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Author
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Comment
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beautifulstars
Unregistered User
(4/17/05 11:09 pm)
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Wolves, Beasts, and other Big Bads.
It's come to my attention recently (and certainly was the spark that fueled my own attention to fairytales in recent times) that many women seem to connect to the Beast in 'Beauty & the Beast' (and variants) and the wolf in 'LLRH' (etc) more so than they do to the princes (even that which the beast turns into). Napoli, in 'Rose Daughter' (haven't read 'Beauty' so can't comment) left her beast a beast, for which her heroine showed gratitude. Francesca Lia Block, in her retelling 'Beast' has her heroine show sadness that her beast became a prince. Many retellings of 'LLRH' --Lisa Stock's comes to mind-- make the wolf a paramour. Since I know alot of people connect to the 'wildness' in fairytales instead of the controlled elements, what comments might you all have in this regard? What is it, exactly, that makes these figures so exciting?
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redtriskell
Registered User
(4/18/05 11:49 am)
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Re: Wolves, Beasts, and other Big Bads.
I think it's simple: those kinds of men, the "beastly" ones, are so much more exciting and interesting. That teensy spark of fear is thrilling. Plus, I think many women like the notion of a ferocious man who loves only them who would defend her against all the other "beastly" men out there.
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aka
Greensleeves
Registered User
(4/18/05 1:53 pm)
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Re: Wolves, Beasts, and other Big Bads.
You're thinking of Robin McKinley's retellings (Donna Jo Napoli's B&tB is called BEAST). I think the reasoning for leaving the Beast a beast is quite simple: Beauty falls in love with the Beast, and she does so not because he's dangerous and exciting; but because he's kind, generous, patient, and loving... all the things the prince was not. We're usually meant to see his return to humanity as a reward for his emotional growth (and Beauty's in overcoming her snobbery), but I've always found the transformation a bit insulting--after falling in love with someone, why would you suddenly want him given a completely different body, however beautiful? My husband wishes he looked like Tom Selleck, but I doubt I'd feel quite the same way about him if he did.
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DawnReiser
Registered User
(4/18/05 3:59 pm)
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Beauty, Beast and the Wolf
Personally, I identified with the Beast in 'Beauty in the Beast' because I had a horrible self-image. It gave me hope, in a sense, that if the Beast could be loved, despite his appearance than so could I.
Additionally, I heard/read that there are three primary fantasies amongst women - the wolf/werewolf fantasy (animalistic, frenzied), the vampire fantasy (seduction akin to rape) and the Prince Charming fantasy (rescued, taken care of).
I'm a werewolf fantasist.
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beautifulstars
Unregistered User
(4/18/05 8:45 pm)
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werewolves
I would certainly have to say that I am too. Thankfully, there seems to be quite an abundance of werewolf/wolf related material lately in books and film.
I would agree. If the interest of these types of men/characters would be that they are challenging, then perhaps returning them to a typical, safe form is what disappoints.
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Conteurlisa
Registered User
(4/21/05 6:31 am)
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Re: werewolves
Hello Beautifulstars,
What a wonderful post! The wolf is indeed my paramour in THE SUN. And you definitely hit the nail on the head when you said that women seem to be identifying more with the beast. As a reader and a writer, I'm drawn to those qualities - as a woman drawn to them in men, and also to present two sides of myself. I'm currently writing about the god Hephaestus (who has been described as everything from lame to ugly to a comedic character) - in a story about love and loyalty. I'm not sure if there is a correlation between Beauty and the Beast and Hephaestus' marriage to Aphrodite (she wasn't so kind to him) - I'd like to know more if there is. While I'm drawing from B&B to make Hephaestus a more triumphant and sympathetic character, the beastly qualities in the story never really disappear. I think there's something liberating about letting that out every once in a while.
