Luke Skywanker
Sometimes I lament the loss of the truly whackadoo shit we lose when we streamline/commercialize stories. I'm re-reading other versions of the Beauty and the Beast tale and holy shit no wonder crackfic is a thing we are seriously missing out.
Luke Skywanker
For instance:
Luke Skywanker
Fairies utterly arbitrarily enspell this queen while she's sleeping
Luke Skywanker
and decree that her son will be full of all virtues, but also you know, be literally a pig, until he marries 3 times
Luke Skywanker
I mean. Why? No reason.
Luke Skywanker
So she has a pig and at first mom and dad are like "wait what" and then they're both like "well, he's ours, so we love him"
Luke Skywanker
But he's also literally a talking pig
Luke Skywanker
Who gets mud all over their clothes.
Luke Skywanker
So finally he's like "mom I want a wife" and she's like "um, honey, you are literally a pig" and he's like "IDC you fix this there's a chick in the village I'm into"
Luke Skywanker
So she goes and convinces the girl to marry the pig, but she's apparently planning on killing him and mentions this to herself aloud or something so in the night he murders her with his hooves
Luke Skywanker
And then he's like "boo hoo she was gonna kill me get me another wife"
Luke Skywanker
So the second daughter (of the same family) agrees reluctantly, and same thing happens. Folks are pretty concerned but STILL go ask for the third daughter to marry the pig
Luke Skywanker
She does, and she is really nice to him and lets him get her gowns all messy and makes room for him in the bed,etc
Luke Skywanker
So finally he's like 'hey girl now that I know u love me, I can show you my secret' and fuckin takes OFF his pig skin and he's totally hot?
Luke Skywanker
But he's also like, "this is just for us in bed, no one can know, it's not time yet:
Luke Skywanker
So she's quiet for a bit
Luke Skywanker
But finally tells her mother-in-law, "yo your son? He's bangin I am so grateful"
Luke Skywanker
And mom is like "um, what are you on, he's literally a pig"
Luke Skywanker
And girl is like, "no seriously, come spy on us in bed you'll love it"
Luke Skywanker
So she does
Luke Skywanker
And both she and the king are like "this is great, let's burn that pig skin while he has it off"
Luke Skywanker
and they do
Luke Skywanker
...
Luke Skywanker
And that's it, literally nothing bad happens because she told his secret, they live happily ever after but everyone still calls him King Pig.
Luke Skywanker
What I love about this is the numerous times shit happens or is mentioned that just... may or may not actually be relevant.
Luke Skywanker
Not to mention the casual beastiality which is somehow the least of everyone's worries, it's the fucking mud everywhere they're crying about.
Luke Skywanker
Also there was NO impetus for this curse, nothing happened to precipitate it other than three fairies happened upon a sleeping queen and were drunk or something.
Luke Skywanker
I think you can explain a lot via 1) pantheistic cultural origins where the world is arbitrary and virtue does not = salvation and 2) everyone was drunk
Luke Skywanker
ANYWAY you can also put this down to shitty writing, it violates all the rules, but don't we lose something when everything has to be streamlined and sanitized and make sense?
titantoadstools
wow nothing happened because she told the secret
titantoadstools
that's very weird
Luke Skywanker
It's amazing.
Luke Skywanker
I think a lot of these stories, when they got recorded for use as children's tales, got 1) stripped of the weirder stuff and 2) VERY moral
Luke Skywanker
More, in a sense, christian? at least in the case of the European stuff.
Luke Skywanker
Less "here's some weird entertaining shit because the world is WEIRD" and more "here's a lesson so children are reminded to be good"
Luke Skywanker
titantoadstools
: And the thing is, this is just the version I have in my book, by a certain teller. Your grandmother might've had a totally different take if she was telling it to you, so
titantoadstools
I think Eros and Psyche was an example of a woman being punished for peeking but that may have been changed for a more modern audience too? Big shrug
Luke Skywanker
I guess I'm fascinated by the possibilities inherent in non-commercial fiction which is a thing we DON'T have in quite the same way
titantoadstools
yeah, lots of different versions
Luke Skywanker
No, Eros and Psyche I think always has that element of "you peeked, you lose" but she's also given the chance to make it up
Luke Skywanker
But the difference between her and Beauty is that her quest is one of action. She is doing labors, she's on a fetch quest, etc.
Luke Skywanker
Beauty's work is basically to be virtuous and sublimate her own desires in order to support first her father and then the Beast
titantoadstools
It's always kind of bugged me when people say "In the original version..."
Luke Skywanker
Well it gets complicated too, because... I mean there sort of is an original BatB. Or two.
