These Arms Don't Fit

The Girl With No Hands - AT Type 706

As promised, I will be discussing my favorite fairy tale today. I don't know why it's my favorite, but I have so far made something like 3 paintings directly based on it and quite a few more roughly inspired by it. I will probably wish to revisit it frequently in the future, as it contains many themes that intrigue and, quite frankly, disturb me.

What I've been thinking about this time, though, is the nature of those silver hands. They were always the most puzzling element of the story, for me. What purpose did they really serve? The girl really never explicitly uses them for anything, and she hasn't gotten her happy ending until she has natural hands again. So what is the deal with the silver ones? Here is my theory, by way of an Absurd Art Anecdote.

One of my latest artistic endeavors is to knit up some clothing for a young girl mannequin in my studio. Perhaps some other time I will tell you the story of how she ended up there. In any case, after a few name changes, she is now known as Audrey (I considered naming her Galatea, but it seemed a bit too on-the-nose), and despite a fresh new coat of pink paint she is otherwise nude. Since I've taken up knitting and using yarn and knitting needles in my sculpture, I thought it would be appropriate to make some clothing and accessories for her. With this in mind, I paid a visit to the local yarn shop, hoping to find a pattern for a nice summer dress for her. Finding knitting patterns for girls around her apparent age (I would guess around nine) is not easy, as mostly people seem to knit for adults and young children only. They even have a name for her demographic: "middle-aged children."

In any case, I asked a lady at the store to help me find a pattern for a sleeveless summery dress for Audrey, of course pretending that she was my niece, because obviously yarn-store attendants wouldn't understand the kind of high-concept art I make. In any case, the lady told me that a girl her age would never wear a knitted dress, and that I should make her a sweater or something. The nerve! To suggest that I wouldn't know what my niece likes, or that she wouldn't absolutely love any gift I put so much effort into. I tried not to let my frustration show, especially since I was already lying through my teeth and very much wanted to leave as quickly as possible. But to be honest, it was really bothering me, and the reason was this: Audrey, being inanimate, would of course like anything I made for her. But what ifI were making something for my real relatives, as I very much intend to do soon? What if they don't like it? Is it presumptuous of me to assume that my young cousins would like clothing I made for them? More importantly, why do stupid questions like this keep bothering me?

Anyway, what I'm trying to say in a roundabout way is that I think the Girl Without Hands couldn't be satisfied with her silver hands because they weren't hers. This is a surprisingly girl-empowering message for a fairy tale, especially one with an implied incest threat and mutilation as retribution for disobeying male authority. As well-intentioned as the king may have been in making her silver hands, she couldn't "win" the story as it were until she got her own natural hands back, through her own strength. Now, given that her strength is piety and constant prayer, maybe we shouldn't be too praising of those old-time Germans' feminism, but it could be worse. The story could end when the king finds her and makes her new hands and marries her, but it doesn't end until she proves herself worthy, through her own actions, of new, natural hands that belong only to her. Now, silver hands are of course a different matter entirely from knitted clothing, but I guess it couldn't hurt to figure out what kinds of clothes my cousins like to wear before I start making things for them...

Nothing Endures But Change

One-Eye, Two-Eyes, and Three-Eyes - AT Type 511

This story is... a bit of an odd one. It's another tree story, because I enjoy running with a theme, and I'm learning a lot. In fact, it's not just another tree story (Green Willow was a tree story too, but I don't think it's anything like these). It's another "tree providing for a little girl when other people are cruel to her" story, which for some reason or another seems to really appeal to me. I think I'll conclude my current visitations on the subject with my favorite fairy tale ever tomorrow. For now, though, I'm writing about this one, because it helped me solve a particular problem I've been thinking about for some time.

I spend a lot of my time thinking about seemingly irreconcilable dichotomies of action or thought. One that has always provided me with a great deal of challenge has been the clash between stability and change. I'm a very mutable person. I'm prone to mood swings, have a very short attention span, and love novelty. I also crave stability. I like having a routine in my life, and forming long-lasting friendships, and repeating things often enough to get very good at them. How can I live with these two forces constantly at war with one another? I want to stick with things for a very long time, but I get bored or distracted or simply overwhelmed with everything else I could be doing.

