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Author
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Comment
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zanobia
Unregistered User
(11/2/02 4:51:19 pm)
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shoe symbolism
What is it with shoes and fairy tales? shoes and folklore? I read somewhere that the Cinderalla story originally came from China, which makes sense since they still bind their feet over there. Apparantly small feet are desirable on women. Or a good woman must have small feet. Which ever came first. Cinderalla's step sisters had feet too big. I also read somewhere that a woman's shoe is symbolic of sex. The argument is that it a shoe looks like a vagina, so portraying a shoe would be a discreet way of portraying female sexuality. Whether sexual or not, there is definitely an obsession with shoes in fairy tales and I'd like to learn more about it. Anyone know anything? Z.
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Nalo
Registered User
(11/2/02 5:22:58 pm)
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Re: shoe symbolism
I wonder how much of it comes from the fact that so many folk tales originate with poor folks who often couldn't afford shoes? Fine shoes would be a symbol of wealth and comfort and warmth on cold days and dryness on wet ones. Small feet might be prized on women because they meant that your wife and daughters didn't have to do manual labour while standing, and so their feet didn't spread out the way that feet do when they're stood on a lot.
Kelly Link has a shoe story: "Shoe and Marriage:" www.google.ca/search?q=ca...n&ie=UTF-8
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Nalo
Registered User
(11/2/02 5:25:17 pm)
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Re: shoe symbolism
Hang on; they don't still bind feet in China, near as I know.
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Jess
Unregistered User
(11/2/02 6:29:41 pm)
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More shoes
I have to think that it is a combination of all of those things. There are a ton of shoe stories - everything from Cinderella to the Red Shoes. A few more that come to mind: Shoemaker and the Elves, the girl that Trod on a Loaf, the Twelve Dancing Princesses, The little Mermaid, and Snow White. Each of these stories represent something different about shoes. The first - hard work and compassion equals wealth and shoes; shoes representing conceit or arrogance; shoes representing rebellion; shoes (feet) representing humanity, sacrifice, and possibly sexuality; justice, respectively. I am sure they represent more to others, but this is just a start.
One thought about feet, shoes and fashion - Fashion generally has shifting focal points to keep things interesting and to keep dressmakers in business. For example, at one point in time fashion will focus on hips and waist and another time it will focus on decolletage. It is possible that at the the time that many of the French stories and Anderson stories were being written feet were a fashion focus. The comment about shoes being sexual would make some sense in this context, especially when one considers it was one of the few exposed body parts. There may be an irony in that the poor wanted to clothe their feet and the rich to expose them. Of course, I could be plain wrong.
Jess
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Lotti
Unregistered User
(11/3/02 11:37:51 am)
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Shoes as punishment
Don't forget that in the Grim(m) originals, the bad queens were often punished by having to dance in heated iron shoes until they died - however that fits into your question ;-)
Regards, Lotti
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isthmus
nekoi
Registered User
(11/3/02 6:19:30 pm)
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Re: Shoes as punishment
They certainly don't bind feet anymore in China! Foot binding was a tradition during only *one* of the many dynasties of China (but I've forgotten the Anglo-cized name T_T I can look this up if anyone wants to know).
I once read something about shoes representing the mind-set of a person, although I'm afraid I can't remember the source. I remember this b/c I've had a number of dreams where I'm walking around shoeless, or had a pair that didn't fit.
One thing that's always made me curious is red coloured shoes in literature and such like. They just seem to show up more than any other colour. Jess, if you wouldn't mind elabourating on the "Red Shoes" that you mentioned in your post, I'd appreciate it! I've never heard of that fairy tale!
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Jess
Unregistered User
(11/3/02 8:30:38 pm)
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The Red Shoes
This is another Hans Christian Anderson tale. Here is the text that I remember as a child:
www.bartleby.com/17/3/14.html
I never liked this tale. I guess it just seemed too harsh.
