Feminism has been an issue dating back to approximately the 1600's and since, the image of a woman is fleeing the stereotype of a limitation and developing into something positive and empowering.  Women have evolved from being viewed as helpless objects, and developed into some of the top leaders of America.  With such drastic changes in roles throughout the past centuries, comparing works of literature from different time periods have drastic differences.  This is exemplified in an analysis of works such as "The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood" by Charles Perrault, written in 1697, and "There Once Was" by Margaret Atwood which was written in 1992. Although they both discuss fairytales, the way they are approached could not be more different.  Works of literature like "The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood" and other works written during that time period have paved the way for the emergence of feminism and feministic attitudes alike to ones mentioned in "There Once Was".

Although both stories focus on different sides of the same spectrum, and despite the fact that both pieces were written approximately 295 years apart, there are similarities between the two, particularly their central subject: the role of women in fairytales.  Although Atwood approaches the stereotype sarcastically, both works of literature recognize that women are depicted as objects and not people. The role of women includes looking pretty and caring for children until their offspring are old enough to do so.  In "The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood," after the princess is born, the youngest fairy starts off by giving her the gift that "she should be the most beautiful person in the world;" (296,297). This alone illustrates the stress and importance of beauty for a woman.  The young fairy's age suggests that young women at this time were taught that looks are the utmost important characteristic/feature to have. This stress on the importance of superficial traits is a uniform trend in endless fairytales written around the time of "The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood".  The Princess was not granted excellent smarts, or the ability to do math alarmingly fast, she was given grace, the ability to sing beautifully, dance beautifully, and play all kinds of music to perfection.  We see a consistent repetition of the words "beautiful" and "perfect" in not only this fairytale, but in virtually all others.  In the story "There Once Was", the authors work involves two speakers; a man that is trying to tell a story (the stereotypical fairytale) and the other speaker is a woman challenging everything the first speaker says.  These genders were not directly stated but can be assumed with the way Atwood writes the back-and-forth story.  Atwood uses phrases such as "you people" when talking about men directing it towards the first speaker, thus separating herself from the group she's criticizing. She then categorizes herself with women and critiques the first speaker while categorizing him with men.  Although poking fun at fairytales, the author recognizes the constant strain on looks for women as well.  "There once was a poor girl, as beautiful as she was good" before the first sentence is completed, beauty is mentioned, further stressing the importance of looks.  The female speaker then makes fun of the common stereotype later by saying: "-Stop right there. I think we can cut out the beautiful, don't you? Women these days have to deal wit too many intimidating physical role models as it is, what with those bimbos in the ads.  Can't you make her, well, more average?" (Atwood 305). Although both authors touch on the same topics, they approach them with opposing views.  "There Once Was" illustrates the attitude that many have regarding the assumed role of women during these sexist time periods.  With Atwood having a sarcastic approach, it gives a goofy feel to the argument which almost makes the reader forget the seriousness regarding feminism.  If Atwood critiqued the stereotypical fairytale in a serious manor, it might have provoked a different feeling from the reader and might not have been as positively affective.  Also, Atwood cannot go too far with her critiques of the typical fairytale without sounding boring and repetitive so her use of sarcasm when writing the story does well to relate to the reader and keep them interested with a funny, sarcastic approach rather than serious, lecturing approach.   In the original work by Perrault, there is not much to analyze in the way that he wrote being that it was written in the same model all fairytales were written in that time period. That being said, the fact that both works of literature discuss the same topic in such opposing ways, strengthens the analysis of both stories immensely when comparing and contrasting the two.

Another similarity between both works regards the role of women and now men in fairytales and fables.  The title of "The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood" foreshadows the role of the princess throughout more than half of the fairytale.  The Princess is almost unnecessary to the storyline in that she is sleeping for over 100 years, illustrating that she is of basically no significance.  Her only arguable accomplishment is having children; and that would probably not have been an accomplishment at all if the Princess did not have a son.  The names of the Princesses son and daughter illustrate perfectly the importance of gender and the idea that men were the superior sex.  The daughter's name is "Morning" and the son is named "Day" which could lead to the argument that despite morning coming first, daytime is more pleasurable.  The daytime is much longer, filled with more activity, etc.  It is also important that the author mentions Day to be "a great deal handsomer and more beautiful than his sister"(Perrault 300) because the author, again, not only stresses the importance of looks but the greater importance of the son. The sexist role of women is also shown in the moral Perrault appends to his retelling: "Many a girl has waited long, for a husband great and strong...". This summarizes most fairytales in that the Princesses' role is to sit there and wait for a man to come rescue her.  In "There Once Was" Atwood also recognizes gender roles as the central issue, but takes a different approach.  She focuses mainly on the fact that the evil people in these fairytales are almost always women by stating: "But I am so tired of negative female images! And stepmothers- they always get it in the neck! Change it to stepfather, why don't you?"  In "The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood" the oldest fairy would be considered the evil woman in the fable.  She is rude, mutters threats, and gives the Princess the curse that makes her fall into the deep sleep.  Also, the mother is an ogre which is considered not only to be gross but evil as well. This further illustrates the negative image of women always being the "bad guy" in fairytales.  It makes sense that this tactic is used in writing fairytales because it's a perfect gateway to illustrate how men are the superior sex and are able to defeat the evil woman with their strength, charm, smarts, etc, while the inferior female (the princess) kindly waits to be rescued.