I am happy to say that I've discovered a new solution today: find things that are a constant part of my life that are themselves constantly changing! How I discovered this was simple. Today I brought the girl I am babysitting to my studio (at her mother's request - she likes art), and we had some time to kill. I asked her if she wanted to try some painting or drawing, or visit other artists at work, but she seemed very interested in the way I decorate my studio. Right now there is thread and yarn stretched all across the ceiling and walls, and lots of things like tree branches and strings of beads and dried flowers hanging from it. She made the suggestion of separating one part of my studio from the other by hanging a bunch of bead strings together to make a curtain. It was a great idea, and we spent the rest of our time working on the project. It occurred to me that the space of my studio, and the sort of general space of "where I am" is kind of like this ever-changing but ever-constant reminder of who I am and the people I care about. The contents, layout, or even location of the space may be constantly changing, but it always reflects the people that matter to me, and keeps me grounded in a very stable reality.

The reason this reminded me of today's story was because of the presence of the old woman. She's a constant source of nourishment for the girl (sort of taking the place of the real mother in the "evil stepmother" stories like Juniper Tree and Magic Orange Tree), but that source of nourishment changes and moves with the girl. First she is given a goat, with magic that works just for her. When the goat dies (as all goats must, especially, it seems, when they're standing in for motherly love), its entrails are used to create a brand new magical tree that only provides food for Two-Eyes. And what's more, when Two-Eyes moves away, the tree moves with her! This brings me right back to the topic of my last entry, the constancy of love. And the funny thing is, even though they're full of fairy-magic happy endings, they're actually pretty relevant to real life if you know how to interpret them.

The Juniper Tree

The Juniper Tree - AT Type 720 (Mother Killed Me, Father Ate Me)

The Juniper Tree is another one of my favorite fairy tales, decidedly morbid though it may be. I read it today because of the similarities I noticed between it and The Magic Orange Tree from Haiti. Namely, they both feature dead mothers who protect or save their children in the form of a tree.

What leads adults to tell stories like these to children? I think we feel their need for us, their dependence and the shelter they seek in our arms, and we fear our own inadequacy. How can we possibly measure up to such love, and such demand for love in return? I've met children who would rush happily into my arms moments after they met me, trusting me completely. Somewhere along the transition from child to adult, we lose the capacity to love unconditionally, unquestioningly. We shut ourselves off for fear that our love won't be returned, or we learn that our trust should not be so freely given. It is this that leads adults to tell children stories like these.

In these stories, the trusted mothers do not abandon their children. They do not fail, they do not die. They live forever and love forever, persisting in magical form as a provider of shelter and nourishment, persisting despite their shortcomings to nurture their children even after death. Only a fear of one's own inadequacy could produce these stories. If you have ever looked into a child's trusting eyes, you have known that fear. How could you tell them you have to leave? How could you explain why? How could you ever explain how much their trust means to you? You can't, you can't. And so you tell them stories, you tell them you'll be back, you tell them everything will work out in the end. And they learn.

Why

Today was not an easy day. It started when I read a Grimm fairy tale, The Strange Musician, that seemed to me yet another divisive, frivolous tale encouraging conflict over communication, an upsetting change from the Japanese stories I had been reading for a few days. I began debating with myself whether it was even worth it to keep reading the Grimms' stories, or whether all I would ever learn from them would be contrary to the lessons they seemed to be trying to teach. Unfortunately, with this minor conflict clouding my mind, I was later brought two very sobering pieces of news, the first being that a child at Lemberg had lost a family member in the Haitian earthquake (which, much to my dismay, I was just learning of this afternoon), and the second being that my paternal grandmother's health had gone into even further decline from its already precipitous state.

