Lend an ear to a lesser-known tale, the love story of a real life Prince. This is a fairytale with a difference.
In the year 1936, Edward, the Prince of Wales, succeeded to the throne of Britain and became King Edward VIII. But his reign lasted merely 326 days— less than a year— after which he chose to abdicate his throne to the younger brother. Why? Because Edward, the Prince, had fallen in love. Wallis Simpson, an American woman, had become the queen of his heart, but the throne of Britain refused to accept her as the Monarch’s official Queen. Wallis was a divorcee, and it was against the Church’s decree to marry a divorced woman while her former husband was still alive. Edward couldn’t keep both the crown on his head and the woman in his heart—he would have to make his choice. The young King proposed various alternative options through which he could be both Monarch and lover true. But the Church— and the people of England—rejected each one of them.
And so on the 11th of December, 1936, King Edward VIII stepped down from his throne, with these words addressed to his people— words worthy of a lover and a king: “I have found it impossible to carry the heavy burden of responsibility, and to discharge my duties as king as I would wish to do, without the help and support of the woman I love.” Within a year, Edward and Wallis were married in a private ceremony in France.
Edward gave up what few men can claim to ever possess—a real crown and an actual throne. He gave up the highest title of his land; from the King of England he stepped down into the position of Duke of Windsor.
There’s always that thing, that little thing, which makes you renounce every treasure, yet leaves you the richer for it. The trivial, insignificant thing that makes you relinquish power yet leaves you the stronger for it. A tiny, inconsequential thing.
A thing called love.
“It was love, love, love, love, love alone
Caused King Edward to leave his throne…”
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Fairytales don’t go down well with feminists.
The argument is that you shouldn’t ‘need a man’ to get you happiness; you should be able to find it yourself.
I see it all the time—the web is full of it. The ‘we don’t need a man’ declarations. I swear I saw a poster on social media that declared ‘Fairy Godmother, bring us the perfect career instead.’ Which is absolutely fine, but does this mean that a career is supposed to replace love? More importantly, as a feminist myself, this is what completely confounds me—do the same rules apply to men; do you ever admonish men for going full speed in the pursuit of love? I know the classic feminist is supposed to hate fairytales; so let me bring you a brief, reverse rendering of two of my favorite ones—from the male perspective instead. (I’m using the Disney versions, of course, not the original Brothers Grimm tales.)
Cinderella
The heir to the throne, the charming and handsome Prince falls in love with a peasant girl—a girl without title or fortune or ‘provenance’, so to speak, and puts on hold every royal activity even as he sets upon a veritable wild goose chase— glass slipper in hand, seeking nothing but the foot that fits it—that one woman who ruled his heart. And when he finds her, ragged and dirty, amid the cinders, he gives no thought to social mores and princely conventions, but takes her hand and leads her to his palace—making her the Queen of the Land.
Beauty and the Beast
The Beast in his huge and haunted castle has been waiting years upon years for a woman whose kiss would save him from this dreaded curse that robbed his human form. When one day a brave and well-read girl arrives to rescue her father from the clutches of the terrifying creature, the castle is filled with hope. The Beast’s kind and gentle side begins to resurface and the two bond together. But when Belle goes to visit her father and is unable to return, the Beast loses hope and languishes in the castle, pining away for his love. In the end, it is only Belle’s love that breaks his curse and makes him whole again.
Now that we just re-read the fairytales, what did we discover? A fairytale is not a tale of escape, it is not a tale of achievement and ambition; it is a story of finding love. Perhaps finding escape and redemption through love, too, but chiefly finding love itself. The actions of the heroes in the above-mentioned tales, or indeed, any other fairytale, are all guided by the quest for love. The thing to be noted is that the women they loved were not for beauty alone—they loved them for their kindness, intelligence, wit and charm. Perhaps, like Prince Charming, they cast aside social conventions and royal concerns, or like the Beast, they let go of their aggression and ego and open up for the healing touch of love. Like King Edward who gave up his throne— it’s love, love, love alone.
So to come back to my question—why don’t you ridicule, downgrade or put down men for casting the world aside in the pursuit of love? Why is a man not labelled as ‘disempowered’ when everything he does is for the sake of a woman? Do you ever hear men say ‘we don’t need a woman’? (Quite the contrary, of course.)
The reason a man never has to say this is because men seldom need to choose between ambition and love. Barring King Edward of course, who heroically tossed it all away—but is still considered a hero, not a disempowered sissy. (And that pretty much displays the inherent sexism in disparaging women when they give it up for love.)
For women, though, choosing love very often means an end to whatever other dreams they had. As Gloria Steinem and her ilk so succinctly put it in their slogans: ‘Sink into his arms and you may end up with your arms in his sink’. Because marriage would be, well, a dead end. Because women went into love expecting a fairytale, and then found that real life never lived up to it.
That was the reason why fairytales were so hated by the feminists: they wanted women to not sit around waiting to be rescued; they wanted women to stand up for themselves and rescue their own selves. And that’s where it all started—the ‘we don’t need a man to be happy’ philosophy. Find your own happiness; be your own power, your own saviour.
Sisterhood of the liberated, I completely endorse your stand. But then there are different kinds of power, different types of powerful, and not all are the ones we’d want to be. Let’s just sit back and take note: fairytales are rife with powerful women— but they’re almost all evil. The Queen in Snow White, the Stepmother in Cinderella, the witch in Rapunzel. And that’s not sexism, sorry. Powerful men and women, in general, tend to choose the path of evil, simply because evil seems to pay higher—and faster. My point? Power is, in itself, a vile and terrible thing if not exercised for a noble cause. And in this regard, the heroines of fairy tales are far better ideals to aspire to, for they are kind and noble and brave.
The one really powerful and generous woman that springs to mind from fairytale universe is the Fairy Godmother. Think about it—how can you disregard her or forget her role in saving Cinderella? She’s that powerful woman who uses her gifts for positive ends. The sad part, of course, is that all she gives Cinderella are pretty dresses and slippers, and a Coach to get her to the Royal Ball. And this is where the reality of the bygone era steps in—the only ambition a woman could aspire to was a fortunate marriage, hopefully filled with love. Times have changed since then—drastically so. Why then do fairy tales still appeal to girls of all ages, in all generations, no matter what the era? Because, as I said, the fairytale is not a story of escape, it is not a story of ambition. It is a story of finding true love, and deep in the core of all our hearts—ambitious or otherwise—none can deny the desire to be truly loved.
So yes, little girls need to hear tales of women that rescue not just their own selves but others folks too—for that is the nobler thing to do. They need to be told that the purpose of their life is not just to be someone’s wife. Let them hear stories of real women, good and strong, who fought for a cause and either won or went down fighting to the last.
But let them also revel in the fairy tale, for in her heart, every girl is a princess.
Equally important is to let boys hear fairy tales too. When boys hear no fairy tales, they scarcely learn how to value love—and romance. A man that grows up hearing stories of a Prince that braved it all for his love would know much better how to love a woman and not let her down.
Here’s the little thing though—when we write the modern fairy tales this time around, let’s not make love the end. Let the stories step into the future, where the King and Queen both chart their noble paths, both ride their way to glory—side by side —lovers, friends, equals. Let man and woman both be each other’s support and realise their dreams together.
The need to be loved is as ancient and natural as life itself. To accept it is not weakness, to deny it is not strength. Ambition and love are meant to co-exist beautifully, boosting up each other.
Just like feminism and fairy tales.
Zehra Naqvi 