Saving Cinderella Read online

  Because, even on their own terms, the critics are wrong. In her book Cinderella Ate My Daughter, Peggy Orenstein says, “I had purposely kept [Snow White] from [my daughter] because, even setting aside the obvious sexism, Snow herself is such an incredible pill.” But that’s completely untrue. If we view Disney’s Snow White as a real person, we’ll find that she is far from a passive participant in her story. In fact, we’ll see that she’s an industrious and courageous girl who longs for a better life but doesn’t let her difficult situation break her. Weird chipmunk voice aside, I wouldn’t worry one bit about a modern girl who held Snow White as her role model. So, first we’ll prove that — even as a real woman — Snow White has merit and once we’ve done that, we’ll go back and discuss what this movie is really about.

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  The main problem that princess critics have with Snow White is that she’s “passive.” Janet Maslin of The New York Times says, “Aside from her great daintiness and her credentials as a fervent housekeeper, Snow White has no distinct personality. She exists only to be victimized by her wicked stepmother.” And entertainment website Flickering Myth says “Snow White is young and beautiful, but appears to have no real motivation in life other than finding a handsome prince.” So is it true? Does Snow White just sit around staring into wishing wells and singing strange, high-pitched songs while the action unfolds around her? Or is there more to her than that?

  When we first meet her, Snow White is trapped in an impossible situation. Her step-mother (we have no idea where her father is, he seems to be out of the picture, or at least unable to help her for some reason) sees that Snow White might one day surpass her in beauty, so forces her to dress in rags and become the castle scullery maid. Snow White is a child, she has been enslaved all her life, and has nowhere else to go. She has no choice but to submit. Here is the princess critics’ first issue with Snow White. In an article for Stylist which ranks all the Disney princesses from most to least feminist, Kayleigh Dray says of Snow White, “she is still an archetypal Damsel in Distress, waiting to be rescued by her very own Prince Charming and be whisked off into the sunset.” Princess critics view the fact that, when we first meet her, Snow White hasn’t done anything to escape her situation as proof that she is just waiting passively for rescue. And the almost immediate entrance of The Prince seems to support this. But let’s look a little deeper.

  Snow White is a girl whose family has failed her. Her father is absent, her mother is dead, and her step-mother is literally a wicked witch. What Snow White is waiting for, when we first meet her, is not rescue, but love. And while it would be nice to imagine that she could somehow find parental figures that would care for her and love her the way parents should, that ship has sailed for Snow White. In Disney’s version, Snow White is fourteen — just on the cusp of adulthood and unlikely to be adopted by anyone else. All human beings need love. We long for human connection, and to be valued for ourselves. This shouldn’t be a controversial concept. And, since Snow White is loved by no one, she longs to find someone who can love her. And since she’s too old for new parental bonds, so she naturally turns to the next stage of love: romance.

  “I’m wishing / For the one I love / To find me/ /Today,” Snow White sings into the wishing well, when we first meet her. And there, as if on cue, is The Prince. (Yes, his name is just “The Prince” — or Prince Florian if you delve deep into Disney fandom. We’ll discuss The Prince’s namelessness later but, just in case you were wondering, it doesn’t mean he’s a total rando that Snow White fell in love with because of something superficial like the jaunty feather in his hat.) When The Prince turns up he is the literal embodiment of Snow White’s need for love. “One heart / Tenderly beating / Ever entreating / Constant and true,” The Prince sings to Snow White. He loves her, he will always love her, and he won’t abandon her. And, in fact, he loves her even in her ragged clothing, proving that he’s not concerned with her physical appearance or her status, only what’s in her heart.

  When she sees him, Snow White doesn’t throw herself at him, crying and beating her fists against his chest, begging him to take her away from this horrible place and make her his wife so she can be rich and live in a castle and have nice things. (Isn’t that what she’d do if she was just waiting around for some guy to save her?) Instead, she is happy to see him, attracted to him, but shy. In fact, she ultimately runs away from him, unsure — in her girlish inexperience — what to do with his advances. (How many of us, in our teenage awkward phase, ran away from the very person we actually had a crush on? I sure did.)

