“It Simply Isn’t Done:” Princesses, Agency, and Gender Roles in The Enchanted Forest Chronicles: Par
This is part 2 of an essay about the princess trope and gender roles in The Enchanted Forest Chronicles. For part 1 of this essay, go here.
Examining the Text: Verbs and Actions
Looking at exactly how Wrede goes about confounding the tropes of fantasy, princesses, and gender expectations allows a much clearer view of why The Enchanted Forest Chronicles is so important. She begins very simply, with verbs in Dealing with Dragons. Each of the chapters in the books use long, descriptive titles of what will happen in the chapter. Almost all of the chapter titles have active verbs related to Cimorene. Just some of these action verbs are refuses, discovers, meets, makes, snoops, casts, and conducts. In addition to the verbs being action verbs, most of the titles also go on to describe a specific action. Chapter one, for instance, is titled “In Which Cimorene Refuses to Be Proper and Has a Conversation with a Frog.” Just the title of the chapter alone sends a message about agency going forward. Cimorene is going to refuse to be proper. This refusal shows that she has her own self-agency, regardless of what anyone else thinks. The refusal to bow to expectations of gender and role also lead directly back to ideas of feminism. The second part of the chapter title involves her interaction with another character, but as with many of the chapter titles, Cimorene’s action come first, followed by any secondary characters. The action always comes back to Cimorene in this way, from the chapter titles onward.
Chapter titles are the first thing that a young reader sees before they start actually reading the chapter. Giving the reader the expectation that Cimorene is going to be active sets the reader up to accept the action when it happens. Chapter 7 of Dealing, for example, is titled “In Which Cimorene and Kazul Make a Journey Underground.” Before they even undertake this journey the expectation is set up that the journey will be made, in this case, without the assistance of any men. Cimorene and Kazul, two women (albeit of two different species) are the ones who will undertake the action typically performed by men. Chapter 9 is titled “In Which Therandil Is a Dreadful Nuisance and Cimorene Casts a Spell,” actively contrasting the useless Prince Therandil with the helpful and intelligent Cimorene. The reader sees right away that the male in this chapter is going to be unhelpful, while the Princess who usually has to count on the rescuing Prince/knight is going to do something useful to take care of herself by the use of the verbs “is” and “casts”. The verb for Therandil merely shows his existence, while Cimorene’s verb gives her an action. Chapter 14, “In Which the Wizards Try to Make Trouble, and Cimorene Does Something About It,” is yet another example of upsetting expectations with the title by using certain verbs. In this case, the wizards (who are all males) are going to “try,” while Cimorene is simply going to do something. This again sets up the expectation of who will be active before the reading of the chapter even starts. When Wrede uses active verbs to set up the action in her chapters, she signals to the reader that Cimorene herself will be active, while also continuing to make the point that Cimorene is in charge of her own actions. She won’t sit around and wait. Instead, she does things, and this act of doing things is the first signal that she can be a feminist role model.
Examining the Text: Refusing to ‘Act Like a Princess’
Moving on to the content of the books themselves, Wrede immediately sets up the idea that Cimorene is living in a typical fantasy realm, with stereotypical gender expectations, and stereotypical ideas of what a princess is supposed to be, only to subvert those stereotypes. In describing the kingdom of Linderwall, she writes, “There were the usual periodic problems with royal children and uninvited fairy godmothers, but they were always the sort of thing that could be cleared up by finding the proper prince or princess to marry the unfortunate child a few years later. All in all, Linderwall was a very prosperous and pleasant place” (Wrede 1). The setting is presented as this typical fantasy world in which marriage can solve problems., and a simple kiss can cure a curse. However, the very next line subverts that setting: “Cimorene hated it” (1). Here is an immediate refusal of the tropes and expectations. Cimorene’s very appearance and disposition also acts as a subversion in itself. She is described as having black hair instead of the more sought after blond hair. She is tall. Her disposition is described as either “strong-willed” or when people were “angry or annoyed with her […] stubborn as a pig” (2), all descriptions that fly in the face of the expected princess. Much of the first chapter is set up to show Cimorene’s attempts to make her existence more palatable. She attempts to do the things-as Wrede referred to in the introduction-that interest her most. She tries her hand at fencing, magic, and Latin, but each time, she is ordered to stop because it is not princess-like. All through this process, however, Cimorene keeps her strong personality, even insisting that since she does it and she is a princess, then it must be something that is done by princesses. This insistence that if a person is doing something then it is something that can be done by that person acts as an example to young readers who might see societal pressure to act a certain way or do certain things because of their gender.
For Cimorene, the decision to completely break from gender expectation and strike out on her own comes when she is asked to marry a prince. In her first interactions with the prince, there is an immediate flipping of the typical gender expectation. The prince is holding a sword, which he refers to as “lovely.” The expectation would be for the girl or the ‘silly princess’ to refer to a sword as lovely, but instead Cimorene picks up the sword and immediately notes that “the balance is off.” This, again, switches the expected roles, as a male would normally be the one to notice such a problem with the sword. Young readers can, once again, see an example of how to respond to attempts to force behavior based on gender. Cimorene then attempts to talk the prince out of the marriage, but with no luck. Her parents are no better in response, insisting that they marry. Modern sensibilities might rebel against the idea of being forced in to marriage, but within the world of the fantasy tropes that have been set up here, it should make perfect sense for Cimorene to accept her fate. Instead, she rebels against this fate, and after having a conversation with a talking frog, she takes her fate into her own hands. Instead of staying and waiting to be forced into marriage, she follows the frog’s advice, and finds her own way out of the proposed marriage. Rather than waiting patiently for her prince, she intentionally goes the opposite way to avoid him. The decision to avoid a marriage being forced on her certainly falls into Hooks’ definition of feminism. She is not only refusing the oppression of marriage, but also refusing the oppression of continuing to live in a place where she is continually told what to do based on her gender.
