A Look at the Female Role in Fairytales

The fairytales of the Brothers Grimm are informational in the regards of matriarchal archetypes. They expose the sinister domination that mothers have over daughters. In regards to Rapunzel, the evil enchantress steals the infant girl from the man who is stealing her rampion. When the child comes of age, she imprisons her in a high tower, with only a window to access the prison. The same is discussed within the essay Lorca: The House of Bernarda Alba - A Hermaphroditic Matriarchate. Bernarda locks her girls away, much like the evil enchantress does with Rapunzel. "It cuts them off from all contact from the outside world, and with men in particular, who she believes might sully them" (Knapp 85). Much like Bernarda, the evil enchantress locks Rapunzel away once she begins to menstruate, as a means of maintaining her purity.

Within the Brothers Grimm fairy tales, the common narrative consists of an evil step-mother or queen pitted against an innocent, younger female. In Rapunzel, she is stolen from her mother, in a deal set by her father, and is eventually locked in a tower high above the ground by an evil enchantress. This imprisonment keeps Rapunzel away from world, until she is eventually rescued by the handsome Prince, where she can spend her days in splendor, instead of the squalor in which the enchantress will cast her. The evil enchantress is Demeter extreme, hording and controlling. She sees the danger in sexual intercourse, and attempts to stymie Rapunzel from copulating. The attempt the evil queen makes to stow away the coming of age virgin in the tower strengthens the curiosity of the sexual object being hidden away. She strives to denounce the impending blossoming of sexuality, all while she exacerbates the imagination of the man. Even though the evil queen is seemingly the antagonist of the story, she is also the moral center, as she represents the social mores of the time, much like Bernarda. "Instead of expressing her love for her offspring, she uses what nature had bestowed upon her as a weapon to dominate and scourge her daughters" (Knapp 85). Both women are bound by the social circumstances of the moment, limited in their beliefs. The enchantress understands the morality of sullen women during Old English times, while Bernarda holds fast to her Catholic beliefs.

Within the text of Rapunzel, it much reads like an instruction booklet for men; sex with unclean women, or any woman for that matter, leads to the moral and physical decay of man. It warns men of the temptations of the flesh and what could happen should they not heed the warning: castration, man's greatest fear. The fairy tales offer many reminders that women should be locked away from man, as they not only have a primal, sexual basis, but they can (and will) destroy a man. This chauvinistic, innate response is visible within the film Titanic. Men jumping into the lifeboats before women and children, it is quite understandable, while at the same time, despicable. Allowing the women to leave the ship first is yet another means of destroying a man and castrating him. Yet it also shows the survival instinct of humans, not just a man. If faced with the same fate as the "unsinkable" Titanic, the same occurrence would appear; it goes beyond the penis and vagina. People simply do not want to die.

Grimm, Jacob and Wilheim. "Rapunzel." Kinder- und Hausmärchen, 1^st ed., 1812.

Knapp, Bettina. "Lorca: The House of Bernarda Alba-A Hermaphroditic Matriarchate" Archetype, Architecture, and the Writer. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1986. pp. 84 - 99.