Published in 2017 by the Feminist Press
at the City University of New York
The Graduate Center
365 Fifth Avenue, Suite 5406
New York, NY 10016
feministpress.org
First Feminist Press edition 2017
Introduction copyright © 2017 by Renée Watson
Copyright © 1981 by Ethel Johnston Phelps
Cover and interior illustrations copyright © 2017 by Suki Boynton
All rights reserved.
This book was made possible thanks to a grant from New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature.
No part of this book may be reproduced, used, or stored in any information retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission from the Feminist Press at the City University of New York, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
First printing October 2017
Cover and text design by Suki Boynton
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available for this title.
ISBN: 978-1-9369-3205-4
To Carol Levin
and Ranice Crosby
for more reasons than
I could ever list
CONTENTS
TITLE PAGE
COPYRIGHT
DEDICATION
Introduction by Renée Watson
Preface by Ethel Johnston Phelps
Mulha
The Hunter Maiden
Elsa and the Evil Wizard
Maria Morevna
Duffy and the Devil
Lanval and the Lady Triamor
Bending Willow
Finn Magic
The Old Woman and the Rice Cakes
The Husband Who Stayed at Home
Scheherazade Retold
Suggested Reading
Acknowledgments
Series Teaser
ABOUT THE EDITOR and ILLUSTRATOR
ALSO BY FEMINIST PRESS
ABOUT FEMINIST PRESS
INTRODUCTION
RENÉE WATSON
We cannot create what we can’t imagine.
—LUCILLE CLIFTON
Let’s imagine a world where women are seen as whole beings and not as body parts, quests to be conquered, or damsels to be rescued. Let’s imagine a world where women save their own days, save the world, even.
Let’s imagine women as hunters.
I have always been drawn to female characters who chase, pursue, explore, interrogate, rescue. Kill, even. Every good story has a character who desperately wants something. But too often the desires of female characters revolve around clichés—gaining the affection of a man or wanting to be popular at almost any cost.
But not here. This is a collection of tales that have imagined worlds where women are on the hunt, where women are in search of their own independence, of finding what will truly quench their physical, spiritual, and emotional hunger. These are women who will sacrifice and risk all for who and what they love, what they need, what they want. They are wise and they are strong. They are like the women I know in my real life who are often criticized, undervalued, silenced, or invisible.
Here, in these pages, a space has been created for their stories to be told. I believe we so desperately need these kinds of spaces—books, classrooms, writing workshops, community centers, homes—where women from all backgrounds can be seen and heard. These imaginary and actual spaces influence each other. If reality is flawed with sexist stereotypes and expectations, I should be able to read a story, a poem, and see what the world could be when characters prove to be more than those assumptions. When literature fails to show the myriad of experiences of what it means to act like a girl, I should be able to look in my world and find many examples of girls and women living life on their own terms. What we experience, what we imagine, and what we create are always in conversation with each other.
This collection is a space where that conversation lives. Some of these women I feel like I’ve met before. Some of them have traits I recognize in myself. Others feel so outside of what I am used to, what I know. They all have a place here, and because they do, they can influence and impact what is created and imagined about women.
Here, Mulha, a fourteen-year-old South African girl, comes face-to-face with a monster and does not “waste time crying.” She does not crumble under adversity but instead finds light even in the darkest of circumstances. The thing that should destroy her becomes a means of provision. Mulha’s story reminds me of the women who raised me, who made a way out of no way, who found joy when all there seemed to be around them was pain and sorrow. There is a space for them here. Mulha’s story validates the years of waiting on an answer to a prayer, on the sweet redemption that comes after years of being forgotten and overlooked.
In these pages, Elsa in “Elsa and the Evil Wizard” makes space for women determined to stand on their own two feet. Elsa refuses to be wooed by an arrogant suitor who only values her physical beauty and has no interest in who she really is. What I love about Elsa, and women like her, is her willingness to take a stand not just for herself but also for all types of women who deserve to be seen. Elsa uses her smarts to rescue herself, yes, but then she goes beyond self-preservation and devises a plan so that no other girl is preyed upon by this evil wizard.
In the tale of “The Husband Who Stayed Home,” we meet a brilliant wife who switches roles with her husband, proving she can do everything he does and not only be good at it, but can also rescue him from the disaster he creates when he tries to take care of her responsibilities. She is not shy about her capabilities. She isn’t self-deprecating and doesn’t downplay the fact that she can do many things well. Once she is out of the box, she refuses to be put back in. She has outgrown its boundaries.
In the Zuni tale, “The Hunter Maiden,” we meet a girl who has the bold belief that there is no reason why she shouldn’t be able to hunt. Her brothers are dead and her father is too feeble. There is no other option for this girl—if her family doesn’t eat, her family will starve, die. The stakes are too high for her to stay in a girl’s place and play by the rules. She must do “the dangerous thing.” She has to.