Later on in Dealing Cimorene exhibits behavior that normally falls into representations of male actions in children’s literature. She climbs a cliff in order to hold off the knights who keep coming to try to save her. When one of the knights comes to rescue her and she hurts her ankle, rather than allowing him to carry her off, she convinces him that he wouldn’t be able to fight off a dragon and carry her at the same time. In this case she uses her wits to get what she wants and stay with her dragon. In comparison, the ‘brave knight’ has a completely different response to the idea of the dragons returning for her: “’You can’t stay here!’ Therandil protested, though Cimorene’s talk of when all the dragons come back had plainly made him nervous” (42). The direct comparison of using intelligence to solve problems with the fear in Therandil causing him to give up on his goal shows just how capable Cimorene is when it comes to taking care of her own self interests. Later on, Therandil returns yet again to try to rescue her and ends up trying to help her organize things in the cave. Instead of actually being helpful, however, he ends up accidentally releasing a genie from a bottle who wants to kill them. In a subversion of gender roles, he becomes the naïve figure, while Cimorene must use her wits again to save both of them from sure death. Again, Cimorene refuses to be the naïve princess who needs saving. The only time she actually acts naïve is when she knows she can use expectations for her own purposes. She does this with the plotting wizards, acting naïve and dimwitted in order to get information out of them, all the while plotting in her head about how to defeat the wizards.
Fear and nervousness, of course, do not need to be completely absent for characters to be a great feminist role model, but the example of how to deal with that fear or nervousness becomes of tantamount importance. While there are examples of Cimorene getting nervous in the books, she always overcomes those thoughts of fear and figures out a way around what is troubling her. When she and the dragon Kazul have to find their way through tunnels that often become pitch black by magical means, Cimorene responds to this frustration by saying “next time I’m going to bring a cane” instead of panicking in the dark or saying that she’ll never return. Even when fear does effect her, it’s never for long as can be seen in this scene:
For an instant, Cimorene was frozen by surprise and fear. Then she ducked and reached for her sword.
She was almost too slow. The bird was on top of her, shrieking and slashing, before she had done more than grasp the hilt of her weapon. But the sword seemed to leap out of the scabbard as soon as she touched it, and she swung clumsily as she rolled aside. She did not expect to do any damage, just to force the bird to back away a little, but she felt the swrod connect and heard a wail of pain from the bird. Thanking all her lucky stars individually and by name, Cimorene twisted and scrambled to her feet, sword ready.
There was nothing for her to guard against. The sword stroke had been more effective than she realized. The bird was dying. As she stared at it, it raised it’s head.
“You killed me?” the bird said incredulously, “But you’re a maiden.” (109)
In this example, while Cimorene does freeze for just a moment, she almost immediately recovers, and succeeds in slaying the vicious bird. Upon realizing who has defeated it, the birds reaction is shock and amazement that a girl could do such a thing. Before it dies, the bird tells her that she can take three magical feathers as a reward, or ‘forfeit.’ Cimorene asks the bird a question to find out if she can use the magical feathers to transport more than just herself, and the bird responds by saying “For once a human with sense is getting the forfeit” (110). The bird has stopped seeing her as just a girl in that moment, and instead sees her as an intelligent person worthy of respect.
This example is only one moment when other characters respond to Cimorene’s refusal to follow typical princess rules. Throughout Dealing with Dragons, Cimorene’s family, suitors, and even fairy godmother, respond to her desires to be different in the same way: By noting that it “isn’t proper.” In response to her desire to take fencing lessons, she is told “it simply isn’t done,” and that even though she is doing it and is a princess, that it still isn’t proper. This continues on throughout. When Cimorene first encounters the dragons and volunteers to be their princess, they note that it is “out of the question,” and that “no proper princess” would volunteer to be a dragon’s princess. When she tries to convince a knight to tell the other knights not to rescue her, he starts to say that it’s just not done, but before he can even speak, Cimorene realizes what he is going to say and finishes his point for him.
One way that Wrede sets up the idea of Cimorene as an exceptionally different princess is by contrasting her with other princesses in the story. In her first interaction with other dragon’s princesses in Dealing, she finds herself interacting with three much more typical princesses. All of them are blond and proper, and aghast at Cimorene’s behavior. They also can’t wait to be rescued by a prince or a knight. One of the princesses, however, is more open to Cimorene’s subversions. Alianora becomes Cimorene’s friend, and becomes less and less ‘princesslike’ the more time that they spend together. As she is exposed to the adventurous princess, she becomes more adventurous and willing to take care of herself than she had previously been. In one instance, they see a wizard doing something suspicious. Alianora wants to ignore it and leave, but instead, the following happens: “”How else are we going to find out who it is?” Cimorene asked reasonably. She shook off Alianora’s hand. Quietly, she walked over to the clump of bushes and peered around it. Alianora followed with evident reluctance” (137). Here we see Cimorene provide the example, and although Alianora is reluctant, she still takes part in an act that she previously would have refused. It acts almost as a guide to the potential readers, showing an example of seeing the behavior that subverts gender expectations and learning from that behavior.