With such things hanging over my head, I naturally began to question the nature of the work that I'm doing with this blog. In times of great sorrow, do children's stories and folktales really have any place in our daily lives? Can I read silly fantasies with simple morals when events in the real world are so grave and require such immediate attention? The answer, of course, is yes, and this answer attests to the real, fundamental reason why these stories are important. Whether or not we agree with all of their messages, these are the stories that survive in our culture and have survived for ages, tying together often conflicting generations through common knowledge and belief. What's more, and particularly relevant now, is that these stories transcend cultural divisions, tying our world together as powerfully as mourning or grief. It is with this in mind that I will be reacting to this global tragedy in the only way I know how, by strengthening the bond with my fellow humans most affected by this tragedy and exploring the culture so hard hit by this disaster. In the coming days, weeks, and maybe even months, I'll be seeking out whatever recorded examples I can find of Haiti's rich folkloric tradition, through the internet and whatever books I can find. This will be an intermittent sub-project whose threads will weave together with everything else I seek to do in this blog, so please be on the lookout in future entries as I compile and read through my sources in order to integrate them with the rest of my materials. I urge you as well to reach out to those around you whose lives have been touched by the tragedy, in any way you see fit. Go with your heart and you will find the human soul that links us all. Thank you for reading, and please be safe.

Faithful Johannes

Faithful Johannes - AT Type 516

My primary concern after reading this story was the moral dilemma presented at its end. It is not, of course, a dilemma for very long in the story, because that is not how fairy tales work. In any case, I'll get to that in a moment and ask for your contributions to a discussion of the situation. First, I would like to reflect on the issue of friendship. Faithful Johannes is at its heart a story about loyalty and, in a certain sense, friendship. Although Johannes is presented as a servant to the prince in the story, he is in many ways what a lot of people would like in a good and loyal friend. He helps the prince in his time of need, plays wingman when the prince wants to win a woman, and puts his own safety on the line when he knows he can help the prince. Of course much of what he does goes above and beyond the line of common friendship, but then again very little is "common" in fairy tales.

This story, and a conversation I had with a friend today, led me to think about what I look for in a friendship and, interestingly, what I don't feel like I have found, or at least don't have at the moment. Earlier today I was rehearsing for my friend Phoebe's play, and discussing the role in which she cast me. His name is Palamon, and he serves as a mercilessly honest critic for the main character, a playwright. He loves his friend, and respects his work, and because of this feels totally comfortable tearing it to pieces when asked to give his opinion. I think I would like to have this sort of friend by my side constantly when attempting to produce art, and really in everyday life. It is a certain kind of trust that enables a friend to speak the honest truth, even when it might hurt, and I'm not sure that I have that with anyone right now. I can remember feeling this absence since high school, when I felt that others perceived me as weak or sensitive and tended to treat me with a little bit of a blunted edge. I wonder if this has changed much. I don't mean to suggest that I don't think I have friends who are honest with me. I certainly think I have a few. But the honesty seems to come in only a few areas, or even sometimes to be motivated by personal bias. More often, sadly, I feel I receive condescension or reassuring platitudes when I discuss real problems with friends. I suppose it is a bit much of me to ask for a friend so brilliant, honest, and trustworthy that he or she would clearly see the truth in all of my actions and call me on it immediately, but this train of thought is being conducted by a fairy tale. The most likely cause of this deficit in the end is probably my own unwillingness to trust. On some level, I imagine I am afraid of the honest criticisms I could receive if I were to open up less discriminately.

In any case, I'd now like to bring up the moral dilemma I mentioned earlier. For this I hope you'll read the story to get a grasp of the situation. At the end of Faithful Johannes, the petrified servant tells his master that he can pay for his wrongdoing and bring Johannes back if he sacrifices his two children. Since the story takes place in Fairy Tale Logic, the prince decides to go ahead with it and lops off his sons' heads without all that much deliberation, and soon enough the servant and the sons are all restored to life and everyone lives happily ever after. Assuming a situation wherein I didn't know I was in a fairy tale, I would, in this situation, gladly leave my faithful friend as a statue for all eternity. Is this heartless of me? Those who know me well will hopefully not be offended and understand when I say I would gladly leave them in the lurch to protect any child, let alone my own, but I wonder if my personal biases against (even the most loyal of) adults are clouding my judgment. I therefore would like to open the floor to discussion. What would you do if faced with the prince's dilemma? Would you trade the lives of your young children for the life of your most faithful friend, a man who has essentially given his life to bring you happiness? I look forward to hearing your ideas. As always, I thank you for reading, and hope you never have to make this decision in real life.

Greatest Fear

The Story of a Boy Who Went Forth to Learn Fear - AT 326

Tonight I wish to present you with a poem. As with all of these entries, it is a largely spontaneous work, far from what I would consider a cohesive finished product. I hope you will keep that in mind, as it could be particularly distracting when it occurs in poetic format, as the meter and rhyme have not really been hammered out as well as they could be. As always, I encourage your feedback as to how I may improve my work.