And even though I've written about wolf and beast, I must admit my current attraction to a vampire. (wink)
:) Lisa Stock
www.inbytheeye.com
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beautifulstars
Unregistered User
(4/22/05 2:26 pm)
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the wolf
Yes of course, I did mean Mckinley. Thanks for the correction.
I think there may be an element--in women's affinity to the 'beast'--of recognition. I think women, in some senses, have an easier access to the primitive than men, and so recognize in 'the beast' something in themselves. And, of course, there is the challenge, etc.
Hmmm....I certainly think some correlations can be drawn to Hephaestus and Aphrodite. I know I read something on this topic fairly recently...if I can recall what it was, I will send you a link.
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Crceres
Registered User
(4/22/05 9:59 pm)
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Re: the wolf
One interpretation I've run across is that the animal bridegroom stories were a sort of counseling for brides-to-be, who might be understandably nervous about marriage. The animal bridegroom appears as a dangerous animal at first, but is transformed into a real person after she gets to know him.
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darklingthrush
Registered User
(4/23/05 9:22 am)
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Re: the wolf
I think Greensleeves has really hit on something there. Once you wrote it down I thought "A-ha, that's exactly the feeling!" It's a bit stranger but as a younger girl I certainly preferred the Beast (take your pick from the animal bridegroom assortment) to become a beautiful human. Now that I'm older (a wise and sagacious 26!) and married I prefer the Beast. We could blame it on my husband's abundance of soft brown curly hair but I think its more than that. I do think its after we have had that process of falling in love that we realize what a cheat it would be to lose that one we love and have to start over again. I think it would be longer than that moment when Beauty searches the Prince's face for traces of the Beast. I feel it would take as long as it took her to fall in love with him to rediscover what she fell in love with inside this new shell. Perhaps that is a story idea there. Its funny that I don't feel quite the same way about Rose Red and Snow White or East of the Sun West of the Moon as I do about Beauty and the Beast or as someone mentioned before Red Riding Hood.
Some great translations that follow along this line and have most
likely been perused on this board include the new Fable comic books.
Bigby (BBWolf) is definately the hero of the series next to Snow.
He has that sort of gruff appeal that Wolverine had/has (for those
that have read Marvel). I tried to pick out individual stories by
Angela Carter but we might as well just chuck the whole of The Bloody
Chamber in here as almost all of the stories involve reinventing
the wolf, the beast, the beauty. And finally a new favorite would
be Theodora Goss' "Sleeping with Bears." Here's the url
for the story: www.strangehorizons.com/2003/20031117/bears.shtml
It could have been a continuation in some ways of Snow White and
Rose Red. (This could just be me).
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Dark Siren
Unregistered User
(4/23/05 1:39 pm)
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Re: the wolf
I'm a vampire/werewolf gal myself.Me and Anita Blake,huh? ;)
The thing about men like the Beast *is* that they're big and strong,yet you can talk to him.He's exciting and dangerous,but you know he'd never hurt you,because he loves you.He'll protect you against anything and everything if he can,and if you'll let him - which we mostly do,because even the Anita Blakes in the world need looking after,and a small part of them loves it.Hence Nathaniel.
(I'll apologise here - I'm waiting on Anita book 13 and Meery Gentry 4,so am suffering deprivation symptoms at the moment.Ignore the rants.)
Actually,my boyfriend's a bit like that. :D Love him to bits,even
when we're arguing,cause he's so damn stubborn!But we always make
up - and out. :D
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DawnReiser
Registered User
(4/25/05 1:49 pm)
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the wolf
Darklingthrush mentioned that she didn't feel the same way about the wolf in Red Riding as she did about the beast in Beauty and the Beast - but if one looks at the wolf in another way they might find the proper animal bridegroom. I absolutely love the pre-human Beast (I don't really care for him as a human) but I so much more prefer the Wolf. Yes the Beast is charming and intelligent but the Wolf in a nonstandard telling has so much more potential. I did a story - for myself because I couldn't find one that would describe him the way I wanted - in which Wolf was a werewolf and therefore could interact more with his world (course I also made Red a thoroughly horrible person and Grannie an evil seductress but it was for myself so I could do that) (and forgive me for mentioning something I did I know it's kind of tacky. Anyway, at least the way I wrote Wolf he was intelligent and charming - but with him being a werewolf I got the best of both worlds, a beast who never looses his beastility and never has to acquire the humanity he already possesses.