  By the way, it’s worth noting that this may not actually be the first time that Snow White and The Prince have met. Snow White sings about wishing that “the one I love” will find her “today.” It’s as if there’s already someone she loves, and she hopes she’ll get to see him on that particular day. The Prince takes Snow White by surprise, appearing next to hear as she sings into the wishing well, and finishes the last line of the song with her. She is (understandably!) startled, since she didn’t see him come in. “Hello,” he says. “Did I frighten you?” He’s speaking to her as if he knows her. As if he expected her to be as happy to see him as he is to see her. But, instead, Snow White runs away. “Wait, please! Don’t run away!” he calls after her.

  Sure, it’s a cartoon fairy tale, but you can imagine this happening in real life, right? A high-school girl is caught unawares by her crush (who she’s been flirting with lightly all semester but hasn’t actually had a real conversation with) when he comes up behind her and says “Boo!” as an excuse to be near her. And she, unsure how to handle these completely male attempts at connection, swats at him playfully and then runs off to tell her friends all about it. It’s the sort of innocent flirtation that holds the promise of becoming more, but hasn’t gotten there yet. It’s possible we’re just catching Snow White and The Prince in the moment in which he finally declares his true feelings for her, telling her that this isn’t just a schoolboy crush, he’s in love with her. And she, though she runs from him at first (initially startled by his sudden interruption), comes back to the window to accept his declaration, sending him a white dove which carries her kiss.

  But even if this is the first time they’ve met, we can still confidently assume that Snow White and The Prince are truly and legitimately in love. Why? Because this is a fairy tale. And, in fairy tales, love at first sight is another one of those shorthand elements. The Disney movie, as well as the original fairy tale, is telling us that The Prince is Snow White’s one, true love. That he embodies qualities that make him worthy of her — loyalty, bravery, passion, strength. It isn’t that Snow White falls for the first guy she meets. It’s exactly the opposite. We are being told, in the language of fairy tales, that she has found her perfect match. And, if we weren’t sure about this, his song tells it to us clearly: “One Song / My heart keeps singing / Of one love / Only for you.”

  The princess critics’ worry, as voiced by Flickering Myth, is that “young girls will see the film as a model for life, wherein beauty takes precedence over personal ambition and all of life’s problems can be solved by finding the right man, or ‘prince’.” But that’s not what they see at all. Mothers who despair over their daughter’s obsession with “true love” have got it all wrong. The message here is this: find the man who is your soul mate — your heart’s true match. Settle for nothing less. And when you find him, cleave to him, because human beings need connection, and this is the most powerful connection of all. That’s what fairy tales are telling us when their heroines fall in love at first sight. That’s why The Prince is a prince. The point is not how wealthy and powerful he is. The point is that he is the worthiest of men. Just as she, even in rags, is a princess — the worthiest of women.

  So, Snow White is someone who is (understandably) looking for love and she has just found her prince. If she was simply looking for rescue (or for the richest guy she could find) this would be the time to pack her bags, leap into his arms, and ri
de off into the sunset. But she doesn’t. She stays where she is. He loves her and she loves him, but this is still just the beginning of their young relationship and she’s willing to wait. Looking at Snow White as a real girl, it’s clear that she views The Prince’s role in her life not as rescuer, but as lover. And, either because we believe that they have met many times before, or because we understand the fairy tale shorthand, we can assume that their love is built on something that is satisfying and real to both of them.

