Note: This paper uses the anthropological technique of "obviation" by Professor Roy Wagner. Further information and resources for this method are forthcoming.
Vasilisa
Furball
Cinderella
Meta-rella
Beastly woman of snarl and bone
supplants the rightly mother's throne
working lightly with her doll
soon Vasilisa knows it all
In the forests of the Slavic part of the world, where frosty winters nip and
bite, where haggard old women will threaten you if they can, and the morning
rides welcoming, there lives a girl. Vasilisa is her name, and she is known
as the fair, the brave, the beautiful. Though far from magic pumpkins and stepsisters
in organdy dresses, in a land too cold for glass slippers, she is one of the
most well-known of all girls: She is a 510 type tale, akin to Cinderella.
The story of Vasilisa is both strange and familiar to western ears: she is abused
by a surrogate family, but she makes her own way; she is helped by a magic woman,
but fairy godmother the woman most certainly is not.
Obviation:
A: The first substitution would be the doll for mother. Vasilisa's mother quite literally gives her the doll (her blessing) and then dies; she substitutes a flesh mother for a symbol of her mother in the doll.
B: At B comes the reinforcing substitution of stepmother for father. Vasilisa's father gives up control of her and allows this new wife, the stepmother, to impose rule over the girl; the stepmother has taken the place of the father.
C: At this point, both of Vasilisa's parents have been replaced by non-blood substitutes: a mother of cloth and a mother of marriage. Since she no longer has any real parents, she enters into the substitution of a real home for a liminal one: forest for home. This (C) completes the "Family" triad, and Vasilisa casts off her normal state (comfort family home) enters into a liminal state (strange tests growth). In essence, she goes from childhood to puberty.
D: After giving up her normal self at C, forest for home, Vasilisa wanders through that forest, that liminality, and comes upon Baba Yaga, who presents a haggard image of womanhood. This is a figure-ground reversal, as Baba Yaga now supplants the false mothers and becomes the dominant mother influence on Vasilisa, if a somewhat frightening and dangerous one. Thus D is Baba Yaga for forest.
E: The real action of the plot unfolds, as Vasilisa is tested time and again, and emerges triumphant. It is the doll for tasks that enables Vasilisa to finally grow and mature; she symbolically learns the arts of womanhood (planting, baking, sewing) and becomes a woman in her own right, yet she does this with the help of her mother, literally and figuratively. The doll represents all maternal influence. (This can also be viewed as blessing for curse, in that her mother's blessing outweighed Baba Yaga's curse, and that the positive aspects of womanhood triumphed over the negative aspects.) This completes this "Liminal" triad of C-D-E, and passes Vasilisa through her liminal phase -- puberty -- and onto adulthood.
F: Moving from liminality back into a normal, improved state (doll for tasks) Vasilisa is now a grown woman, and capable of facing life. She triumphs over the influences of her past at F, fire for stepmother, in which the fire she's earned (as an adult) burns her wicked stepmother to ashes. She is a woman in her own right, and no longer needs the constrains of her childhood; she symbolically burns her childhood at this point. It connects back to A (doll for mother) in that Vasilisa may now have her own daughters, and complete the cycle and her feminine potential. E-F-A is the "Maturity" triad, and shows Vasilisa's adulthood. The triads hold true for all of the other girls.
Axes:
D->A Axis = Mother Axis
Baba Yaga supplants the other mother influences at this point, and becomes the
negative aspect of the mother, while the doll grows to be the positive.
E->B Axis = Tasks Axis
For the doll-blessing for tasks-curse reasserts the positive mother influence
over the negative; the interplay between Vasilisa's real dead mothers (in the
doll) and Baba Yaga (in the tasks) allows Vasilisa to finally grow into an adult
woman; this cancels the stagnation of childhood, and the stepmother who, with
her task to find fire, represented that. Adult tasks are substituted for childish
tasks.
F->C Axis = Liminality and Growth Axis
F (fire for stepmother) cancels C (forest for home) along the Liminality/Growth
axis. Her stepmother vanquished and childhood conquered, Vasilisa can now return
home and leave her liminal state behind.
Sublimation:
Girls grow triple mothered.
Although I did not include it in my retelling for simplicity's sake, there is
a variant of Vasilisa that includes three horsemen. As Vasilisa wanders through
the forest, she comes upon a glorious red-haired horseman, clad all in red,
upon a red steed: when she sees him, suddenly it is morning. Later, she sees
a white-haired horseman, clad all in white, upon a white steed, and it becomes
midday. Lastly, she sees a raven-haired horseman, clad in entirely in black,
upon the purest black steed she has ever seen: and thus, it is night.