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beautifulstars
Unregistered User
(4/25/05 10:35 pm)
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wolf...anita blake
Yes, most of the original LLRH tales I've come acoss specifically refer to a 'bzou' or 'werewolf' which makes the wolf so much more potent as a character, mostly becuase it allows us the element of human empathy. Carter uses that element of a human/wolf understanding beautifully in her trilogy of LLRH stories--how the wolf knows what he is and is mourning it. I love the Beast dearly, but there is something even a little more dangerous about the Wolf because he is rarely transformed from his original big bad self.
As for Anita Blake-I am dying for Hamilton's next book. The new Merry Gentry is out, but somehow I cannot get as involved in that series. Whereas in Blake, at least she keeps some semblance of plot between the sex, in the Gentry series, there's no such veil. I lurve Nathaniel, and am dying for Blake to choose him as her 'one' (if she ever does) but also kind of go pitter-patter whenever Richard is around (so hard not to). Started out loving the vampires, but gotta say...ended up totaly in the wolf camp.
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Dark Siren
Unregistered User
(4/26/05 1:30 pm)
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Re: wolf...anita blake
First:Oh my God!How can you not like Merry Gentry!There is sooooo much of Asher and Damian in Frost!
Second:OH MY GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!How can you prefer Richard to Jean-Claude?To Asher?The guy is a...pr*ck!How he treats Anita is abomnibal!Okay,yes,I liked him okay before book 6,and then - bam!Nasty Richard.My friend Senga is with you,unfortunately,but I liked Richard befgore he was so nasty to Anita(dfon't make excuses for him)even when I knew she was gonna end up with Jean-Claude.But I can admit he's cute.
With you on Nathaniel,but I don't think Anita can ever choose just one guy.They're all a part of her life,she has a responsibility to each of them and their people,and ahe loves them all separately.
We've decided that because it's book 13,something bad is going to
happen - and we've settled on "Mommy Dearest"waking and
killing Belle(yay! :D )and Anita has to pick up the mess.And because
it's called Danse Macabre,there's going to be developments with
her new triumverate and/or Damian.
So what else is new? ;)
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lisajensen
Unregistered User
(4/28/05 4:58 pm)
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Beasts vs. Princes
It's said that when Greta Garbo first wached Jean Cocteau's classic "Beauty & The Beast" film, she emerged from the screening room crying, "Give me back my Beast!"
This is the way I always felt about the ending of B&B: cheated. The Prince always seems like such a bland, handsome, nobody. I used the Garbo quote as the introduction to my B&B novel, in which Beast—as Beast—struggles to overcome his treacherous inner prince and become the hero in his own tale. I thought there must be a reason the prince was changed into the beast, and imagined the Prince as a beautiful, heartless schemer who only gains nobility and wisdom through his Beast persona. Then I imagined an alternative heroine who hates the Prince but falls in love with the soulful, brooding Beast, and tries to outwit Beauty from breaking the spell and releasing the Prince.
As someone else on this post pointed out, ther's always been a teeny element of self-interest in Beauty falling in love with the Beast—the gowns, the lavish meals, the glamorous music, the fabulous palace, all hers to command. I thought Beast deserved someone who loves him for who he is, not for the luxuries he can provide.
As to wolves, men, and wolf-men, has anyone read Gillian Bradshaw's "The Wolf Hunt?" Based on one of the medieval lays of Marie de France, it's a novel about a prince addicted to the rush of turning into a wolf (he chooses when) whose scheming bride steals the mechanism that allows him to turn back into a man—so he's stuck in his wolf body. There are some great POV scenes when he's in his wolf persona losing his grip on his humanity, succumbing to the feral.