One day a little boy went out to see what he could learn of fear
This feeling he had never felt but heard of quite a bit.
"What could it be," he thought aloud, "that captivates so many minds?"
"How stupid I must be to have such little grasp of it!"

So out he went into the land, through hours and weeks, through months and years
While asking everyone he met what thing they feared the most.
Some mentioned death, and others sin, some injury or grave disease.
Still other spoke of demons, or of monsters, or of ghosts.

But none of these could fright the boy, he knew them to be myths, or worse,
The specters of a sullen mind, excuses not to live with mirth.

The boy lamented that his quest had been so fruitless all these years.
While passing through a quiet town on one still, moonlit night
A local overheard his sighs and told him of a haunted place
Where he might pass three evenings and bring all his fears to light.

And so the boy took up this challenge, staying in the house alone
But for three nights he witnessed nothing, though he checked in every nook
Until the final night, when seaching in the cellar there he found
A silver, polished mirror into which he dared to look.

What he saw was strange to him, a cheerful life of peace and love,
Surrounded by a family and a host of caring friends.
A smile crossed his face, because he knew what he could have,
But unfortunate for him, that is not where the story ends.

For you see, this blessed mirror was reflecting only lies,
And in a moment it had changed before the child's weary eyes.

When the shining surface showed the truth, he saw he was no boy, at last,
But just an old and tired man whose dreams would never come to pass.

He'd spent his life in searching and had never really lived,
Nor had ever learned the value of the love he had to give.

Because I Said So

Mary's Child - AT Type 710

One of the issues I often find myself confronting in my work as a preschool teaching assistant is the nature of my power as an authority figure. It's an unsettling position, because I would like to believe that everyone in my role is there to be a positive influence on children, and not because they want to exert control over other people. I'm blessed to be working at Lemberg Children's Center, an environment that strongly echoes my personal feelings about how young children should be taught, socially and intellectually. Of course, after almost two years of working there, this is largely because the environment has shaped my values, but I can recall being very comfortable there from the start and never feeling as though I was supporting an unhealthy system. One of the most fundamental aspects of this system is that all rules are in place for very important reasons - to protect the health and safety of our children and staff, to encourage a cooperative community based on mutual respect and care, and to maintain the safety and integrity of our shared property and space.

I think things have changed a bit since the olden days, don't you? In Mary's Child, we see the same sort of "don't do it because I said so" message that comes up time and time again in fairy tales. Let the kid see the Holy Trinity, why don't you? I hate to criticize the Virgin Mary on her child-rearing practices, but it basically seems like she's giving the child a rule just so she can punish her when she breaks it. I've found that when dealing with anyone above the age of 2, one's best bet when seeking obedience is to actually explain to the child why you're asking them to do something. Well, OK, sometimes you need to tell them you're going to count how many seconds it takes them to put their blankets in their cubbies, and promise you're going to start from Negative Zero. And sometimes you're better off asking them how many feet they have and then indulging them and counting both of their feet repeatedly all the way up to one hundred when that's the answer they give (this method, by the way, is for getting shoes on). But that's beside the point. If you're asking a child to do something, and you can't come up with a better answer than "because I said so," then why are you saying so?

Shared Home

The Cat and Mouse in Partnership - AT Type 15 "The Theft of Butter by Playing Godfather"

Most Sundays, I pack up a few good books and a sketchbook and ride the commuter rail to the Out of the Blue Gallery in Cambridge. I've been so busy for past few months with final critiques, holidays, and other distractions that I haven't been able to make it in for my regular gallery-sitting appointment in some time. In these weeks, I've been able to think about what my presence at the gallery really means. I have sold a few pieces there, yes, I am occasionally the only one around to keep shop or take care of minor chores, but it is increasingly clear that my relationship with the place and the people who work and spend time there is much deeper than one of monetary benefit. That relationship could not have been put in better words for me than it was today.

