Alexis Muttillo

Professor Smith

English 101

28 November 2016

Essay 4

To start off her story, “There Was Once,” Margaret Atwood used one the most common introductions within the genre of the fairy tale by stating “there was once a poor girl, as beautiful as she was good, who lived with her wicked stepmother in a house in the forest” (511). Although the start of this story is typical and mainstream, Atwood brings it to the reader’s attention with the very next sentence that this is not your average fairy tale story, but instead two speakers discussing how average fairy tale stories tend to be politically incorrect. When comparing this side by side with Charles Perrault’s “Sleeping Beauty in the Wood,” it becomes clear that although there is a partial story formed within Atwood’s piece, most of her work takes shots at Perrault’s writing.

After Atwood’s opening statement about the poor girl living with her evil stepmother in the woods, the second speaker within her story speaks up about how every fairy tale talks about characters living in the woods, and how the story should create a more modern feel with a different setting. This text fires at “Sleeping Beauty in the Wood” because although the princess is living in a castle, the castle is located within the woods surrounding it which generalizes the setting into the basic fairy tale. After the second speaker makes the first aware of this generalization he quickly changes the setting to a house within the suburbs, yet again the speaker refutes his story because how can a poor girl own a house. Although the topic of being poor does not relate to the princess within Perrault’s story because it is obvious she has money based on her standard of living, many other fairy tales contain a character who is poor and ends up falling in love with a prince such as Cinderella and Belle. Following this next disagreement, the speaker telling the story changes it yet again to a more correct socioeconomic standing which he refers to as middle-class. However, even with this change, the second speaker still finds a fault in the story. The use of the word beautiful is now creating an issue because he believes it creates an image in which you have to be beautiful based on the standards set within today’s times. Therefore, the storyteller yet again makes a change to his story by making the main character a heavier set girl with messed up teeth, but this description only disturbs the second speaker more. The description of beauty relates to the princess within “Sleeping Beauty in the Wood” because when she is born she is given multiple gifts in which one of them is beauty, and the importance of the gift was deeply expressed by her parents making it an important role within the story. However, after the whole discussion about beauty and describing what the girl looks likes, yet another flaw comes up in the story, and this time it is pertaining to the word wicked. The second speaker this time describes how the use of two opposing forces, typically good and wicked, are always used in fairy tales. This correlates directly to Perrault’s story because at the very beginning of the story, the king invited seven fairy godmothers who are to come and grace the princess with magical gifts, but not only do the seven good fairies show up, a wicked fairy godmother shows up as well, and along with the wicked fairy godmother comes a curse which could kill the princess. Therefore, even if the battle between good and wicked is overused, it is what typically creates the whole story. Eventually the first speaker makes another edit to his story, but his fellow companion still believes there is an issue, and this time it is pertaining to the use of woman being put into negative roles. The use of a stepmother being evil is used throughout multiple fairy tales including Snow White and Cinderella, but not only is the use of a wicked step mother a negative role for a woman. There is the role of a damsel in distress which is used within “Sleeping Beauty in the Wood” because once the princess pricks her finger on the spindle, she falls into a hundred-year sleep which calls for a prince to help save her. Even though the role of a damsel in distress does not seem like a super negative role, it still makes the female character look as if they are unable to save themselves from whatever evil they are placed under. After this comment, the storyteller goes on the make the correction, but this time gets stopped even shorter than the times before. The second speaker disagrees with the use of the word girl because if the story is to end in marriage, how can the character be a girl and not a woman. However, in “Sleeping Beauty in the Wood,” Perrault makes it known that the princess in the story is only between the ages of 15 or 16 when her prince comes to save her from her curse, and upon being saved, they immediately wed. 

Although “There Was Once” doesn’t seem like the average fairy tale because a full story is never actually told within the writing its self, it is still considered a fairy tale by many. This is possibly because of the satire used throughout the writing to make fun at the typical versions of the stories within the genre. However, according to Roger Sale within his writing, “Fairy Tales,” the genre of a fairy tale is widely overused because “only a few stories we call by that name contain fairies or elves or leprechauns or similar creatures” (372). Therefore, should “There Was Once” be classified under this genre at all because there are no magical creatures or anything similar to them throughout Atwood’s whole piece. Furthermore, is it possible that fairy tales could be classified under different assumptions? Throughout a multitude of stories there seems to be a pattern pertaining to the use of archetypes with the genre. According to William G. Brozo and Ronald V. Schmelzer in “Wildmen, Warriors, and Lovers: Reaching Boys through Archetypal Literature,” examples of archetypes include “pilgrim, patriarch, warrior, magician, king, wildman, healer, prophet, trickster, and lover” (6). Though none of those exact archetypes are used within Atwood’s piece, the appearance of the villain arose with the use of the wicked stepmother. Within “Sleeping Beauty in the Wood,” multiple archetypes come out including the damsel in distress, the villain, the hero, the king, and the magician. Of course, the damsel in distress is the princess who falls under a curse and is sentenced to a hundred-years sleep, and since there is a damsel in distress there must be a hero who just so happens to be a charming prince to save the princess. Yet, none of this would have occurred if it wasn’t for the wicked fairy, whom plays the villain role within the story, giving the princess a curse which was diminished down thanks to the help of the magician which in this case is played by seven fairy godmothers.

All in all, although Atwood’s piece does not contain every element which a fairy tale needs to be a fairy tale, it is overall discussing the many factors of a fairy tale which get repeated way too many times for any reader. The significance of the piece may be to make other authors aware of this common tradition within the genre, and create a new path for the use of different characters and settings. Overall, all the comments the second speaker had throughout Atwood’s writing correlated directly with Perrault’s piece which could be direct evidence to the overuse of the common characters and plots within the genre.

Works Cited

Brozo, William G., and Ronald V. Schmelzer. “Wildmen, Warriors, and Lovers: Reaching Boys through Archetypal Literature.” Journal of Adolescent &Amp; Adult Literacy, vol. 41, no. 1, 1997, pp. 4-11. www.jstor.org/stable/40026293.

Sale, Roger. “Fairy Tales.” The Hudson Review, vol. 30, no. 3, 1977, pp. 372–394. www.jstor.org/stable/3850269.