I have recently been struck by the preponderance of family dysfunction in Western fairy tales and myths. It seems that everywhere I turn, I find another evil mother or unkind sibling. Here are only a sampling of stories involving family strife and betrayal:
- In Cinderella, she has an unkind stepmother (who I read was the biological mother in some older versions), an absent father, and cruel step/half/full sisters who compete with her for one man.
- In Thousand Furs/Donkeyskin, the father either tries to or succeeds at raping his daughter the princess.
- In The White Cat, we have three brothers competing for their father’s throne.
- In Blockhead Hans, we have older brothers being cruel to their youngest “simple” brother.
- In Toads and Diamonds, we have an evil “step”mother and sister conspiring against our heroine.
- In Snow White, we have the evil, jealous stepmother who wants her stepdaughter to be killed. And what about the father? He’s apparently alive and just completely neglectful of his daughter.
- In Hansel and Gretel, we have the evil wife who wants to get rid of an excess of children.
- In Beauty and the Beast, we have a father willing to sacrifice his daughter for himself.
- In the legends of King Arthur, we have the seduction of King Arthur by his half-sister Morgan, and his troubled relationship with his son Mordred.
- King Lear has its root in British mythology, and shows the unhappy relationship between a king and his three daughters (and jockeying between the three daughters for position, including use of armed force).
- In Rumpelstiltskin, we have a father willing to sacrifice his daughter to save himself because he lied, and the daughter in her turn carrying on the family tradition by being willing to sacrifice her future child for her own safety.
- In Rapunzel (or now Disney’s version Tangled), we have the overprotective and narcissistic “mother”, exemplified by the wicked witch who pretends to be a blood relation.
- Don’t even get me started on those crazy Greek gods and goddesses!
I find this particularly fascinating because I’m used to thinking of family dysfunction as a modern phenomenon that only began to be spoken of in the last few decades, but of course there have been dysfunctional families since the dawn of time. Not only that, but it seems to have been a subject of much interest and anxiety in times past to be featured so prominently in the surviving stories.
This consciousness in fairy tales runs counter to the zeitgeist of the 1950s, which seems to be personified by the TV series title “Father Knows Best” and idealizes maintaining an image as the “perfect family”. No, in fairy tales, the downtrodden member of the family is usually the protagonist of the story, and these heroes and heroines are often shown having adventures and using adversity to help them transform so that they are able to escape their tormenting relations. In other words, they often win. The evil family members in question often meet horrible and gruesome fates, like the step sisters in Cinderella who have their eyes pecked out when attending Cinderella’s wedding, or Snow White’s evil stepmother who is forced to wear iron shoes and dance until she drops dead. Other times our protagonists merely leave their family members far behind as they begin their new lives.
Are these tales truly discussing dysfunctional families or are they merely providing enough hardship and conflict (often in the form of evil family members) to force the protagonists into growing up and coming into their own? Whatever the answer, it’s hard for me to read them now without noticing the implicit moral of distrust of family and reliance on self — maybe with a little help from a magical item or a fairy godmother along the way.
The Practical Free Spirit 
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That’s an interesting point about the difference between the classical image of the family as a source of conflict and instability, and the 1950’s iconography. I suspect that the classical images grew organically, out of genuine social trends (the statistics on rates of abuse by stepparents versus biological parents being the obvious example), but the 1950’s images were part of a deliberate attempt to inform everyone that Everything Is Normal. Not because they were normal, but because that was part of the entire postwar and post-depression social dynamic. Even today we still see a lot of the 1950’s dynamic left over, with the social view of how family ought to be great. But I think that’s an artifact of the reaction against all of the large social unsettlements of the 1930’s-2000’s, rather than an actual statement of the underlying situation. The fairy tales are on to something.
I believe there were also social trends of family abuse having to do with the biological families. I remember reading somewhere (but unfortunately have no idea where it was) that many of the fairy tales began with mothers who were later turned into “stepmothers” to avoid offending sensibilities. I think this may have been the case, for example, in Hansel and Gretel (although don’t quote me on it!) I’d love to see a list of stories that began with biological parents that were later converted to step families vs. those that originally features step families, as I’m not sure if this was a fairly limited trend.
I also think there are some class issues coming to play here. In the 1950’s, I believe the “perfection strictures” came to play the most in middle class families — but you’ve read more on this subject than myself, so is this correct?
Huh… that’s very interesting, about biological versus stepfamilies.
I’m not really sure about the class issues in the 1950’s, unfortunately. Historians don’t seem to discuss it much, and I don’t know the sociology literature at all. I could easily imagine that being the case, but I could also imagine it being the case in (at least white) lower-class families as well, both because of emulation of the middle class and because of the same normalcy pressures. I really don’t know.
Also, “perfection strictures” is the perfect term for this. Thank you.
I took a class in grad school about Fairy Tales (one of my top three favorite classes EVER – the professor is absolutely amazing). While we discussed many theories about the emergence of fairy tales, and why dysfunctional families are so prominent, one really stuck with me: fairy tales were originally meant to entertain, and to teach. So, they searched as a sort of guide for when children saw their own families broken apart.
Because of the high mortality rate of mothers, stepmothers were quite common in the middle ages. One might grow up with several mother figures. So stories like Snow White and Cinderella basically take the worst case scenario – an emotionally abusive woman replaces your mother – and then shows how the young woman in the story overcomes her shitty family life.
It’s not a perfect way to empower a young girl who just lost her mom, but I think it might have been somewhat comforting. At least, it was very familiar.
And searched* I meant, served. Waking up at 5 a.m. has not done me any favors today!
I wondered if this was the case, Danielle, so thanks so much for sharing your greater knowledge here.
I actually think providing heroic story models for living under poor familial conditions is a great idea. If one can get over the whole “prince saves her” ending that many of the heroines achieve and see the obligatory marriage at the end as more of a final passage into adulthood and/or independence, then these stories offer hope for something better and a positive way to escape unhealthy influences. A map for survival, if you will.
Sure thing!
So true about the prince sweeping in. I’m also puzzling over if we covered any stories where the family actually helps a child escape from a bad situation. Will post if I remember any!
Now I’m trying to remember if I know any stories where loving family members get through adversity together…Hansel and Gretel are all I can think of at the moment.
Doesn’t that story begin with their stepmother luring them out into the forest and leaving them to starve?
Yes, Hansel and Gretel has the loving siblings and the horrible parents.
Snow White and Rose Red seems to portray a relatively good family. The Seven Swans (or Six Ravens is another similar one) has the one sister searching for her brothers in order to help them. In Sleeping Beauty, the royal parents love their daughter and do all they can to protect her (it’s just not enough, once they make the dumb newbie mistake of inviting fairies to her christening in the first place).
Pinocchio is another that comes to mind, although it’s a twisted little story, so I’m not actually sure….
This is very interesting. I have often compared my own covert Narcissistic family to “the fairy tale family”. Adult Children seem to have become “normal” in our society.
Where did you find the part about the Snow Whites mother wearing iron shoes and Cinderellas sisters getting their eyes pecked out? I’ve never heard that before?
Thank you,
Joyce
Can you please give examples of….”No, in fairy tales, the downtrodden member of the family is usually the protagonist of the story, and these heroes and heroines are often shown having adventures and using adversity to help them transform so that they are able to escape their tormenting relations”