This morning, I set out bright and early, walking to the train station despite the cold and the snow, ostensibly to wear in my new boots and afraid my car wouldn't make it out of my driveway. However, I think my real motivation was an exhilarated desire to meet every challenge the day had to offer me, because my fairy tale this morning is one of the most silly and disheartening ones I've ever read. To imply that two creatures, simply because they should be natural enemies, cannot by any means forge a trust between one another in a shared living space, is an affront to my every naive belief about the nature of community and camaraderie. Indeed, when I set out for the gallery today I was looking forward to being with people I had honestly missed, people with whom I had no familial bond yet shared the intimacy of a communal space. I was looking forward to my opportunity to test this old fairy tale notion that some people are just destined not to get along.

In any case, I braved the snow and rode into Cambridge, took a subway and a bus to Central Square, and hiked down Prospect Street to the gallery. My day was, as usual, mostly uneventful. I got to chat with the regulars and get a lot of reading done, and at the end of my usual shift the new drumming instructor began to move in his instruments for the weekly drumming circle. Due to the commuter rail schedule, I usually leave around the time he begins setting up, but today I decided to wait around a few more hours and join in, feeling swayed by a newly rediscovered sense of community.

I will be honest (and apologize to him, if he ever reads this), but I've had my reservations about this new drumming instructor. I was very fond of the man who used to come on Sundays, and I don't know why he left, and this new one seemed to be a bit of a hippy. But today I gave him a chance, and he said something that moved me deeply. As I grabbed some extra chairs to help him set up, he was speaking to another drummer, and talking about how he felt that the gallery was like a second home for him because of the music he made there. He gestured to me and said I must feel the same way, because my art is on the walls, and because of this connection we were sharing a home. I knew as soon as he said it that he was exactly right. I agreed heartily, and he started teaching us the rhythms we would use that night. As we played on, more people I know and love, whose art and poetry lines the walls of the gallery, came in to dance and play with us, and for those few hours we shared that warm home, safe from the weather and worries outside.

And no one tried to steal anyone's fat.

The Frog King or Iron Heinrich

Today's fairy tale is one that's been getting a bit of attention lately. The Grimm version can be read here (my translation did not change the names from German), and as a bonus includes the introduction after which I named this blog. As I have not yet seen the recent Disney adaptation, but hope to soon, this story may be revisited later. For now, I'd like to focus on a trait of the male protagonist that actually merits a comparison with my previous story, Cupid and Psyche. I noticed yesterday, but didn't choose to pursue at length, the fact that Cupid seems rather ashamed of his physical form. Perhaps shame isn't quite the right word, but he explicitly forbids Psyche from viewing him. Why, exactly? It's never really stated in the story. There's no magical reason, no spell that breaks or curse that activates upon her viewing him. It seems to be a matter of faith or trust. For all Psyche knows, her new husband could be the vile serpent she was told to expect, but Cupid's true form is of course quite beautiful and powerful. It would seem to behoove the god to reveal himself, but he never reals his true nature willingly.

This is also true of the Frog King, but the nature of his curse might reveal some clues as to the meaning of these silly men's behavior. Like Cupid, the frog king's true form is quite wonderful, but unlike Cupid the monarch's physical nature is quite dependent on the actions of his would-be bride. Without her touch, he is a hideous amphibian, but once she welcomes him (at her father's insistence!) into her bedroom, he becomes the charming man she must of course desire to wed. Both of these stories are most certainly about a maiden's acceptance of her betrothal to a strange man, but being myself a strange man, I am quite interested in what the narratives seem to be saying about men's bodies and our feelings towards them. The male protagonists could be seen as passive characters, meant merely to symbolize The Inevitable Husband or something like that, but maybe they're actually saying something to our about men, or boys who might want to become men someday. Both Cupid's and the Frog King's acceptance or realization of their own physical potential and beauty seems to be dependent on the actions of a woman. Neither is able to reveal his true nature until his beloved, willingly or otherwise, takes it upon herself to form a more intimate relationship between the two of them. Psyche, at her sisters' insistence, shines a light on her beloved, revealing his unexpected beauty, and the Youngest Princess, at her father's command, allows the frog up to her bedroom, transforming him from a wretched beast into a very eligible human bachelor. Perhaps these stories are about girls accepting their betrothal to strange men, but they also seem to suggest that their actions alone are capable of making their men a lot less strange. Take heart, young lads, there is a woman out there somewhere who can reign in that beastly form you find yourself inhabiting these days.