It is time now for the Frog Princess. I found out yesterday about the fairy tale classification system. This is type 402 - animal bride - in the ATU Index.
"The Aarne–Thompson–Uther Index (ATU Index) is a catalogue of folktale types used in folklore studies. The ATU Index is the product of a series of revisions and expansions by an international group of scholars: Originally composed in German by Finnish folklorist Antti Aarne (1910); the index was translated into English, revised, and expanded by American folklorist Stith Thompson (1928, 1961); and later further revised and expanded by German folklorist Hans-Jörg Uther (2004). The ATU Index, along with Thompson's Motif-Index of Folk-Literature (1932) (with which it is used in tandem) is an essential tool for folklorists." ~Wikipedia
"The king (or an old peasant woman, in Lang's version) wants his three sons to marry. To accomplish this, he creates a test to help them find brides. The king tells each prince to shoot an arrow. According to the King's rules, each prince will find his bride where the arrow lands. The youngest son's arrow is picked up by a frog. The king assigns his three prospective daughters-in-law various tasks, such as spinning cloth and baking bread. In every task, the frog far outperforms the two other lazy brides-to-be. In some versions, the frog uses magic to accomplish the tasks, and though the other brides attempt to emulate the frog, they cannot perform the magic. Still, the young prince is ashamed of his frog bride until she is magically transformed into a human princess."
Can you imagine being considered the heroine because of the ability to perform household tasks for a King. What does he need a daughter-in-law servant for? There's the core of fairy tale lessons: innocence, beauty and virtue are valued as the attribute a woman should possess (and passivity is good too). Ambition is evil and possessed by witches and stepmothers.
I read this article by Dr. Silima Nanda "The Portrayal of Women in the Fary Tales" and had to admit it was discouraging to find out about social and cultural values through the centuries. Rather than dwell on the past, the index of tales is fascinating - I found the index HERE.It starts with animal tales and progresses through to people tales.
For example, ATU 425 - Beauty and the beast ATU 440 - The Frog King ATU 510A - Cinderella
Our pictures for today are our Spring stories - what's blooming in the garden yesterday.
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