIRD Princess spins gold. THREE sets of THREE drinks enabled him to cut off the NINE headed monster, though each time it got more difficult.

Above illustrations by Kay Nielsen

The Soldier leads the Princesses back to the well he had come down, but the trecherous Captain and Lieutenant cut off the rope when they think they are hauling up the soldier. Left alone, the soldier searches and finds a whistle, which summons a flock of birds and a large eagle, who will transport him out once she has eaten TWELVE oxen.

Meanwhile the Princesses are dismayed at the thought of marrying the Captain and Lieutenant and say they will only marry when they can have a set of gold checkers just like the one in the mountains. The Soldier calls on the eagle to get it for him, and he and the Princesses reveal the truth. He marries the youngest-the THIRD-Princess.

So not only do these stories contain threes and multiples, but there's a sense of building up to the third as the climax. Many other well-known stories have this pattern too.

-Cinderella attends the ball THREE nights in a row (ignore the cheesy saying and just look at the pretty picture.)

-The two stepsisters plus Cinderella make THREE sisters

Illustration by Henry J. Ford, from Andrew Lang's Blue Fairy Book

-The maiden in Rumpelstiltskin has THREE nights on which she must spin gold.

-The Grimm's version even repeats that the bobbin goes "whirr, whirr, whirr! THREE times around"

-On the THIRD night, the baby is bargained-the climax

-The maiden has THREE nights to guess Rumpelstiltskin's true name

Illustration by Katherine Cameron

-There are TWELVE dancing Princesses, a multiple of three

-Each night they pass through THREE forests that get grander and grander-silver, gold, and diamonds

-They danced till THREE in the morning

-This happened THREE nights in a row-on the THIRD night the soldier takes a cup with him as well as the twigs

Willy Planck

The Goose Girl

-The Princess' mother gives her a handkercheif with THREE drops of blood on it

-The Princess goes out to tend the geese THREE times before she is revealed

Long ago, people thought that as they had children, each time the children improved-like each was the "newest model," so to speak-and that helps to explain all the emphasis on the youngest siblings in fairy tales. The patterns of threes may have made them, easier to remember, although it makes reading them tiresome. Some versions spell out all the details three times and some just say "And the same thing happened again." It's very similar to the phrase we still use, "Third time's the charm." Yet in modern retellings of tales, we want a faster pace so we cut out the repetitions. Anyone reading the Grimm Snow White for the first time is schocked at her stupidity, accepting gifts from the Queen three times in a row, when they are obviously meant to be deadly. But this isn't a commentary on Snow White so much as following the traditional story-telling pattern.

From Surlalune's annotations to Goose Girl: "The reasons and theories behind three's popularity are numerous and diverse. The number has been considered powerful across history in different cultures and religions, but not all of them. Christians have the Trinity, the Chinese have the Great Triad (man, heaven, earth), and the Buddhists have the Triple Jewel (Buddha, Dharma, Sanga). The Greeks had the Three Fates. Pythagoras considered three to be the perfect number because it represented everything: the beginning, middle, and end. Some cultures have different powerful numbers, often favoring seven, four and twelve."

Also:"The number and/or pattern of three often appears in fairy tales to provide rhythm and suspense. The pattern adds drama and suspense while making the story easy to remember and follow. The third event often signals a change and/or ending for the listener/reader. A third time also disallows coincidence such as two repetitive events would suggest."