Kind and Unkind Girls
Stamped: September 15th, 2005 | Toggle Similar
Tagged: folklore.
I have this book on my bookshelf. I actually read it in college. Dull read, a whole book of cataloging folktales and footnotes of one tale type (AT480). But the subject matter was fascinating. Basically you have an old lady and two girls. One of the girls is kind, one is unkind. The kind girl is rewarded in the end with some kind of gift and the unkind with death or torture. Nearly every culture has a folktale that incorporates these elements, in fact this book catalogs over 900 versions. In one version the kind girl is meek and solicitous of others. She helps a fairy disguised as an old woman, ends up spitting diamonds when she speaks, and gets the prince. The unkind girl refuses to help the “old woman” and ends up vomiting toads; she starves to death.
Well you don't have to fuck me twice to get the goddamn point.
I realize that this is a cautionary tale. I also realize that we all have to live exemplary lives… blah, blah, blah. But goddammit, why do kind and unkind have to be mutually exclusive? We all know that this is not how the world works. We don't all find ourselves on such well-defined planes of the dichotomy. I know for a fact I've been the kind girl just as often as I have been the unkind girl. And I know by now not to expect rewards for my kindness…no spitting diamonds or princes. Sometimes I am even rewarded for my unkindness.
And when I ask you to explain
You say you gotta be
Cruel to be kind, in the right measure
Cruel to be kind, it's a very good sign
Cruel to be kind, means that I love you
Baby, you gotta be cruel to be kind
(Now that I've gotten that song stuck in your head don't you wish I was spitting up toads right now?)
Actually, truth be told, I keep the book on my shelf cause I think the title is HOT. So there.
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Life would pretty dull being the “kind” one all the time.
Sometimes the villain is the more interesting one.
Wouldn’t you rather being the wolf than one of the dumb three little pigs?
But, then again, I’d probably feel to guilty being the wolf. Damn guillt!
Why does this book have to be PINK?
That’s just so cliche.
You have the girl version of the story. The boy version reads a bit differently. The kind boy doesn’t spit diamonds but passes them through his uretha shouting, “Goddamn! … That’s the last time I help anyone!!!”
It should be half pink, half BLACK like the soul of the unkind girl, non?
Was this for a gender studies class? I remember reading something of the sort during undergrad and discussing how it perpetuated the subjugation of women for hundreds of years. Either that or it was the basis for the film “The Bad Seed.” I can’t recall.
Meg: What about pink with black polkadots?
CTB: I studied folklore under Prof. Alan Dundes (who passed away this year, sadly) I never took a gender studies class…those departments always seemed to be riddled with people who are incapable of understanding the cross-discipline of knowledge (like many departments at Berkeley). Folkore is not a method of subjugation, it’s a reflection of the culture…look at the modern form of folklore - urban legends. If it exists in the collective conscience, you’re sure to find it in the stories and jokes we tell.
When you look into the Kind and the Unkind tales you find tons of themes dealing with female maturation…there’s one where she has to take a bun out of the oven at the right time, milk a cow, or falls down a well…use your best freudian interpretation.
Sorry for the rant, I am particularly fond of folklore.
sometimes i like to be unkind…not to someones face, but a girl likes to be catty once in a while…
I’d rather spit diamonds than vomit toads.
But that’s just how I roll.
When it comes to folklore and myth (are they different?), there’s a limit to what I know. But I did study it to a degree and spent a great deal of time reading the folktales of various cultures. Which is all just a preface to saying, the nature of folktales explains a lot of why I enjoy some “pop” culture. For example, movies - which I’m really into these days. I sometimes think people are puzzled by films that are “real” (and often very good) but don’t seem to do well in terms of popularity. I don’t think people want stories that are real, they want stories that are true - and they aren’t always the same thing. Folktales tend to have the ring of truth, no matter how sweet or horrific they are.
I wish I could be more articulate about what I’m saying, but I suppose I haven’t quite figured it out in my own head. But I think there’s a reason why some of today’s “crap” is so popular. And why someone like Shakespeare, who today would be your garden variety Hollywood writer, was so popular.
Crap isn’t always crap. (Don’t know how I got on this tangent. Or where I thought I was going with it. Or how folktales relates to this … but I’m pretty sure it does. Must be a personal bee up my ass.)
As opposed to an impersonal bee up my ass.
Actually Bill, folktales and myths are different, but most people use the terms interchangably. Myths are stories about creation or origin. Folktales are timeless tales, ‘once upon a time’, existing outside of the present.
And as you say there is a big difference between reality and truth, as Anais Nin once said, “We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are.” I think we find those truths appealing on a very core human level.
As for bees in the backside…well, I can’t help you there.
once, i had a black fly stuck in my ear for an hour. serious.
i’m jealous you had a great teacher, meme.
You weren’t ranting, you were explaining something I know very little about. Thank you.