Jess
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Jess
Unregistered User
(11/3/02 8:51:56 pm)
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Follow-up
Re: foot-binding - it was begun during the Sung Dynasty (around 600 B.C.) and continued until it was outlawed in 1911. It reached its peak during the Ming dynasty and preceeding dynasty (oops forgot its name) when nearly all Chinese women had their feet bound. I have to admit this is from various Internet sources and not confirmed with an old-fashioned hard copy book.
Re: shoes in fashion - during the 17th and 18th C., women of fashion wore cloth shoes, usually heeled, or mules - backless shoes with at first high and later low heels. Paintings of this period often show women's feet in stockings wearing mules. What this means? That is up to you to figure out. I stand by my rather unscientific theory.
Jess
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isthmus
nekoi
Registered User
(11/4/02 10:17:06 am)
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Re: Follow-up
Thanks for the link, Jess!
As for foot binding, I'm going to have to retract what I said about it only covering *one* dynasty. I think I got that confused w/the one dynasty under Mongol rule.
Before Ming... that would be the dynasty under Mongol rule... I think it's Wan or Wuan or something like that. (I don't know the pin yin system very well.) As for foot binding beginning in 600 BC (BC???) I'm going to have to question that b/c that's *before* the Han dynasty (when China became consolidated as a country) and I'm pretty sure the practice didn't begin during the warring periods (which incidently were not called Sung). There is a Song dynasty directly preceding the Mongol dynasty, and that begins around 600 *AD*, perhaps that's what you were talking about?.... Granted, it has been 3 years since I took East Asian history....
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Jess
Unregistered User
(11/4/02 11:46:02 am)
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Ack!
That is what I get for trusting the net! The B.C. came from the San Francisco Museum site !
Back to the books for me. Sung Dynasty began 960 A.D.! Yes, that
does sound better. :) Grun, "The Timetables of History."
And several book sources - foot-binding began during the Sung Dynasty
(a.k.a. Song Dynasty). Yuan Dynasty (begun 1278) preceeded the Ming
Dynasty (begun 1368). Foot binding was common during these dynasties.
It did appear to end in 1911 when outlawed. (again various book
sources).
Please forgive my mistakes!
Jess
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Jess
Unregistered User
(11/4/02 11:47:05 am)
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darn Html
problem fixed by Heidi
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Carrie
Unregistered User
(11/5/02 7:11:48 am)
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golden lotus
From sources I have read on the subject, many women bound their daughters' feet even after foot binding was outlawed. But it wasn't just the Chinese who have deformed the body for beauty's sake. The corset seems another fine example. I understand women had to wear the corset day and night and would sleep sitting up. One of the top killers in women those days was pneumonia. Because of the reshaping of the rib cage, these women's lungs were actually smaller than they had been when they began the practicing around the age of 12. Foot binding starts much earlier -- around 5 to 7 years of age. However corsets aren't as beautiful as the tiny silken shoes that adorned elite feet. From what I have read -- the golden lotus was the most prized in China -- a perfect foot measuring only 3 inches in length. I just published a piece on shoe folklore in regards to wedding customs in Conde Nast's Bride magazine this month with some of the funner aspects of shoes -- if anyone is interested. The idea came from discussions on this site. Thanks for the inspiration.
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isthmus
nekoi
Registered User
(11/5/02 3:31:23 pm)
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Re: golden lotus
Jess, that sounds more likely :) Yuan, that's it!
Hm... maybe it's Tom Ford and Stella McCartney's (sp?)refashioning of the corset in their collections the previous year, but corsets were really in vogue for awhile, esp w/the success of Moulin Rouge. Of course, the new ones are hardly constrictive when compared to corsets during the Victorian era!!
I don't think that much has changed in terms of women harming their bodies, even though in North America, we're now in the third wave of feminism. I know too many women and girls who have considered plastic surgery, made drastic and unhealthy changes to their diet, taken pills etc for me to write it off as an anomaly... But now I'm getting very seriously OT...! Back to shoes everyone!!
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swood
Unregistered User
(11/6/02 6:51:12 am)
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Maiming the body ...
Isthmus,
I think we can find a way to make your comments relate. After all, in many versions of the tale the stepsisters slice off part of their foot in order to fit into the shoe. (One cuts off her toes, the other her heel.)