  Very soon after this encounter with The Prince, Snow White is told that The Queen (presumably a powerful figure, who would have influence over the people that Snow White might meet in the outside world) wants her dead. The Evil Queen’s magic mirror has proclaimed that Snow White, not The Queen, is suddenly the fairest in the land. Unwilling to accept this, The Queen sends her huntsman to cut out Snow White’s heart. But the huntsman, overcome by Snow White’s innocence and purity, can’t go through with it. “Run away,” the huntsman entreats her, and “never come back.” So she does. She must. She has no time to pack a bag, or make a plan, or think things through. If she confronts The Queen, she’ll die. The Queen has powerful magic which, presumably, Snow White knows about given that she’s been living with the woman for most of her life. The Huntsman can’t help her, he’s employed by The Queen and might (it would be reasonable for Snow White to assume) change his mind at any moment. So she runs. And at first, like we probably all would in her situation, she panics. But then, when she’s calmer, she thinks things through and makes a plan.

  “I’m so ashamed of the fuss I’ve made,” Snow White tells the animals, when she comes to her senses. It isn’t like her, this tells us, to be so hysterical. She is determined to pull herself together and find a way out of this. So she asks the woodland animals to help her find a place to sleep. They lead her to a little cottage in the woods. Snow White goes inside and finds the place in shambles. But when she sees what a mess the cottage is, she comes up with a plan. “I know!” she tells the animals. “We’ll clean the house and surprise them. Maybe then they’ll let me stay.” And she begins to industriously and efficiently tidy up.

  “Snow White will always make scrubbing and scouring seem the pleasantest of chores,” complains Maslin. When princess critics look at Snow White’s behavior upon entering the dwarfs cottage, they despair. Because, to princess critics, an affinity for housework is the surest sign of a woman’s oppression by the patriarchy. And Snow White, seeing a messy home, gets straight to work, singing a cheerful song. Maslin, and others, believe that Snow White’s cheerfulness in the face of adversity somehow conveys that the adversity is fun. But that’s ridiculous. No one wants to be afraid for their lives in a cottage in the woods instead of safe with people who love them. Her cheerfulness is not indicative of her enjoyment. It’s indicative of her strength. She won’t let her hardship get her down. Her cheerfulness is an act of defiance. You will not break me, she is saying to the world. I am stronger than you. “There's no use in grumbling / When the raindrops come tumbling / Remember, you're the one / Who can fill the world with sunshine.”

  Snow White doesn’t like housework. She doesn’t like it at all! When we first meet her, in fact, she is scrubbing a flight of stairs and sighing forlornly about how many more stairs there still are to scrub. If she loved housework, wouldn’t the vast number of stairs excite and motivate her? And here, while tidying up the dwarfs’ cottage, Snow White sings the now-famous song “Whistle While You Work” which princess critics use to show how much Snow White loves chores. If she’s whistling while she works, she must love it, right? No, no, wrong again, no.

  “Just whistle while you work / And cheerfully together we can tidy up the place / So hum a merry tune / It won't take long when there's a song to help you set the pace.” Snow White doesn’t like this. It’s tedious, boring work and she’d rather be doing something else. But she whistles, and puts on a cheerful face, because what’s the use in complaining? “When there's too much to do / Don’t let it bother you / forget your troubles / Try to be just like a cheerful chick-a-dee.” The song is not because of the chores, it’s in spite of them. The song allows Snow White to find some joy in a difficult and boring task. It’s what the British call “stiff upper lip.” She’s been handed a raw deal and she’s got two choices: she can whine, complain, and swoon (rather like a damsel in distress); or she can buck up and get on with doing what she has to do. And she chooses the latter.

  One thing Snow White does do is take pride in her work. Which is very different from liking it. Like many women in America today (myself included) Snow White believes in keeping a neat and orderly home. Condemning anything a woman does towards the upkeep of her home, and the smooth running of her family is harmful to the many, many girls who yearn (as I did) to grow up to be wives, mothers, and homemakers. If feminism truly means letting women be anything they want to be, then homemaker has to be on the list of acceptable life paths. No, not everyone has to be a homemaker, but those who do oughtn’t be condemned for it. Wife and mother is a valuable and worthwhile (perhaps the most worthwhile of all) life path. So don’t knock it.