And so do we.
In our real lives—whether writer or reader, scholar or student—we must do the dangerous things: challenge oppressive systems, take risks to go after the thing that will feed us, nurture us. We must provide spaces for diverse stories to be told and heard. The exchange of stories reminds us of each other’s humanity. The imagined story gives us an opportunity to create a new world.
This collection has brought together a diverse cast of women who, individually, are remarkable and intriguing. Together, they are powerful. There is strength in this collection. There are no easy solutions for our heroines; there are no princes who come to make everything better with just one kiss. These stories tell girls it is okay to be afraid, to be flawed, to be hungry, to be curious, to be angry. These are complex characters who are perfectly imperfect, who don’t need fixing, per se, but rather a space to exist as is. Imagine it.
In some ways, The Hunter Maiden reminds me of the gatherings I often have with friends—sometimes brunch or sometimes a meet up at home. We gather, all of us so different from each other, all of us bringing our stories of loving, parenting, creating, living, womaning to the group. It is there, in that place, during the exchange of stories, that we bear witness to each other, that we heal, that we question, that we imagine the world we want to create.
I am thankful for those women. I am thankful for this collection. Both provide
a space for women to be.
PREFACE
ETHEL JOHNSTON PHELPS
The traditional fairy and folktales in this collection, as in my earlier books of tales, have one characteristic in common: they all portray spirited, courageous heroines. Although a great number of such collections are in print, this type of heroine is surprisingly rare.
Taken as a whole, the body of traditional fairy and folktales (the two terms have become almost interchangeable) is very heavily weighted with heroes, and most of the “heroines” we do encounter are far from heroic. Always endowed with beauty—and it often appears that beauty is their only reason for being in the tale—they conform in many ways to the sentimental ideal of women in the nineteenth century. They are good, obedient, meek, submissive to authority, and naturally inferior to the heroes. They sometimes suffer cruelties but are patient under ill treatment. In most cases they are docile or helpless when confronted with danger or a difficult situation.
In short, as heroines, they do not inspire or delight, but tend to bore the reader. I think it is their meekness that repels. They are acted upon by people or events in the tale; they rarely initiate their own action to change matters. (In contrast to this type of heroine, when clever or strong women appear in folktales, they are usually portrayed as unpleasant, if not evil, characters—cruel witches, jealous stepmothers, or old hags.) It is not my intention to delve into the psychological or social meanings behind the various images of heroines in folktales, but simply to note that the vast majority are not particularly satisfying to readers today.
In actual fact, the women of much earlier centuries, particularly rural women, were strong, capable, and resourceful in positive ways as hardworking members of a family or as widows on their own. Few folktales reflect these qualities. Inevitably the question arises: How many, if any, folktales of strong, capable heroines exist in the printed sources available?
In a sense, this book grew out of that question. Over a period of three years, I read thousands of fairy and folktales in a search for tales of clever, resourceful heroines; tales in which equally courageous heroines and heroes cooperated in their adventures; tales of likeable heroines who had the spirit to take action; tales that were, in themselves, strong or appealing.
As a result of that search, the heroines in this book are quite different from the usual fairy and folktale heroines. In a few of the tales, the girls and women possess the power (or knowledge) of magic, which they use to rescue the heroes from disaster. The hero may be more physically active in the story, but he needs the powers of the self-reliant, independent heroine to save him.
In the majority of the tales, the heroines are resourceful girls and women who take action to solve a problem posed by the plot. Often they use cleverness or shrewd common sense.
All the heroines have self-confidence and a clear sense of their own worth. They possess courage, moral or physical; they do not meekly accept but seek to solve the dilemmas they face. The majority have leading roles in the story. The few who have minor roles (in terms of space) play a crucial part in the story and have an independent strength that is characteristic of all the heroines here.
Although most of the printed sources for the tales I’ve chosen are from the nineteenth century, the tales themselves are part of an oral, primarily rural tradition of storytelling that stretches far back in time. Each generation shaped the tales according to the values of the time, adding or subtracting details according to the teller’s own sense of story. While the characters and basic story remained the same, it was this personal shaping of the tales that may explain the many variations of each story that now exist. As every folktale reader knows, different versions of the tales are found in different countries and even different continents. Variants of Cinderella and of tales of hero/heroines bewitched into nonhuman form are particularly widespread.
In giving the older tales of our heritage a fresh retelling for this generation of readers, I have exercised the traditional storyteller’s privilege. I have shaped each tale, sometimes adding or omitting details, to reflect my sense of what makes it a satisfying tale. The stories “Maria Morevna” and “Finn Magic,” for example, have been compressed to make a smoother flow of narrative.
Most of the tales in this book follow the story outlines of earlier sources quite closely. In a few cases I’ve added my own details to amplify the story’s ending, as in “The Husband Who Stayed at Home” and “Elsa and the Evil Wizard.”