Luke Skywanker
There's not really a story by that name before those published versions, but there are stories like this pig king and the frog prince and East of the Sun, etc.
titantoadstools
Right but the idea that there's always an original version and it's always the Grimm's or something
Luke Skywanker
Yes, exactly.
titantoadstools
speaking of The Frog Prince it's funny how people today treat it like another BatB
Luke Skywanker
Though I think it's a convenient shorthand.
titantoadstools
fair
Luke Skywanker
I mean, it's significant that Little Mermaid was very sanitized from Anderson to the Disney? Even if it's not ORIGINAL it's still a way to say "this story originated a different way" but yeah
Luke Skywanker
Depends on context.
Luke Skywanker
IDK, I mean it's clearly related, if you put it in the "animal husband" category
titantoadstools
yes, but in the most common version today he becomes human specifically because she won't sleep with him and throws him at a wall, while in most BatB's told today the story's about accepting the animal husband
Luke Skywanker
Mmmm, true.
Luke Skywanker
I think it's one of the things that attracts me so much to the Phantom of the Opera story. Even he (the Phantom) sort of frames it as one of these "if you love me, I'll change" stories but it's just not. She does finally show him some compassion, and he I guess changes in that he decides not to murder them or whatever, but you don't get a pass.
titantoadstools
do you have a favorite fairytale?
Luke Skywanker
For a long time I'd've said Beauty and the Beast. I'm not sure, now.
Luke Skywanker
You?
titantoadstools
that's a pretty good one. Aside from that there is one obscure one but I don't remember the name
Luke Skywanker
What's it about?
Luke Skywanker
OMG I just read a Frog Princess story where the husband has to go find her. She's basically forgotten him in the time it took and is about to marry someone else, but he breaks the spell or whatever and they take a magic carpet back to Russia, and the new husband is chasing and chasing them
Luke Skywanker
...but they reach Russia and he can't follow them "for some reason" and stops
Luke Skywanker
Like, that's it. That's the only explanation. He's almost got them, but he can't cross the Russian border.
Luke Skywanker
It's also amusing because the main character breaks the rules he had no way of knowing.
Luke Skywanker
Like, he finds out his frog wife is actually a maiden, burns the skin, and she's like "whoa dude if you HADN'T DONE THAT we'd've been happy forever but I guess now I'm leaving."
Luke Skywanker
Seems unfair imo
Luke Skywanker
Okay just read one about the Swan Maiden
Luke Skywanker
Who is trapped into marriage by a hunter who steals her feathers while she's bathing.
Luke Skywanker
THey live together for seven years until he's like "hey girl remember that time i tricked you into marriage? hahaha here's your swan coat"
Luke Skywanker
and she grabs it and fucks off through the window forever
Luke Skywanker
I find this so goddamn relateable I can't even.
titantoadstools
yeah, she said nothing
Luke Skywanker
In all of these, and in the iteration of it, it's interesting to me that there's a huge tension between "things that happen as a consequences of your virtue or action" and "things that happen just because the world is fucked"
Luke Skywanker
There's no logic to it. The girl who slams the frog against the wall? He turns into a prince and marries her anyway!
Luke Skywanker
Like, it doesn't matter whether you're nice or not! You're still gonna have to marry this dude!
titantoadstools
I thought that one was more like "if you don't go to bed with him he'll turn into a prince!" With of course no consideration that that might not happen or that she might not want to marry him
Luke Skywanker
Well in this copy, anyway, all that happens is she promises she'll be his companion if he gets her ball out of the well, then she refuses, and her dad is like "that's not cool, honor your promise," and she is reluctant, and when the frog tries to get into bed with her she throws him at the wall and he stands up human is like "psych, I'm hot."
Luke Skywanker
There's a Japanese story in this collection that is so... well, Japanese, in comparison. A fisherman catches a turtle, who turns into a maiden and says "yo I'm immortal, I fancy you, wanna come home with me?"
titantoadstools
heh
Luke Skywanker
So he's like "yes please" and they stay with her family for three years until he gets homesick. SHe's sad, but she gives him a box and says "if you want to come back, hold onto this box but DON'T EVER OPEN IT"
Luke Skywanker
So he goes home and it's actually been 300 years
Luke Skywanker
and he's like "well shit I guess I want my wife and life back" but he forgets about his promise and opens the box and clouds float out of it and disappear and he's like "oh right I guess that was my one chance to be with her again"
Luke Skywanker
And that's it, he dies alone.
titantoadstools
I've heard a Chinese frog bride story with a strong emphasis on how many chores the frog wife did
Luke Skywanker
It's funny how many cultures have stories about how "yes I can do this thing but you can't ever look at me doing it"