People still maim their feet to make the shoe fit, whether it's due to fashion, manufactured shoes, or salesmen who don't know how to measure a foot.
There are all sorts of things going on in this story, but one of the very powerful aspects of the story is physical transformation. Cinderella goes from drudge to princess in a matter of moments. I think that is one of the aspects that makes the story so popular. Most women would love to have that transformation.
There is also the aspect of the shoe standing in for the rest of the body. The prince swears to marry the girl who the shoe fits, luckily for him it only fits one girl. But there is also something a bit disturbing to have one's entire being reduced to a shoe, albeit a magical one.
Sarah
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isthmus
nekoi
Registered User
(11/6/02 4:09:24 pm)
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Re: Maiming the body ...
I think there was another thread that touched on this idea of the *passive* transformation of the woman, or giving the power/responsibility of transformation to someone else whether it's the knight in shining armour or the plastic surgeon.
>>But there is also something a bit disturbing to have one's entire being reduced to a shoe, albeit a magical one.
I'm not familiar w/the history behind Cinderella, but maybe there's a shift as the story is reworked into our society: from the shoe fitting the girl to the girl fitting the shoe?.......
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Judith
Berman
Registered User
(11/8/02 6:33:02 am)
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shoeless in Bellona
Back to the original question about shoes and folk literature, sometimes the lack of shoes, or shoe, is the issue... I'm reminded of Robert Graves' discussion in THE WHITE GODDESS of the mono-shoed heroes of classical myth. Which in turn reminds of the (not entirely coincidentally, I am sure) singly shod "Kid" hero of Delany's DHALGREN, who, like -- among others, Jason? My memory is slipping -- lost the other shoe just prior to arriving in the city.
I also can't now remember Graves' argument as to what he thought the hero's lack of one shoe signified beyond his hero-ness, if derives from early Greek religion or whatnot.
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Nalo
Registered User
(11/8/02 10:04:02 am)
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Re: shoeless in Bellona
For some reason, the image of the one-shoed hero is resonating in my mind with the image of the supernatural creature who gives herself away because one of her feet is a goat's. I used to think this was a Caribbean thing only, but Marina Warner refers to it in _From the Beast to the Blonde,_ so it seems it's one of those things that crossed many waters to arrive in the Caribbean. There (in the Caribbean), it's usually La Diablesse (seductive woman devil) who, despite all her beauty elsewhere, has one goat's foot. IIRC, Warner says that Queen Makeda (the queen of Sheba) in one tale is said to have one goat's foot. But don't quote me on that; it's only a vague memory.
Hmm, I think I feel a story brewing...
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zanobia
Unregistered User
(11/29/02 5:54:39 pm)
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shoe binding in china
Sorry, for the mistake. I know that foot binding no longer happens. But didn't still exist at the turn of the century? I only say this because I read a autobiographical novel, i forgot its name... something like Three Swan? ANyway, it talks about three generations of Chinese woman, it was written about a decade ago, and the great grandmother in the story had had her feet bound.
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Zanobia
Unregistered User
(11/29/02 6:05:42 pm)
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one shoe, one hoof
I think the diablesse's single animal foot, as well as the other legendary female seductresses, is a sybmol of the basic animalism of sex. Sorta like Pan, Dionysus, and the Satyrs, whose cloven feet emphasises their beastiality. Like when Zeus disguised himself as a bull when he raped I forgot which half-mortal. He could'a disguised himself as a human or something, but being a bull immerses him in the physical, muscular, hootblooded, masculine, macho mode... Maybe I'm going off topic here.
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cpe
Unregistered User
(11/29/02 6:11:04 pm)
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foot binding
just to add to the disussion, foot binding was not done ALL throughout China. Not even likely amongst a majority. There was an enormous peasant class that was undernourished, overworked and dirt poor and far, far away from the centers of 'fashion.'
con cariņo,
cpe
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swood
Unregistered User
(12/2/02 8:12:57 am)
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Wild Swans
The book referred to in the earlier post is called Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China by Jung Chang. It's an interesting example of what cpe was talking about in another post, a family history.
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