Part of her world
If you want to get Edith to do something these days, your best bet is to think like a princess.
Clothes need putting on?
"Cinderella, let me help you with your ballgown."
Only ten minutes to walk to school? (I know, it's just one block. But Edith is a highly distractible, intractable walker.) Unless...
"Let's swim to the sunken pirate ship, Little Mermaid!"
Want to maintain her interest in the kite Daddy is trying to get launched?
"Hey, do you think it might bump into any magic carpets up there?"
***
Actually, to get her to the front door to head to school in the first place, all one needs to say is "Time to go see Sarah!"
Then Edith will beam, shout "Time to see Sarah!" and run for the door. And then she'll tell you, on the way down the stairs, "If Sarah is the Little Mermaid, then I have to be Snow White. But if Sarah is Snow White, I have to be the Little Mermaid."
She's right about the need to share the daycare costumes, of course, but I'm not sure why there's any doubt about the roles. Virtually every morning for the past six weeks or so, we've arrived at daycare to find Sarah dressed as Snow White, jealously saving the Little Mermaid costume from all the little boys in the class for Edith.
Sarah is something of a goddess in Edith's eyes since her vacation to Disney World. It wasn't the trip so much as the fact that the Princesses sent Sarah a postcard after her return home. Edith is convinced that Sarah and the Princesses are tight. And so we've heard our first wistful, "I wish I could go to Disney World..."
It's a little alarming sometimes to see the gendered play taking such strong hold. Yesterday morning on arrival Edith ran over to inspect Sarah's Princess sweatshirt and name all the characters on it. Meanwhile Sarah fingered Edith's string of Mardi Gras beads. It was as if they were admiring each other's prom gowns.
On the other hand, Edith reported that today at lunch she had been feeling whiny (Ms. Bela confirmed) but that "My friend Sarah cheered me up by showing me her Princess lunchbox. That was very nice of her." Who can argue with that?
***
The other night I finally asked Edith, as she inspected the details of the dress and hairstyle of each of the Princesses on her metallic Princess storybook box for the nteenth time, just what was so appealing about the Princesses.
"They have happy endings," she said immediately, and flipped to the back of the story of Snow White with a smile.
An insight into the mania?
***
Dress-up notwithstanding, the stories themselves are Edith's favorite part, so we've tried to improve the literary quality of the versions we're telling by getting some other renditions out of the public library to counteract the Disney. Edith has been happy to have us incorporate some minor details from these versions into the tale as we tell it, but she won't let us totally cut the Official Disney saccharine. So sure, Cinderella's stepsisters can chop off their toes and heels to try to get the glass slipper to fit, but meanwhile there better be two mice named Jaq and Gus sneaking a key out of the stepmother's pocket and up the stairs.
Still, even Edith is beginning to deconstruct the narrative structure of these fairy tales after 25 hearings per day. I'm impressed by her counterfactuals:
Inspecting a picture of Sleeping Beauty about to prick her finger, as the evil fairy stands with arm outstretched, the signature long skinny fingers of an evil Disney female much in evidence:
"Mommy, what if Sleeping Beauty tricked Maleficent and she pricked her finger on the spinning wheel instead? What would happen?"
And looking at Cinderella weeping in the garden after the stepsisters have torn her gown,
"What if Cinderella just went to the ball in rags? What would happen?"
Guess Edith's not totally hooked on the ballgown part after all. If daycare had a Cinderella rags costume, that would probably be cool, too.
It did give us a chuckle at the beach last week when Edith walked around holding shells over her belly button and announcing she was Ariel. For someone as expert on nipples as she is, it's funny she hasn't quite figured that one out.
Still, even Edith is beginning to deconstruct the narrative structure of these fairy tales after 25 hearings per day. I'm impressed by her counterfactuals:
Inspecting a picture of Sleeping Beauty about to prick her finger, as the evil fairy stands with arm outstretched, the signature long skinny fingers of an evil Disney female much in evidence:
"Mommy, what if Sleeping Beauty tricked Maleficent and she pricked her finger on the spinning wheel instead? What would happen?"
And looking at Cinderella weeping in the garden after the stepsisters have torn her gown,
"What if Cinderella just went to the ball in rags? What would happen?"
Guess Edith's not totally hooked on the ballgown part after all. If daycare had a Cinderella rags costume, that would probably be cool, too.
