Gender Roles In Fairytales

Fairytales: Fantastical failures

For the past several years, I have been a babysitter for a little girl by the name of Magnolia. She and I have developed a clockwork schedule of our time spent together. Four o'clock we play princesses, five o'clock we eat, six o'clock we play princesses again, and by eight o'clock I am reading a story to her while she drifts away dreaming of faraway kingdoms. My favorite part is always story time; when her little hands eagerly shove her now tattered copy of Cinderella into my own. I always suggest another story, perhaps the Velveteen Rabbit, or Rainbow Fish, but to her her bedtime story is not complete without a princess, a brave knight, and a happy ending. These once upon a time’s are all that dominate
Women are portrayed as, “weak, submissive, dependent, and self-sacrificing, while men are powerful, active, and dominant” (Parsons). The heroine is not characterized by her bravery or her intelligence but rather naivete and beauty. Though often in obvious distress, either poisoned by the evil queen, or horrendously ridiculed by her stepmother, the heroine never does anything to appease her situation, rather remaining docile, “ ‘waiting for Prince Charming to to save the day’ ” (Patel). This notion of waiting for Prince Charming teaches children, in particular girls that they themselves have little to no power in righting their own situation and instead should be reliant on a male figure. Would girls like Magnolia stick up for themselves, or would she follow in her literary idol footsteps and remain in a dangerous situation until a male figure or a figure of authority intervened? Would an adult (whom are just as equally influenced by the rhetoric of fairytales) remain in a abusive relationship, because she believes Prince Charming will come and save
However, all who are deemed these qualities are the villainesses of the stories. When the beautiful damsel is placed in distress, it is always the ugly villainess who places her there. Thus, as stated by Grauerholz there becomes an “ association between beauty and goodness and then conversely between ugliness and evil..” (qtd. in Hanafy). When a villainess acts out against the heroine, as seen in the characters of Maleficent in Sleeping Beauty, and the Evil Queen in Snow White, they do not act from any intelligible source of anger but rather from jealousy (mostly stemming from beauty) and pure malice, therefore furthering the reader and/or listeners disdain of powerful women, and instead reinstating one’s compassion, and reliability for the distressed heroine. Furthering dissuading people from connecting with the powerful women of the fairytales are that they always are punished in the end. No fairy tale ends with the villainess winning, she always gets her compuence. However, not all female characters fit between the dichotomies of malicious and good. There are a select few characters, particularly the fairy godmothers and the dwarves of Snow White, whom are portrayed as not only genial, powerful, and wise, but also help guide the heroine on her journey to find her Prince. Without the Fairy