|
Author
|
Comment
|
arbydean
Registered User
(10/30/03 11:05 pm)
|
Blue roses
I'm new to this board and I wanted to say hello and that I'm glad I found you all. I'm looking for people who know fairy tales about blue roses, either online or in books. I noticed in one post on this board someone mentioned the movie "Thief of Baghdad" which involves a thief having to search for a blue rose to cure a sick princess. I thought I remembered a story similar to this from my childhood, possibly from the Arabian Nights stories, but when I looked in my collection I couldn't find the story. I've never actually seen the movie, so I'm pretty sure I didn't get this idea from there. . . Can anyone help with stories involving specifically blue roses, especially ones where they're situated as an "impossible quest" item for marrying/healing? I'm really interested in this topic and its implications, especially because companies are trying to engineer actual blue roses nowadays. . .there's something sort of anticlimactic about actually fulfilling the impossible quest in my mind, so I'd like to investigate how that's dealt with in fantasy and fiction. Thanks for any help you can give me--I'd love to just hear your thoughts!
--Robin
|
denag
Registered User
(11/2/03 11:39 am)
|
quest thoughts
i don't know of any stories about blue roses (although i had played with the idea of writing one, at one time - currently on the back burner though). i came to the idea after learning a very little bit about grail lore, as the holy grail seems to be a classic example of the impossible quest.
i love roses, and have always been intrigued by the blue rose thing. didn't know about the biotech research, but i suppose it's inevitable really - tell a biotech company "it's impossible" and it's like a red rag (or rather a blue rose) to a bull.
from the little reading i've done, i've found that quest stories are often connected with the search for immortality (another key target for biotech companies!). this appears in all kinds of guises: stopping ageing (like the ring-bearers in LOTR), or moving out of the mortal world into a world of eternal life, or through communal continuity (i interpreted his dark materials in this way).
if i get time, i'll do a little hunting on the blue rose thing. if i find any info, i'll post it. meanwhile, i'd be interested in your thoughts on quests (if you'd prefer this to go on another thread, to keep this one for blue roses only, please do say so.)
|
janeyolen
Registered User
(11/3/03 6:01 am)
|
Re: quest thoughts
In the early '60s, Knopf published a picture book called THE BLUE ROSE, but I don't remember anything else about it.
Jane
|
RymRytr1
Registered User
(11/3/03 2:30 pm)
|
Blue
Here's a couple of books for sale, that may be
what you seek:
www.locusmag.com/index/b460.html#A6678.1
STRAUB, PETER (Francis) (1943- ) (stories) (assoc.)
* *Blue Rose (Underwood-Miller 0-88733-005-3, Sep ’85, $35.00, 92pp, hc) [Blue Rose] Novella of horror/dark fantasy. Signed, slipcased, limited edition of 600 numbered copies.
* _Blue Rose (Penguin 0-14-600107-9, Aug ’95, $.95, 87pp, tp, cover by Charles Burchfield) [Blue Rose] Reprint (Underwood-Miller 1985) horror novella. A “Penguin 60s” anniversary edition.
|
vsdragon
Unregistered User
(11/6/03 11:34 pm)
|
Blue Rose script
There is a Asian folk tale (perhaps Chineese) that is called the "Blue Rose"
I am a director and directed this story last year with a group of young teens. It is about a princess who will only wed one who bring her a blue rose.
|
arbydean
Registered User
(11/11/03 1:03 am)
|
Re: Blue Rose
Thanks--the Chinese folktale seems sort of familiar. I found a few references to it online. This site is one of the best:
www.civprod.com/storylady...ueRose.htm
It's possible that I encountered it in a World or Asian collection of fairy tales, but I'd been so convinced that it was Arabian, and this one still doesn't have the dimension of sickness that I remember. I like the Chinese one very much, though.
In relation to the quest in the Chinese tale, there doesn't seem to be any emphasis on actually succeeding, but rather in finding the most cleverly justified solution to a problem that's accepted as impossible. That strikes me as a little different than stories involving Grail quests or miraculous cures or atonement...there's always the hope in those, I think, that the hero can win out and find the object in the end. Although a lot of quest stories really seem to be "all about the journey." I'm not sure if blue rose stories fit more into the "journey" or "destination" category of quest stories...