***
It did give us a chuckle at the beach last week when Edith walked around holding shells over her belly button and announcing she was Ariel. For someone as expert on nipples as she is, it's funny she hasn't quite figured that one out.
***
A final lament about the hideous writing in Disney storybook versions of their own movies. The dwarfs "sadly grieved"? "Happily, they rejoiced"? The girl awoke, then the dwarfs were startled, then they loved the beautiful girl, soon they hid behind the bed, soon she stirred, then she saw them? And don't get me started on the dangling modifiers--they're everywhere!
Some of these movies I haven't seen in many years and can't quite reconstruct--and the storybooks fail to help. The tale of Sleeping Beauty, for example, spends half a page on the animals in the woods stealing Prince Philip's clothes and dressing up in them for fun, but it fails to mention (1) just what Maleficent's curse on Princess Aurora is, (2) why the good fairies decide to raise the princess in a cottage in the woods and why they have to give up their magic powers, (3) why she's returning to the castle on her 16th birthday, (4) why she has two different names. And then the pricked finger, deep sleep, curse on the land, conquest of Maleficent, triumph of the prince, kiss of the princess, and happily ever after resolve in two (count them, two) sentences.
But even worse is the promotion of all these female characters as the crux of the stories, divorced from context. Snow White, Cinderella, and Sleeping Beauty as the central figures, sure...but think for a minute about the story of Aladdin told from the perspective of a princess in the royal palace waiting for the right suitor to show up. Lamp? Genie? Nowhere to be found.
Some of these movies I haven't seen in many years and can't quite reconstruct--and the storybooks fail to help. The tale of Sleeping Beauty, for example, spends half a page on the animals in the woods stealing Prince Philip's clothes and dressing up in them for fun, but it fails to mention (1) just what Maleficent's curse on Princess Aurora is, (2) why the good fairies decide to raise the princess in a cottage in the woods and why they have to give up their magic powers, (3) why she's returning to the castle on her 16th birthday, (4) why she has two different names. And then the pricked finger, deep sleep, curse on the land, conquest of Maleficent, triumph of the prince, kiss of the princess, and happily ever after resolve in two (count them, two) sentences.
But even worse is the promotion of all these female characters as the crux of the stories, divorced from context. Snow White, Cinderella, and Sleeping Beauty as the central figures, sure...but think for a minute about the story of Aladdin told from the perspective of a princess in the royal palace waiting for the right suitor to show up. Lamp? Genie? Nowhere to be found.
5 comments:
I'm hoping we can avoid most of this world. JSC does know about some of the princess stuff but it's not a big part of her life. We'll see.
Other note: Not to be a defender of Disney's crappy writing or anything - but "sadly, they grieved" might seem repetitive to you (the reason I assume you held it up as bad writing) but if you don't know the verb "to grieve" then the sadly gives you context and helps you figure it out. The same could be said for happily rejoicing.
Good to see you posting again!
I'll indeed be interested to see if Julia escapes it. We feel like we did nothing to encourage it...and neither does Sarah's mom, who is embarrassed by the whole thing. (Since she's a fellow JE'er, I've thought about teasing her by sending in mention of the second-generation Princess pals to the alumni magazine.) That said, inasmuch as it's about stories and pretend play rather than wanting to wear purple frills and lipstick or have handsome princes kiss her (she's really not that interested in the princes at all), it's not as bad as I'd thought it would be.
Must respectfully disagree on "sadly grieving" and happily rejoicing," though, as little kids are such sponges for new words that I think it's better to expose them to good writing and let them figure it out than to pander in ways that make the adult reader cringe.
To weigh in on a different point, I definitely think Edith's on to something with her "happy endings" theory of the Princesses' appeal...
I also agree that Jasmine, from "Aladdin," is the "one of these things is not like the others" member of the group. Not sure why she's been included at all -- it's not like "Aladdin" is a classic in the way the other films are. Think it's 'cause Disney felt they needed an ethnic Princess?
Have you ever thought about switching over to women's lit? ;) Living in Southern California, I wondered if they BRED princesses out here... and my other thought - can we ever avoid Disney these days? When we worked in NYC, the company was affectionately called "the rat" and that's how we've always felt. I'm a bit nervous for the "princess phase" if/when we have a daughter. Sounds like you're doing the best you can. Good luck. I am glad Edith certainly preferred Maria vonTrapp and her "princess" lifestyle to these ladies, at least for awhile. ;)
LOVE her imagination!
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