Thursday, November 19, 2009

Slay Your Own Dragon

A friend shared this with me today and I like it so I'm passing it on to you.

#212 Remember that most fairytales were written by men.

"Some of the greatest writers of children’s fables were male: The Brother’s Grimm, Hans Christian Anderson, even Walt Disney. You are not a tiny princess awaiting rescue by a valiant man, a symbol of frailty and naïveté, or the punch line in a morality tale. The women in those stories were crafted by a different sex at a different time for a different audience; these days you slay the dragon yourself."

3 comments:

Torie said...

I love your title. I think I'll make it my motto.

It's true, girls! We're fully capable!

grburbank said...

Alert: there's a male lurker on your blog. But we guys like to feel lovely too. This reminds me of an episode of Dollhouse where Echo is reading "Sleeping Beauty." She encourages a girl to identify with the prince instead of the princess. When she says, but he's a guy, Echo responds, "Yeah, but that's not his fault."

Also, Angela Carter's book The Bloody Chamber re-examines fairy tales from the female pov. It's pretty much awesome.

Meg said...

Hehe. Oh Greg. You can always lurk. And comment. Especially when you reference Dollhouse.

I love this quote A LOT. It reminds me a lot of Robin McKinley's books - The Hero and the Crown and such. I love the revamping of so many current stories where we're shifting from only damsels in distress. Although it does also remind me of the time when I observed that although we always think guys have Heathcliff in them, we forget that he was invented by a woman. :)