Lisa
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DonQuixote99
Registered User
(4/28/05 6:44 pm)
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Re: Beasts vs. Princes
Perhaps it is that the Beast displays hyper-forms of man-symbolic traits? Male tendencies that contrast to the 'typical' female tendencies, and are therefore markers of maleness, such as aggression, violence, anger, loud deep voice, hairiness, largeness, strength, and visibly bulging muscles, are displayed in exaggerated form in Beast-men.
The attractiveness of Beasts might, by this theory, be the human analog of the attraction of Bird of Paradise females to the males with the largest tails.
Just thinking out loud....
I have seen three emperors in their nakedness, and the sight was not inspiring.
- Otto von Bismarck, 1815 - 1898
CastleQuixote
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aka
Greensleeves
Registered User
(4/29/05 1:26 pm)
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Re: Beasts vs. Princes
Lisa, THE WOLF HUNT is on my annual must-read list. I think it's an interesting example to bring up, and speaks to the issue of what's more appealing: the man inside the beast, or the beast inside the man?
(and it's just a really beautiful novel. And a rarity among Bradshaw's books, which don't often have female protagonists)
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DawnReiser
Registered User
(5/2/05 3:54 pm)
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beasts, princes...
I agree that the Beast displays 'hyper-forms of male symbolic traits' but would also point out that many animal specifies, specifically wolves, are very social, familial creatures deeply protective of their mates and their young. A quality not always shared by the male of the human species. It is partly this knowledge, which is also displayed in many versions of the B&B and LRRH, which draws me to the Beast.
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Dark Siren
Unregistered User
(5/3/05 1:37 pm)
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Re:beasts,princes...
It's definitely the beast inside the man.Just the thought of all
that...ferality<sp.?>makes me shiver in pure feminine delight,and
melt to a mindless puddle in my chair. ;)
But I will point out that,while I too prefer the Beast,he himself wanted to be human,and I was always pleased when he transformed back because - apart from Beauty loving him like he did her(soooooo Jean-Claude) - it was what he wanted most in the world.And to be fair,he wanted that longer than Beauty.I think he deserves it.
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bielie
Unregistered User
(5/5/05 1:55 pm)
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Women!!
Goodness gracious me! Women confuse me.
I just read the thread on submissive women and abusive men, and how bad it is to be abused etc, etc. And here in this thread all the ladies are howling after beasts and wolves and vampires: all archetypal predators who devour their victims.
Someone please slap me with a wet fish...
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Erica
Carlson
Registered User
(5/5/05 4:41 pm)
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Re: Women!!
Hi bielie. If you really meant it, consider yourself (gently) slapped. Do you prefer mackerel or haddock?
I'm not a huge Laurell K. Hamilton fan (especially of her later work) so I may not be the best person to comment, but here goes.
1) Abuse is bad (this probably doesn't really need saying).
2) There's a certain amount of danger/surrender on both sides during any intimate encounter. If both parties are willing, that can be a very good, thrilling and/or pleasantly overwhelming thing. If both parties are not (and I don't think anyone here is arguing differently), that can be a bad, bad thing. Willingness (on both sides, thank you) is key.
3) I don't think all women, and certainly not all of us who post to this board, are "howling after beasts." The metaphor of the beast is a good one, though. We all have animal natures, and sex is one place where this tends to be most obvious and accepted.
4) You don't really have to understand women any more than women have to understand you (I think it's doing a real disservice to men to imply that they are straightforward, easily-understood creatures). On the whole, if you pay people (women and men both) the respect of believing that they mean what they say, it's not so hard to live with a little confusion.
Best,
Erica
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AliceCEB
Registered User
(5/5/05 5:44 pm)
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Re: Women!!
Well said! (Especially the "not howling after beasts"
part :lol)
Alice
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