The Fairy Godmother is in Love with the Princess: Lesbian Desire in the Rewritten Fairy Tales of Emma Donoghue
Journal Title: Ankara Üniversitesi Dil ve Tarih-Coğrafya Fakültesi Dergisi - Year 2017, Vol 57, Issue 1
Abstract
Fairy tales once belonged to oral literature and later became part of the literary tradition, and the formal and thematic qualities have gone through various changes in time. By means of the changes it has gone through, the genre, which bears a great impact on cultural transmission, has always developed to adapt to its time. Especially, the classical European fairy tale is one of the major genres which reflects the cultural, social and gender characteristics of the nations. Because of the prevalent patriarchal discourse, female characters, although they are generally the protagonists, female characters are represented as secondary to the male characters and they are exposed to the sexist attitude of both male writers and fairy tale heroes. Having seen the discriminatory aspects of the fairy tale genre, twentieth century women writers took interest in the traditional tales in order to subvert the sexist ideology. Giving specific importance to the issues of lesbian desire, liberation and voice of women, Emma Donoghue, a twentieth-century Irish woman writer, in her Kissing the Witch: Old Tales in New Skins (1997) rewrites various classical fairy tales. Specifically in “The Tale of the Hair” and “The Tale of the Shoe” as the rewritten versions of “Rapunzel” and “Cinderella,” respectively she attempts to subvert the patriarchal ideology and to promote the female agency through parody in various aspects. By altering the entrenched elements of the fairy tales genre, she not only reads but also writes against the grain and by postmodern parody she sheds light upon the unquestioned issues with the aim of unearthing and restoring the hidden discriminative and sexist attitude. In doing this, Donoghue reimagines an alternative 'happily ever after' which offers a peaceful and egalitarian final state for the female characters.
Authors and Affiliations
Cemre Mimoza BARTU
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