14
Courtney Davis
Understanding Fairytales and Society
Dr. Heiniger
27 March 2014
“Every Rose Has It’s Thorn”
“Every Rose Has It’s Thorn,” a song produced by rock-metal band Poison in the 1980’s, uses the symbol of a rose to portray the lesson that no body is perfect, and that even something as beautiful as a rose is not without flaw, for it contains thorns. The symbol of a rose can hold an array of meanings. In the fairytale Beauty and the Beast, written by Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont, a rose is used as a symbol of love, beauty, honor, devotion, and even of secrets. In the story, roses are of equal importance to the main characters Beauty and Beast, which stands as a metaphor of equality between them. Beaumont’s fairytale teaches the lesson that love is not skin deep, and that though no one is perfect, a healthy relationship should be based on someone’s inner beauty, not purely the physical. Fairytales, their meanings, and the tropes that are present within them can change over time. In Disney’s film version of Beauty and the Beast, the rose holds significantly different meanings. The changes follow a pattern of romanticism of the material, and parallels the changes in both the dynamics of the relationships between the characters, and the messages derived from the fairytale. A trope is a powerful tool that is pivotal in the propagation of a specific message, and the variability it holds can greatly affect the interpretation the audience derives from a certain fairytale. The changes to the trope of the rose in the fairytale Beauty and the Beast is an example of how the messages derived from fairytales evolve and transfigure over time.
Beaumont’s version of the tale can be summarized through:
In the story of "Beauty and the Beast," a wealthy merchant with three beautiful daughters, the youngest incomparably lovely and good-hearted, loses everything through misfortune. Hearing of one cargo ship's safe return, the merchant sets out to straighten out his finances. His older girls clamor for rich gifts, but Beauty requests only a rose. After a fruitless journey, the merchant turns homeward, gets lost in a storm, and discovers a magic palace, where he plucks from the garden a rose. This theft arouses the wrath of a terrible Beast, who demands he either forfeit his life or give up a daughter. Beauty insists on sacrificing herself but becomes instead mistress of a palace and develops an esteem for the Beast. In spite of her growing attachment to him, however, she misses her ailing father and requests leave to care for him. Once home, she is diverted by her two sisters from returning to the palace until nearly too late. She misses the Beast, arrives to find him almost dead with grief, and declares her love, thereby transforming him into a prince who makes her his bride.” (Hearne, 74-76)
In this version, a rose was the symbol of many qualities present in the character Beauty. The attributes Beauty modeled were to be illustrations of proper behavior for Beaumont’s intended audience, young women and girls in upper class society (Tatar, 58). Beauty professed her wish for a single rose to her father when she stated, “‘Perhaps you could bring me a rose, for they do not grow here.’ It was not that Beauty was really anxious to have a rose, but she didn't want to make her sisters look bad” (Tatar, 63). Beauty’s modest desire for a rose, paralleled by the lavish yearnings of her sisters, modeled the characteristics of humility, patience, and selflessness. These attributes were illustrations of proper behavior for young girls during the time the tale was written. These virtues are pervasive throughout the tale, and the trope of the rose aids in the illustration of these attributes. In many ways, Beauty represents the red blossoms a rose, which symbolically represent Beauty’s coming of age to be married, her blossoming fertility, sexuality, and her youth, “[R]ed flowers stand for the fruitful aspect of womb blood” (Vaz Da Silva, 245). The rose is also used as a symbol of her devotion (“Rose Meaning and Symbolism”). Beaumont distinctly indicates Beauty’s lack of eagerness for a rose, stemming from her discretion to her sisters, and their extravagant wishes. This lack of eagerness illustrates Beauty’s love and devotion to her family, as well as the absence of her desire to be married off. This lack of desire to be married off was pertinent to Beaumont’s intended audience who, at the time the fairytale was written, would have been subjected to arranged marriages. Beauty must overcome the obstacle of the balance between her devotion to her family, and the imminent future of marriage to a stranger, along with the sexuality that comes with this new life. The character of the Beast, and Beauty’s sacrifice of herself to his demand to save her father’s life, represents Beauty’s forceful arrangement into a life symbolic of marriage. These attributes and characteristics are equally propagated through the trope of the rose because a rose is of significant importance to both characters.
