Sorting out Donkey Skin (ATU 510B)

Sorting Out Donkey Skin Sorting Out Donkey Skin Scholars of this tale type must decide how (ATU 510B): Toward an to interpret the tale’s elements, ranging from those that appear in real life—family Integrative Literal-Symbolic relationships, rings, and dresses—to those Analysis of Fairy Tales1 that are clearly fantastic, like the garments that shine as brightly as celestial bodies. Interpretations of this tale tend to focus Jeana Jorgensen either on its manifest or latent content; Indiana University- however, exclusive attention to surface Purdue University of Indianapolis details instead of deeper symbols, or vice versa, restricts the potential meanings of Abstract the tale and its possibilities to address a This article debates the merits of fairy tale wide range of experiences. The purpose interpretive frameworks that privilege the of this inquiry is to illuminate this full psychological and symbolic, versus those that range of meaning in ATU 510B and, in utilize a literal and feminist orientation. Using doing so, to outline a flexible interpretive ATU 510B as a test case, for its intriguing blend methodology that can better account for of real-world elements and the fantastic, the author these multiple interpretive levels. suggests that a synthesis of literal and symbolic theories allows for the fullest understanding of the Classificatory scholarship on ATU 510B polyvalent meanings of tale, which is particularly tends to focus on its divergences from the problematic due to its depictions of incest. Drawing related tale type ATU 510A, “Cinderella.” examples from canonical as well as contemporary Hans-Jörg Uther’s updated The Types versions of ATU 510B, various psychoanalytic and of International Folktales describes ATU feminist interpretations of the tale type are put to 510B’s plot generally: a king promises his the test, and ultimately combined to reach a more dying wife that he will marry someone productive framework. as beautiful as her (or who fulfills another condition), who turns out to TU 510B, “Peau d’Asne” (also be their daughter. The daughter delays “Donkey Skin” and previously the wedding by asking her father for “The Dress of Gold, of Silver, and magical garments, often three beautiful Aof Stars [Cap o’ Rushes]”), exists within a dresses and a coat or covering of rough rich, international oral tradition and has fur or wood. The daughter escapes to attracted literary rewriters, from Charles another kingdom, works in the castle, Perrault and the Grimm brothers, to and enchants the resident prince in her modern American novelists and short story dresses. She taunts him with her secret writers. The tale has been problematic for identity, retaliation for his rude treatment publishers as well as scholars, however, of her servant persona. Finally, she slips due to its overt references to incest. As Kay him a token or he uncovers her, and Stone observes, ATU 510B rarely appears they marry. The versions that Uther in collections “since the heroine is forced lists span the British Isles, Baltic states, to leave home to avoid her father’s threats Scandinavian countries, Germanic- of an incestuous marriage” (1975, 46). speaking countries, Romance-language Cultural Analysis 11 (2012): 91-120 © 2012 by The University of California. All rights reserved 91 Jeana Jorgensen Sorting Out Donkey Skin countries, Mediterranean countries, East sister incest tales, and other tales that are European states, Slavic states, Middle not as easily classified, reminding us that East, some parts of Asia, and European- the boundaries between tale types are colonized locations in North and South fluid. 2 America. In this paper, however, I primarily limit Christine Goldberg’s monograph on my analysis to examples of ATU 510B. ATU 510B gives an outline of the tale’s I utilize some of the well-known texts plot that positions the “Unnatural Father” found in Ashliman’s online tale collection, and the “Love Like Salt” episodes as “The Father Who Wanted to Marry His equivalent, for either one can provide the Daughter”: Charles Perrault’s (French) motivation for the daughter to flee and “Donkeyskin,” the Grimms’ (German) pose as a servant. Goldberg asserts that, “All-Kinds of Fur” (“Allerleirauh” in because “the Unnatural Father (motif German), Thomas Crane’s (Italian) T411) is a character in AT 706, The Maiden “Fair Maria Wood,” and “Broomthrow, without Hands,” the incestuous father’s Brushthrow, Combthrow” from Austria. presence cannot be used to distinguish Ethnographically-collected texts in my ATU 510B from other types (1997, 31). analysis include Laura Gonzenbach’s Instead, she argues, “The essence of Sicilian “Betta Pilusa” (in Zipes 2004, 52- the Donkey Skin tale—its identifying 58), E. T. Kristensen’s Danish “Pulleru” qualities—are the