In this variant, after her three trials, Vasilisa questions Baba Yaga about the horsemen, and Baba Yaga casts her out for being too curious, too nosy. This can be interpreted as Vasilisa's maturity towards her life, and puberty; she no longer needs the help of Baba Yaga, as she has come to understand her adulthood on her own. In this way, the horsemen would not only stand for the three phases of the day cycle, but also the phases of the life cycle: childhood, adolescence, and adulthood. Each triad of the obviation replaces one phase for the next, just as the horsemen replace one another; much like day eventually reclaims night, thus Vasilisa's adulthood will spawn another childhood, with her own children.
In a coat of tattered tails
the lovely princesses tells her tales
hiding lovely golden locks
she wins her love with cooking crocks
Between the wizened trees in the howling forests of German land, there huddles
a girl with a coat of all kinds of fur, lost in the cold. She was once a princess,
now, she is Princess Furball. Without mother or stepmother, she finds herself
in relation to men, with her own cleverness.
As with all 510 tale girls, Furball's story begins with the death of her natural
mother. Unlike Vasilisa and Cinders, however, Furball's plight focuses more
on her relationship to men than it does to other women.
She does have a surrogate mother figure in the form of the governess, who does not appear in this variant, but in many others. Furball's governess basically raises the child once the queen dies; she is the one who teaches her to cook, clean, and make soup. She is responsible both for Furball's humility and willingness to work; like the helper-godmother of the other tales, she is the one who gives Furball the feminine skills necessary to achieve womanhood. This helper-godmother is not key to the tale, however, as Furball tales focus on her complex relationship to men; they are in tone darker and more concerned with sexuality.
There are also variants in which the father does not wish to marry his daughter, but holds a "love contest" and banishes her from the kingdom when she gives a simple, yet true answer. (Typically, "I love you as meat loves salt," far less flowery and poetic than her sisters, yet more true.) Shakespeare's King Lear borrows from this tale. Once the princess marries the distant Prince and invites her father to dinner, he realizes she truly loves him, and all is forgiven. Though less overtly sexual, this tale also has to do with a father's misplaced affections -- indeed, he wants his daughter to love him too much, and it's only when she finds herself a non-paternal object of affection that he realizes the error of his ways. This is similar to Labyrinth tale
Obviation:
A: The first substitution is the daughter for the mother. Like the other tales of this sort, the mother dies at the opening of the story, leaving the girl to face the impending issues by herself. In this case, the mother leaves her defenseless against the father...
B: At B is the substitution of monster (threat) for father; indeed, in some toned-down variants, the father does not want to marry his daughter... but simply sell her off to a hideous ogre. At this point, he is no longer her father, but a horrible monster, a threat, and something to be escaped.
C: At C comes forest for home, completing the first triad. With her father and mother both gone, home becomes an unsafe place, and she must enter into liminality.
D: The pre-liminal princess has been fully replaced by Furball, as she encounters the new kingdom. This is a reversal of her previous state; the high made low. Furball for Immature Princess.
E: The persona of Furball is in turn replaced by the Mysterious Princess. She is starting to enter the post-liminal state, but has not quite fully achieved the triumphant figure that she becomes when the prince reveals her...
F: Mysterious Princess replaced by Mature Princess. High again replaces low, adult replaces child, new replaces old, and all live happily ever after. Indeed, this Cinderella-type girl has replaced the "pump kin" for the prince!"
Axes:
D->A Axis = Identity Axis
The liminal power of Furball banishes the weakness of the prepubescent princess.
E->B Axis = Power Axis
As the Mysterious Princess, Furball can control princes -- which cancels out
her being controlled by her father, the king.
F->C = Home and Security Axis
Once she attains the state of a Mature Princess (woman), she no longer needs
to fear others, and thus can truly escape her liminal period.
Sublimation:
Although not quite Cinders, Furball replaces the "pump kin" for a Prince!
Though Cinders is known to you and me
godmothers traditionally grow as trees
yet only those with a dainty foot
will truly embrace the princely loot
Between stone walls and the forest hides a ragged figure of a girl, neither
daughter nor servant nor princess, yet all of these at once, and more. She knows
only duty and toil until her mother clothes her; her bark disguising her bite.
Finally, though she flees, she find salvation of the sole. Finally, we come
to the most well-known of all the 510 girls: Cinderella.
Although this tale is familiar to most every person in the American culture, most recall the variant in which a fairy godmother waves her magic wand, transforming Cinders' rags into a beautiful gown, white mice into horses, and a pumpkin into a golden coach. I have chosen to examine a variant that seems, to me, to be a bit closer in relation to the other 510 tales: instead of a seemingly random godmother, the helper figure takes the form of a magic tree, planted on her mother's grave, and watered daily by her tears.
In this tale, the helper is a tangible manifestation of the lost mother -- very similar to Vasilisa's doll-blessing. Cinderella is rewarded for her devotion and love to her dead mother. And the shoe remains, with all of its Freudian vaginal glory.
Obviation:
A: The first substitution is the tree for the mother. The mother dies (as she is obliged to do) but Cinderella re-incarnates her in the form of a tree.