Possibly the most important fact regarding both stories is the time periods they were written in.With both stories being so drastically different, it cannot be ignored that they were written in such extremely different time periods.  "The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood" was written in the year 1697, which was centuries before the feminist wave began while "There Once Was" was written in the year 1992.  Also, the author of "The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood" was a man (different writing approach) whose main focus in writing was simply "courtly love", mentioned in the background information of the author prior to the story.  This is the complete opposite of the author of the second piece, "There Once Was".  Author Margaret Atwood, a woman, not only wrote the piece centuries later, but she specializes in feminist retellings of traditional fairytales.  Atwood also wrote about hard-hitting subjects such as corporate dictatorship, sex slavery, genetic engineering, catastrophic effects of science, and many more topics that are mentioned in the backstory of the author, prior to the piece.  This illustrates how both authors could not be more different from one another in their time periods, which reflects on how they discuss their topics as well as their specific styling approach when writing.  It also cannot be ignored that the gender of the author influences their writings as well. The piece regarding the more male dominated world is written by a man and the piece stating women are much more than objects, is written by a woman.  Another major difference in both stories is the tone.  The tone in "Sleeping Beauty in the Wood" although fictional, is told in a serious manor, while the tone in "There Once Was" is very sarcastic. Although the second work of literature is sarcastic, the snide tone works perfectly with the feeling the piece is trying to evoke.  This is an important parallel to present-day feminism because there is a great deal of sarcasm tied to the issue.  Atwood sets up a conversation between a man and a woman where the man is trying to tell the sexist fairytale and the woman is criticizing it from an arguable feminist point of view.  She seems to purposely go overboard when she states to the man that everything is about him (in a sarcastic tone) which goes along with the generalization that she believes all men think everything is about them.  She even goes as far as stating: "Change it to the stepfather,why don't you? That would make more sense anyway, considering the bad behavior you're about to describe. And throw in some whips and chains. We all know what those twisted, repressed, middle-aged men are like." Despite the fact that these utterances are short and snide, they are of extreme importance in the strength of the work because it touches on an important assumption of feminism called man-hating.  Those opposed to feminism or those uneducated in the topic believe that feminism is simply the hatred of man (man-hating). Those opposed to feminism then try to lessen their argument by saying they're just being equally as discriminatory.  With that being said, it is true that some people take feminism too far and turn it into an instance of man-hating and Atwood seems to recognize that in her piece.  With the way Atwood pokes fun at the stereotype, it seems that she is being more credible, recognizing that in some instances feminism does go to far and develop into man-hating.  She does this by throwing in sarcastic comments here and their that generalize men as bad people.  For example, she says " And throw in some whips and chains.  We all know what those twisted, repressed, middle-aged men are like.." she makes the generalization that all middle-aged men are twisted and repressed. If she were just to discuss the sexist stereotypes for women and ignore sexist stereotypes for men, the piece wouldn't be as credible because it would be one-sided and seemingly directed only toward women.

In "The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood" and "There Once Was," there are many examples of feminist roles in early centuries, whether they are being criticized, or simply stated.  "The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood" acts as a baseline for most fairytales written in this time period because they are all so similar; they provoke the same responses and illustrate the same sexist manors.  Although on different sides of the gender role spectrum, both works of literature have repetitive similarities and differences throughout.  If there is one thing to be learned by the comparison of "The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood" and "There Once Was", it is that the issues of sexism, specifically in literature, dates back centuries, with works of Perrault and endless other authors alike. Fairytales like "The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood" have paved the way for the emergence of feminist movements and attitudes similar to the ones depicted in "There Once Was" which is why the comparison, the contrast, and the analysis of both literary works was so beneficial.