  When the dwarfs finally arrive home, Snow White is ready with her bargain. She tells them, “If you let me stay, I’ll keep house for you. I’ll wash, sew, sweep, and cook!” She’s making a deal: keep me safe and I’ll cook and clean for you. This is not the behavior of a passive heroine. In fact, it’s pretty resourceful, if you ask me. Contrary to all the princess critics’ complaints, Snow White has actually found a workable solution to her problem all on her own. In essence, she has saved herself. Here, again, looking at her as a real woman, the way the princess critics want us to, she comes out looking pretty good.

  But, oh dear, this simply will not do! For princess critics, Snow White’s bargain with the seven dwarfs isn’t resourceful at all. In fact, for them, it’s the height of passivity. Because, even though Snow White has orchestrated her own rescue by using her marketable skills (which princess critics should approve of wholeheartedly) she has done it using housework. And housework, as we’ve already seen, (no matter its purpose) is the epitome of oppression. But think this one through carefully, feminists. Would you rather Snow White becomes a freeloader in the dwarfs’ cottage? Should she throw herself on the mercy of men? Should she expect them to save her? To hide her and care for her for nothing? Isn’t that exactly the problem with Disney princesses according to princess critics? That they expect men to save them? But Snow White doesn’t expect that at all. She sees that she would be asking something of them, and she offers them something in return. Something they actually need. It’s a bargain, and a mutually beneficial one at that.

  Snow White is someone who is using the resources available to her to find her way out of a difficult situation, and who takes pride in the work she is doing. “She cooks, she cleans, she sews on buttons, she makes men feel good about themselves,” scoffs Dray. But far from simply waiting around for her prince to show up and rescue her, she spends her time industriously engaged in providing for her own future. Once the dwarfs accept her bargain, Snow White spends her time in the cottage, not elegantly draped over furniture sighing “woe is me!” but, rather, engaged in the difficult task of keeping house for seven slovenly men. Not because she feels the need to attend to the needs of every man she meets, but because she is earning her keep.

  Looking at Snow White as a real woman, as the princess critics insist we do, reveals her to be resourceful, brave, and fiercely determined. Sure, her daintiness and her treacly sweetness may not appeal to everyone. And yes, she’s certainly not as fully realized and internally nuanced as the princesses Disney would create in the early ‘90s. But, remember, Snow White was the first. She’s the blueprint for a Disney princess. Her kindness, her strength in the face of adversity, her unwavering determination to follow her dreams, and her understanding that love must be true in order to be worthwhile set the precedent for all the princesses to follow. And, when you look at the list of qualities she
actually embodies (not the ones the princess critics want to mistakenly ascribe to her), it’s easy to see why so many young girls gravitate towards Disney princesses. And easy, too, knowing what we now know, to let them.

  So, what about the fact that Snow White then gets duped into eating an apple by a literal wicked witch who looks about as trustworthy as a guy wielding a chainsaw? And what about the fact that this apple causes her to fall into a “sleeping death” from which she is only awakened after the wicked witch has been vanquished? This final sequence of the movie leads princess critics like Maslin to conclude that Snow White, “exists only to be victimized by her wicked stepmother.” It’s the same old Snow-White-lacks-agency argument. But we’ve just proven that Snow White isn’t passive. That she’s a strong, resourceful young woman, who’s in love with The Prince but not reliant on him for her ultimate survival. So what’s going on in this final sequence?

  Well this is where we have to look to the film’s true meaning. We need to view it as a fairy tale, and interpret the fairy tale shorthand of this final sequence and the story as a whole. Because even though, as we’ve just proven, Snow White has a lot to recommend her as a real woman, she actually isn’t one at all. That’s not what’s going on in this film. It’s actually something much deeper than the princess critics are willing (or able) to see. Snow White is an allegory.