Thursday 26 February 2015

Twelve Dancing Princesses

So it's a new year and fairy tales is still the theme, we've had Disney's Into the Woods, an adaptation of the popular musical, we're going to have Disney's Cinderella in glorious live action and Disney's Beauty and the Beast live action film has been announced. Plus, Once Upon a Time is just around the corner!

The first Fifty Shades of Grey film came out and the last Hunger Games film is due. What is the new craze now? Vampires seem gone, True Blood ended, Dracula: The Untold Story failed to bring back the classic horror vampire, but whilst angels, fairies and witches have risen in the book world I don't see it much in the film world. Still, I've been too busy catching up on books that are old now, playing PS games and working *sigh* the joys of an inbetween adult, working and living independently but not yet wed or with children.


I just finished Jessica Day George's 'Princess of the Midnight Ball' a retelling of the Twelve Dancing Princesses fairytale, it was an engaging and addictive book with a little humour, moments of darkness and some beautiful description. Set in a fictional version of Europe, a barren queen manages to have twelve daughters, and her king finally succeeds in winning a long war against the odds but the terrible cost of all this is known only to the queen and then to her daughters upon her passing, a bargain with the banished King Under Stone. It's up to Galen an ex-soldier turned gardener who has a growing fondness for Rose to find out the secret of the princesses' worn slippers and end their curse before they and their kingdom are doomed. It has two sequels, 'Princess of Glass', a retelling of Cinderella and 'Princess of the Silver Woods', a retelling of Red Riding Hood.

I've always enjoyed the Twelve Dancing Princesses and wondered, like so many others, why it is so bad that they dance every night and what this underground kingdom was. In most versions the king asks for someone to find out the secret with his kingdom and a princess as a reward, but they are only allotted three days to do so and punished with death if they fail, a rather severe punishment. Also, the princesses never seem to complain of their nightly dancing but rather enjoy it and, in most versions, are guilty of drugging their suitors to sleep to avoid their secret being discovered, despite knowing that it will ultimately mean death for them. The fairytale ends with a soldier who has followed them for three nights, reveals their secret and produces branches from trees of silver, gold and diamond, a golden goblet as his evidence. The sisters confess the truth of their dancing in a different world and their dancing is ended and the eldest princess married to the soldier who is described as old. In an addition their dance partners, the twelve princes, are sometimes cursed.

A perplexing fairytale with ambigious morals as the deed of dancing nightly is not an evil thing and if there any villains it is the king and the princesses for bringing about the death of any who would try to solve the mystery of their worn shoes. It is also strange that their dancing is ended merely by the soldier revealing it, it's never actually stated that the realm they dance in is gone or the access to it stopped.

Princess of the Midnight Ball gives some depth and clarity to this, explaining the dance as a curse of King Under Stone but still offering the idea that some in the kingdom believe the princesses to be followers of witchcraft who have brought about the death of their would be suitors. The idea of religious zealotry is a common theme in the book along with the persecution of witches and the idea that not everything is so black and white.

My one disappointment is that the twelve princes had little to no personalities and King Under Stone was a stereotypical villain with little reasoning as to why but perhaps the sequels might elaborate upon this. Even the princesses lacked some development in some cases but again that's why there are sequels. It's still a wonderful retelling and entertaining enough and stays faithful to the fairytale with the soldier, the old woman aiding with a cloak, the trees and the goblet etc.

The fairytale itself is an intriguing one it has the appeal of princesses, balls, endless dancing, mysterious suitors and a mystical world of beauty and music but it has a sinister touch to it with the idea that the dancing is wrong and the death of men who tried to solve the mystery. It presents that idea that perhaps mystery, magic and dancing isn't necessarily good, a damning thought but it adds an extra layer to the story. It also gives the potential of the princesses potentially being heroines, villains or damsels. Whilst there are numerous adaptations of it in book it's sadly not had much action on screen perhaps because it would demand too big a cast and it just wouldn't be possible to develop so many characters in a decent screen time or perhaps it simply lacks a certain appeal the likes of Cinderella has. After all the hero is not a handsome prince, rather the princes are shadowy unnamed characters who row the princesses to the ball nightly, but he is in fact an old soldier. A clever one mind but there seems an emphasis on his age as he takes the older sister for a bride because he is old, not quite so appealing to young readers as Prince Charming. Perhaps it's simply still waiting for Disney to pick it up.