The "Kid's Concert" was a compilation of classical fairy tale music with story telling and dancing all in one show. The stories were the classics of Hansel and Gretel, Puss and Boots, and Tom Thumb. There were a few archaic fables I had not heard of, but there was also The Princess Collection: Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, and Beauty and the Beast.
The music that accompanied the princess stories was absolutely beautiful. Yet it wasn't the music that caught my attention.
As each new princess story began, thousands of little girls in the audience stirred in their seats, smiled at their moms, and gasped in excitement of the soon to be told tale. Each was summed up in about three sentences to keep the concert flowing. The last sentence of each story held all the power.
Cinderella: "Prince Charming rescued Cinderella from her cruel fate. They danced and they lived happily ever after" (cue awesomely romantic waltz music)
Sleeping Beauty: "And the Prince found Aurora, and kissed her!" (cue Tchaikovsky)
Beauty and the Beast: "Beauty was so beautiful and kind, and the beast so cruel and sad. Yet in the end they both learned to love one another" (cue incredibly low oboe that indicates 'the beast')
As I watched the little girls in the audience, their soft faces listening candidly to the story tellers, I could all but see the visions of prince charmings and romance swell up in their minds as the music took flight.
On the other hand, it took everything in me to NOT stand up and scream "BULL SHIT!" after every possible Princess story! Sure let's just fall asleep for 100 years and just WAIT for our Prince to come and 'kiss' us all better! Girls buy into this Princess bull crap and are constantly let down by the men as they get older and older because no man will EVER be prince Charming.
Mia desperately clings to the princess stories, and loves playing 'prince and princess'. She claims she can't go to the ball without a prince, and that if he's not there it won't be any fun. I try my hardest to convince her that she can have fun without the prince, and I am completely abhorred with the whole concept.
Here's the thing about it; boys hear these stories too! Why are girls the only one's who seem to remember when and what EXACTLY the prince is supposed to do and say? Men watch as many chick flicks and know exactly what makes a woman swoon, so why do they refuse to do more than one romantic gesture a year?
Yet something deep inside of me can't, and won't entirely crush the fairy tale dreams of little girls, particularly Mia. Part of me will always still believe that my Prince Charming will come along (even if he isn't wearing hot white tights and singing "do I love you because you're beautiful, or are you beautiful because I love you", although that would rock!).
I also think that to be as bitter and tainted as I am about love at the moment, and still be able to have a nostalgic belief bearing thought about the unrealistic at best lessons that we get from fair tales, then we can all continue to believe that one day our prince will come. And then we can spend the rest of our lives with them wishing and praying they will actually act like the prince, just once!
What is important to realize is that these little girls are not necessarily worshipping the 'prince' in the stories. They are worshipping the actual woman, (her clothes, her tiara, her shoes) which is so much better than just worshipping the man (wink and chuckle at my sarcasm). But in all seriousness, if we can teach our girls that these princesses did wonderful things, and perhaps use fairy tales where the princess saves herself (Mulan, the Little Mermaid, etc) we can focus on not only her great outfits, but also her great attributes. We can start conversations about getting what you want before focusing on marriage...(don't ask me what we're going to do with the stories of Sleeping Beauty...talk about how adequate sleep was a big thing for her?)
6 comments:
Joey Adams: That writer needs to take a breath .. and look at it this way. These stories are about the ladies doing stuff . David was saved my The Little Mermaid, Charming is so unimportant he does not even have a name . Now what should be looked at is the other bad messages . Like the little Mermaid should have not became a person, no one man or woman should change just for a date . If David dig her he should have wanted to date her even if she was a fish . What do you think?
ME: I love that! I'm not sure who David is though? I'm pretty sure the prince in Little Mermaid was Eric. Anyhow, you are very right. That is kind of what I was getting at, the fact that the prince is not really a part of their lives. And I agree she shouldn't have changed who she was to be with him. What a horrible message! However, she did save him first and want to be a human long before she met her prince. Hello "walkin around on those, what do you call them feet! Up where they walk up where they run up where they lay all day in the sun. Someday I'll be part of their world"...so as you can see from my awesome Disney movie lyric memory, it was part of her plan all along. And had nothing to do with the man. love ya joey!
Dearie the most important thing when looking at fairy tales is to return to the original... they are not so nice on the female and tend to be more like the Classic myths. Men get what they want when they want it. Sadly the only powerful women in real fairy tales are the wicked witches and evil queens which are then tainted by jealousy over the beautiful princess or "heroine"... Disney just changed things around to make it more appealing to children.
Yes, and pity the poor princes,too. What pressure to always have to be the one to do the saving and make someone's dreams come true. Happily ever after sets the bar quite high for both princesses and princes...
happily ever after is great for kids stories, it's just difficult to prevent the ideology from transcending the decades of our lives. i think what men and women have to do is make up their own rules for their own fairy tale, rather than stick to the prescribed plot elements right?
Well put!
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