heroine’s disguise and (in Holbek 1998, 552-53), Alessandro her position as a servant” (1997, 31). Yet Falassi’s Italian “Donkey Skin” (1980, 42- the same could be said of ATU 510A, 45), James Taggart’s Spanish “Cinderella” or ATU 923 (“Love Like Salt”).3 Thus (1990, 106-109), and Ibrahim Muhawi the reason for the heroine’s flight must and Sharif Kanaana’s Palestinian inform any consideration of this tale type “Sackcloth” (1989, 125-30). Finally, I also as distinct from related tales. draw on recent literary rewrites of the As the threat of incest links many tale: Robin McKinley’s Deerskin (1993), variants found under these tale types Jane Yolen’s “Allerleirauh” (1995), and that chronicle the rise of an innocent Terri Windling’s “Donkeyskin” (1995). persecuted heroine in disguise, an Though the above-mentioned tales are analysis of one should be informed by the only texts I will directly reference, I the others.4 D. L. Ashliman’s analysis and also make use of Marian Rolfe Cox’s 1893 collection of Indo-European incest tales collection of Cinderella-type tales and relies on intertextuality to discuss the Anna Birgitta Rooth’s 1951 The Cinderella tales in light of one another. His summary Cycle. Here, I take the view that it is more of ATU 510B on his webpage “The Father useful to view literary and ethnographic Who Wanted to Marry His Daughter” texts on a spectrum than to separate them 6 is useful, as it does not rely solely on completely in analysis. motifs to define the tale, but instead breaks the tale down into plot elements Interpretive Frameworks 5 rather like Holbek’s moves. Ashliman’s How we interpret fairy tales depends a comprehensive analysis includes ATU great deal upon how we conceive of their 510B in addition to ATU 706, brother- relationship to reality, and the nature of this 92 Sorting Out Donkey Skin relationship remains contested. Although social conditions in the narrator’s real fairy tales’ content may not be precisely life” (1991, 192). Holbek goes further in mimetic, the scholarly treatments of his Interpretation of Fairy Tales to claim them have often employed the metaphor that fantasy may even be the primary of a mirror to describe a wide variety of instrument through which social relationships between these texts and conditions can be discussed, mediated, reality. For instance, Stephen Swann and escaped (1998). Social context is an Jones (2002) hypothesizes that fairy tales important part of folkloristic analysis, but are cultural and psychological mirrors, it is not always clear whether this context while Kate Bernheimer’s edited book should privilege internal (relating to the Mirror, Mirror on the Wall: Women Writers psychology or emotions of characters and Explore Their Favorite Fairy Tales (1998) narrators) or external reality (historical or is based on the premise that fairy tales actual events). This conundrum creates offer people, especially writers, valuable the divide between symbolic and literal sites of self-reflection. Bengt Holbek, by readings of fairy tales. contrast, observes that it does not appear Often the issue of performing possible to keep the interpreters out of the literal or symbolic reading has broken interpretation, and hence that “texts are down along the lines of those who see in fact mirrors in which we see our own characters as exhibiting human emotions faces rather than anything else” (1998, and reactions, and those who see them 402). Fairy tales do not always serve as as flat details or psychological devices simple mirrors, however. As Cristina in service of a larger narrative. The Bacchilega demonstrates in Postmodern question of whether characters in fairy Fairy Tales, the mimetic strategies of fairy tales represent real human beings and tales are ideologically motivated, making can be analyzed as such is subject to great it crucial to ask not only how the fairy variation. In the assorted versions of tale is framed, but also who is holding ATU 510B, for instance, we see behavior and manipulating that frame. Therefore, that ranges from earthy and human to it is necessary to ask about cultural abstract and archetypal.7 This range is context, and to determine when fantasy necessarily related to the tension between can be interpreted as mirroring reality or communal tradition and individual distorting it. innovation, which is at the heart of That fairy tales have some connection folklore performances. Naturally, diverse to reality is undeniable. Vladimir Propp, narrators and audiences will relate to for instance, notes: “Obviously, the tale is their characters differently, with several born out of life; however, the wondertale levels of projection and empathy. Given is a weak transcript of reality” (1984, this range, it is most productive to view 84). This

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