being a princess

My four year old niece's birthday was a flurry of pink and tulle and several plastic silver crowns, and princess make up and fairy-ness. And my niece loved it. 

She knows about princesses and fairies. Contrary to the views and encouragement of her down-to-earth parents, she has embraced the pinkest of pink, barbies, princesses, dresses that twirl, and blonde stereotypical beauty. She can't help it. It is everywhere in the world.

And we might feel upset at our modern age and the way beauty is dictated to us, but it really is an age-old problem.

We have always been assailed by ideal beauty.

Back in 1210, Geoffrey of Vinsauf, when writing his Poetria Nova, had already tired of the stereotypical descriptions of beautiful women and offered his new amplified version, the head-to-toe appraisal:

"If you wish to describe womanly beauty:

Let Nature's compass draw the outline of the head; let the color of gold gleam in the hair; let lilies grow on the lofty forehead. Let the eyebrows equal black whortleberries in appearance; let a milky way intersect the twin eyebrows; let restraint rule the shape of the nose, lest it fall short of, or exceed, the proper bounds. Let the sentinels of the forehead gleam from both sides, twin little eyes with emerald lights, like a constellation. Let the face be like the dawn, neither rosy nor white, but of both and neither color at the same time. Let the diminutive mouth shine forth like a half circle; let the swelling lips be moderately full, and red, fired with a mild flame. Let order join together the snow-white, even teeth. Let the savory odor of the mouth be like frankincense; let Nature, more powerful than art, polish the chin smoother than marble. Let the milky supporting column of the head, of exquisite color, raise the mirror of the face on high; from the crystalline throat let there proceed a certain splendor which can strike the eyes of the beholder and steal the heart. By a certain law let the shoulders be similar, neither sloping nor rising but resting in a straight line. Let the upper arms, as long as they are slender, be enchanting. Let the fingers be soft and slim in substance, smooth and milk-white in appearance, long and straight in shape: in them let the beauty of the hand shine forth. Let the snowy bosom present both breasts like virginal gems set side by side. Let the waist be slim, a mere handful. I will not mention the parts beneath: here the imagination speaks better than the tongue. But let the leg show itself graceful; let the remarkably dainty foot wanton with its own daintiness."

Wow. It is hard not to let comparison be the thief of joy when reading this. And this was written 800 years ago.

600 years on and the Brothers Grimm came up with the tale of Snow White. A tale of vanity and desperation.

The Queen wants to be the most beautiful woman ever. The mirror has been a faithful friend and made her feel good about herself for quite some time. That is, until Snow White, the Queen's step-daughter, blossomed.

Now, Snow White was hot. And hotness goes a long way. When the Queen asked a huntsman to take Snow White out into the woods and kill her, of course he didn't. She was way too hot for that.

So she wandered around for a while, indulged in some breaking and entering, helped herself to food and drink and fell asleep in someone else's bed. When the owners, seven small men, came home and discovered her, all was forgiven. 

Because she was hot.

So she lived with them. They warned her not to open the door to anyone, given her recent brush with death. And off they went to work.

When there was a knock at the door, Snow White answered it, bought the random lace bodice that the old pedlar woman just happened to be selling way out in the middle of a forest, let the woman pull the bodice strings so hard, that she couldn't get air and fainted.

When the seven small men came home, they revived Snow White and reiterated how important it was not to open the door. And the next day they went off to work again.

Once again, there was a knock at the door and Snow White opened it, was enchanted by a comb that another random pedlar was selling her, stuck it in her head, was poisoned and fell to the ground again.

More reviving by the seven dwarfs who spoke very slowly to Snow White, adamantly telling her NOT TO OPEN THE DOOR.

And yet the following day, Snow White, hot, yet clearly stupid, once again opened the door, because she really wanted the apple the newly random pedlar lady was offering. This time, the seven small men did not get home in time. Snow White was dead.

Clearly, the best thing to do with a dead hot girl is to place her in a glass coffin on top of a mountain so everyone can see her hotness and mourn its loss.

Luckily it was glass because when a prince, who also happened to be hot, and just happened to be passing, saw her, he immediately reacted the way anyone would upon seeing a hot dead girl, he kissed her. Which brought her back to life. And they got married even though they had only just met, and lived happily ever after, which is never explained in these stories, completely ditching the seven small men who had looked after her until that point.

So what we learn from this and from other fairy tales, like Cinderella, The Little Mermaid and, in fact, modern chick flick fairy tales is that beauty is essential. Intelligence is not. Beauty wins hearts and wealth and ends in marriage. To a man. And that has to be what we all desire.

It's time we wrote another version. And defined and owned that version. We have centuries of brainwashing to overcome.

But we have to start. We need to encourage self-reliance and an independent shaping of identity and a renewed sense of what happily ever after might mean.