--Robin
|
Laura
Registered User
(11/11/03 10:44 am)
|
Blue Roses
This is certainly off the strictly fairy tale track, but one of my most vivid memories from childhood was an episode of the Smurfs wherein Smurfette sacrificed her blue-ness to create a blue rose. From those who recall better than I:
excerpt from www.astrostreasurechest.n...ub/faq.htm
What did Smurfettes blue rose symbolize?
Vic has the answer: Smurfette's blue rose symbolized broken promises, or at the very least the need to break promises when they are absolutely necessary. In the episode Smurfette's Rose, Smurfette desired to see a blue rose so badly that she made a promise to Mother Nature that she would not cut the rose if Mother Nature made a blue rose. After Smurfette made the promise, a white rose turned blue and Smurfette turned white and started smelling like a rose! When insects attracted to the smell the rose really started to bother her, Smurfette had to make a choice of whether to cut the blue rose or not, which she eventually did.
Aside from the morality for kids, I recall fairy tale elements creeping into that show with some frequency. The episode might spark some ideas for you.
Laura
|
Carrie
Unregistered User
(11/11/03 11:53 am)
|
From a flower of the heart to a flower of the liver?
Hi all. I found an interesting story on the pursuit of the blue rose. It appears there is an enzyme in the liver that can be used to create the blue color that scientists are trying to achieve in their quest for the holy grail of roses.
www.biomedcentral.com/news/20030213/06/
|
janeyolen
Registered User
(11/11/03 5:04 pm)
|
Re:Hoffman
Just reading Alice Hoffman's latest magical book and a blue rose figures highly in it.
Jane
|
Nalo
Registered User
(11/23/03 2:27 am)
|
Re: Re:Hoffman
This isn't folklore, but there's a reference to blue roses in “The Glass Menagerie,” by Tennessee Williams. The female lead suffered from pleurosis as a child and missed a lot of time from school. When she returned to school, one of her classmates asked her why she had been off, and when she said "pleurosis," he heard "blue roses," and from then on called her that.
-nalo
|
Nalo
Registered User
(11/24/03 8:58 am)
|
Re: From a flower of the heart to a flower of the liver?
Oo! This may actually help with a story of mine that's gotten stuck. Thanks, Carrie!
-nalo
|
Carrie
Unregistered User
(11/26/03 12:26 pm)
|
blue roses
You are welcome Nalo. I have other notes in one of my journals -- blue roses figure in a novel I've been struggling with on and off over the last few years. I'll see if I can dig up anything else.
Carrie
|
jess63
Registered User
(11/26/03 3:57 pm)
|
Re: blue roses
Nalo,
If I recall, in the movie "The Madness of King George", King George was supposed to have suffered from this disease, which caused both temporary madeness, and it made his urine blue (putting a whole different meaning on "blue blooded"). You might find more on the subject if you read some of the articles regarding his "madness" that came out at the time of the movie.
Jess
|
Nalo
Registered User
(11/27/03 10:38 am)
|
Re: blue roses
It was porphyria that they think King George had: www.thelocalplanet.com/Cu...cleID=3536
...and to bring us back on topic, this may be the disorder that created the werewolf myth. A Google search under "porphyria" and "werewolf" will bring up the connections.
-nalo
Edited by: Nalo at: 11/27/03 10:43 am
|
jess63
Registered User
(11/28/03 1:00 am)
|
Re: blue roses
Thanks, Nalo. I thought perhaps the liver enzyme which may be used to make "blue roses" and the madness disease might be related. Didn't mean to go so OT.
Jess
|
Rosemary
Lake
Registered User
(11/28/03 8:43 pm)
|
Re: blue roses
If I wrote about a blue rose, I'd be tempted to put in a green carnation.
Rosemary, simpling out...
|
zonewell
Unregistered User
(12/12/03 4:24 pm)
|
blue roses
The "blue roses" reference in Glass Menagerie also referenced Tennessee Williams sister, Rose, who was the model for the play's heroine Laura. Miss Rose suffered from devastating clinical depression (the "blues") which ultimately ruled her life...
|