B: At B is the substitution of the steps for the father. At this point, in all of the tales, the opposition is introduced; either a Father-monster or a Mother-monster. Like Vasilisa, Cinderella's threat is a Mother-monster.
C: At C comes the substitution of servant for daughter. Cinderella is forced into liminality by her stepmother by becoming a servant, much as Vasilisa is physically forced into the forest. Her status as a servant, low, signals her entrance into liminality. This is in accordance to Turner's work on liminal states, where one must become low in order to transform in the liminal time/space.
D: For D, we find the Fruit of Devotion in place of the Weeping Willow. As Cinderella has been so dutiful to her lost mother, the tree-mother figure rewards her with new, mature persona in the form of a dress.
E: They give an Eye for an Eye for a Toe for a Heel. The wicked stepsisters are punished, as all villains must be, and their wicked deeds are paid for in pieces of feet. Cinderella regains her mature identity as the foot fits. Freud would deliver the prince into vaginal glory by way of tiny tootsies.
F: For F, there is the classic Riches for Rags, happily-ever-after closure. Cinderella's virtues and peds transformed her into the elevated, mature figure of a princess. She leaves the liminal state, secure in her new position, and can finally be released from her mother's blessing/curse.
Axes:
D->A Axis = Devotion Axis
The devotion of Cinderella towards her mother pays off in tactile rewards. Her
mother's blessing cancels out the loss of the mother at A.
E->B Axis = False Identity Axis
At B, the stepmother and sisters take the false identity of Cinderella's family.
This is cancelled at E, where they are exposed as frauds.
F->C = Love and Money Axis
When Cinderella wins the heart of a prince, and the prince wins her feet and
vagina, she blossoms into a woman. This mature identity at F cancels C, the
liminal identity of the servant.
Sublimation:
Loyalty and love will save your sole.
Metarella knows what to do
to hie childhood hence with doll and shoe
and from supposed mother's help
turns maid from girl and adult from whelp
Despite the differences in focus and personality between the various 510 girls, they all deal with very similar issues about parenting. Cinderella and Vasilisa tales tend to focus on maternal worries and conflicts, while Furball deals with worries and concerns about the father. (Although there are certainly a wide range of tales, including some Slavic Vasilisa-type tales with the incestuous father.)
A simplified look at the obviation can be compress the various girls into the shared components of the tales:
A: The first substitution is Lack of Maternal Influence for Mother. The key
problem in all of these tales is the absence of the mother, which creates undue
worries and stress for the child. These manifest themselves in either worries
for the absent parent (lack of a mother figure, therefore inability to mature
into healthy female) or worries that the remaining parent will not perform adequately
(inappropriate father).
B: These worries take full shape in the form of Threat for Father. In father-centered tales, this is where he becomes a corrupted parent, either by lusting after his own daughter, promising her to a monster, or doubting her love. In mother-centered tales, the absent mother becomes threatening by not preparing the girl for womanhood, or even cursing the daughter, in the case of a ring. Usually, she is replaced by a horrible threatening stepmother.
C: The girl must now flee the dangerous situation she finds herself in and enter the challenging arena of liminality. While it is strange and frightening compared to her past safety, it now is a haven that will allow the girl to grow and progress through her adolescence. The substitution is Liminal State for Home Life. Interestingly, Cinderella and Vasilisa are almost forced to leave their home-life by the stepmother (or Mother-monster), both stepmothers force them into the role of a servant, thus setting off the entrance into the liminal state.
D: The Helper for the Lack of Maternal Influence. At this point, the manifestation or reincarnation of the maternal figure takes hold. Vasilisa's doll consoles her, Cinderella's tree rains and reigns down gifts, and Furball takes on a persona made possible by her nanny's upbringing. This is the beginning of her salvation, and concludes at...
E: Talents for Threat. At this point, the 510 girl actually integrates the power
that her maternal figure has given to her. Vasilisa works with her doll in order
to complete the tasks that Baba Yaga presents. Cinderella and Furball take on
the identity of Princesses; Cinderella clothed by her mother, Furball becoming
almost the reincarnation of hers.
F: Integrated Adulthood for Childish Fears. At the close of the story, the mature identity is secured, the prince is womanly won, and the liminal identity is cast aside. The threat of Mother-monster or Father-monster is forever banished; no longer a concern for the mature woman. She has made peace with her motherless past, she has conquered her repulsive relatives, and she's show virtues of vagina... er... foot. The 510 Girl can now live happily ever after.
Axes:
D->A Axis = Maternal Advice Axis
At D, the helper figure makes up for/cancels out the mother's absence at A.
E->B Axis = Manifestation Axis
The powers that manifest at E serve to combat and cancel the threat that was
presented at B.
F->C = Maturity Axis
When the 510 girl matures at F, she leaves the liminal space entered at C; her
mature identity cancels the need for liminality.
Sublimation:
Once she can bleed and not die, a girl's womanhood is mature and she fears
no monsters.
In other words: Pussy Power Pummels Perils.