For the tale “Lanval and the Lady Triamor,” I have used as sources the versions of fourteenth-century literary storytellers who drew on oral folktales of their period. As might be expected, this is more complex than other tales in the collection. However, there are tales to appeal to the very young as well as the more sophisticated reader. Through the tales’ diversity, the reader becomes aware of the extraordinary vitality of the fairy and folktale heritage, not only in the range of imaginative fantasy but also in humor. I confess a partiality for the lighthearted tale. The humor here is most obvious in the comic tales of “Duffy and the Devil” and “The Husband Who Stayed at Home.”
Two of the tales in the book deserve longer comment. The tale of Lanval dates back to the twelfth century, if not earlier, and has many variants. Fairy women who marry or mate with humans are found frequently in Celtic folktales. They are powerful, independent women who confer benefits on the man of their choice. The terms they state for the union always contain a taboo, and they always glow with the radiant, eternal youth of the Other World.
This is the one tale in the present collection in which dazzling beauty is a plot element—but it is the humans who place false value on the illusion of beauty, not Triamor herself. It is clear that Triamor’s dazzling beauty is a supernatural attribute. The ability of fairy folk to create an illusion of glamour was well-known to the Celtic people who told and listened to these tales. Actually Triamor’s strange beauty is a side issue; the mainspring of the story is Triamor’s power to confer fame and wealth. She grants young Lanval his heart’s desire and adds the usual taboo to their pact—in this case, Lanval is forbidden to mention Triamor to humans.
The tale is a little more complex than most folktales using this basic plot. As usual, the human’s impulsive thoughtlessness causes the breakup of the pact and the withdrawal of good fortune. In this tale, Triamor relents at the end and rescues Lanval—if dwelling in the shadowy Other World of fairy folk can be called a rescue. Implicit in the tale is a moral concerning Lanval’s fate. Extravagance and thoughtless speech brought about his first misfortunes. Although Triamor rescued him from that state with her magic bounty, this good fortune was again lost through thoughtless speech—a character flaw that may seem minor to us. Nonetheless, Lanval did achieve his dream of wealth and fame for a time, and his departure for the Other World of fairy folk may not be a sad fate after all.
“Finn Magic” is told from the hero’s point of view. Although there is no doubt that Zilla is a heroine of strength and courage, hers is a much smaller, though crucial, role. However, the theme of ethnic prejudice is unusual. I felt that the story belonged in this collection, despite the fact that Zilla is seen only through Eilert’s eyes. Whatever her role may be in rescuing Eilert from the Draug and Merfolk (the tale is deliberately discreet on this point), it is clear the Nordlanders believed she possessed magic spells or influence over the people beneath the sea. While Eilert may be uncertain about Zilla’s magic, he does recognize her physical courage in saving him.
Although I have taken the greater part of this introduction to speak of the remarkably spirited heroines I have culled from the large body of traditional folktales, I cannot end without a few words about the heroes who appear in some of the tales with them. By and large, they are not the stereotyped heroes of most fairy and folktales. They are not flat cardboard characters, but are individually appealing in their own right. Eilert struggles with family loyalty before breaking through prejudice; brave Alexey redeems his mistake of impulsive curiosity; and Lanval
is extravagant and thoughtless.
But enough has been said about the quite special heroines—and heroes—in these tales. The proof is in the reading.
Long ago in southern Africa, demon spirits and monstrous ogres were much more to be feared than the wild animals of the forests. The ogres were both sly and cruel—they could quickly change their shapes, and were said to devour children.
Mulha, like many other children, had heard tales of the ogre Inzimu and his sister, Imbula. However, it was not until she was fourteen and almost fully grown that she came face-to-face with these monsters. This is the way it happened:
One day Mulha’s father was away hunting. Her mother was at work tending the crops in their field, some distance away. Mulha’s task was to stay at the family’s thatched hut and care for her two younger sisters. Unfortunately, Mulha became quite bored watching the children.
Her eyes fell on the large storage pot sitting near the door of the hut. The three children had always been forbidden to open this pot, but this day Mulha decided she was going to peek inside. Perhaps, she thought hungrily, her mother kept honey cakes or special treats there.
So Mulha lifted up the heavy lid. Before she could even see the contents, a small, sharp-fanged animal that had hidden there leaped out and grew at once into a huge ogre. When Mulha saw his long tail, she knew he was the ogre Inzimu.
The three girls ran into the hut, the Inzimu after them.
“I won’t harm you,” said he, making his voice as sweet as honey. “I only want you to cook me some dinner. I’m very hungry.”
He persuaded the two older girls to go out for buckets of water; then, as soon as they left the hut, he popped the youngest girl into a large cooking pot and put on a heavy lid.
While the two girls were filling the buckets, a large honeybee buzzed about their heads. The buzzing became words: “The Inzimu has hidden your little sister in the cooking pot!”
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