The character of the Beast indicates his love of roses when he says to Beauty’s father, “I have saved your life by giving you shelter in my castle, and you repay me by stealing my roses, which I love more than anything in the world” (Tatar, 65). Like Beauty, the trope of a rose communicates many characteristics about the Beast. His love of roses indicates his honor, compassion, kindness, and devotion as roses hold these symbolic meanings (“Rose Meaning and Symbolism”). These virtuous attributes are, in the end, what make Beauty fall in love with him, and thus break the curse. In many ways, the Beast’s physical appearance serves as a representation of a rose’s thorns. His dangerous, horrific exterior makes it nearly impossible for people to see who he really is on the inside, much like roses who’s beautiful blooms cannot be touched because they are encased in thorns. It is the Beast’s virtues that Beauty falls in love with, but it is his exterior that she has to get past. Beauty got past the thorns of the Beast in order to see the beautiful blossoms of his inner soul, which is when she truly fell in love with him, “It is neither good looks nor great intelligence that makes a woman happy with her husband, but character, virtue, and kindness” (Tatar, 75). These trials and tribulations Beauty needed to overcome are symbolically represented by the roses’s thorns.
The equality of each character in the relationship, and their equal importance to the perpetuation of the story, was symbolically represented by their shared love for roses. This equality was also illustrated through the equal importance placed on Beauty’s character development, and the metamorphosis of the Beast, both situations represented symbolically by roses. Beauty needed to overcome the Beast’s “thorns,” a trial that is also symbolic of the way young girls had to get past their own budding sexuality, and the sexuality of the suitor in the arranged marriage. Beauty’s character development is marked by her triumph and acceptance of the sexuality of the Beast, indicating a maturation from her childhood beliefs of sexuality. Though she began her journey in a self-sacrificing fashion to save her father, Beauty develops a true love for the Beast preceded by an establishment of a friendship relationship, rather than a relationship purely based on lust and desire. This establishment of friendship before lust was strengthened by the Beast’s haggard exterior, to where no physical attraction could be derived. His “Beast” exterior, and the animality associated with the term, enhances the image of foreign and exotic sexuality of the suitors, “[B]easts function as veiled symbols representing sexuality that children must initially experience as disgusting before they reach maturity and discover its beauty” (Talairach-Vielmas, 272). Beauty had to establish her love based purely on his inner character, shown through his kindness and virtue, “Is it his fault he is ugly and lacks intelligence? He is kind. That is worth more than anything else. Why haven’t I wanted to marry him? I would be happier with him than my sisters are with their husbands. It is neither good looks nor great intelligence that makes a woman happy with her husband, but character, virtue, and kindness” (Tatar, 75). Beauty’s equality in the relationship was also established through the fact that the curse could only be broken if Beauty willed it, through desiring him. This basis on the heroine’s will gave equality in the relationship, much like Beauty had to have the perseverance to get past the Beast’s thorns. It also parallels the preparatory process the young girls would have to go through in arranged marriages, and marks the climax of Beauty’s character development, “Beauty finishes by comprehending that, when she is prepared, the monster is not a beast but a man more seductive than her father… Beauty matures. She accepts the sexual reality of the beast with lucidity. Thereby she gets rid of her taboos and infantile fears” (Zipes, 120). In this way, Beauty’s character development was as significant to the plot as the Beast’s metamorphosis into the handsome prince.
This equality in the relationship, and it’s perpetuation through the association with the symbolism of roses, gives the moral of Beaumont’s story a healthy message for young girls. The moral Beaumont’s version of Beauty and the Beast is that beauty is not skin deep, and that love should be based on the inner beauty of an individual and not their appearance. Beauty falls for the Beast’s kindness, tenderness, and character, which is the mark of a beautiful heart, “There are certainly many men more monstrous than you,’ said Beauty. ‘I like you better, even with your looks, than men who hide false, corrupt, and ungrateful hearts behind charming manners” (Tatar, 71). Through this, it also teaches the idea that deep relationships are produced from a basis of friendship first, and a connection between individuals, instead of the shallow relationships produced from lust and desire harbored from physical attraction. Beauty saw past the Beast’s exterior, and based her love on the his character, “You were the only person in the world kind enough to be touched by the goodness of my character” (Tatar, 77). Her perseverance through his “thorny” exterior was rewarded, and the Beast was transformed into someone as handsome on the outside as the inside, “You preferred virtue to looks and intelligence, and so you deserve to see those qualities united in a single person” (Tatar, 77). Beaumont portrays a healthy relationship by telling her readers that “esteem and tenderness are the best basis for marriage” (Ross, 61). In the beginning, Belle desired a rose because they didn’t grow where she lived. She didn’t want a rose so she could show everyone, or possess it; she wanted a rose to appreciate it. It is this message that Beaumont teaches: that love is about appreciation not possession. Love is about appreciation of an individual, even though every rose has it’s thorn, and no one is perfect, they have beauty that is found within, which is worth more than possessing someone who looks good on the outside, but holds no beauty on the inside.
Fairytales change. They are a dynamic force, that mold to the times. Through this evolution, the symbols, themes, and messages present in them change along with the fairytale. In Disney’s version of Beauty and the Beast, the trope of a rose, and the symbolism it holds changes drastically, which in turn changes the message derived from the fairytale. Disney makes changes and, “[F]ocuses attention on the romantic aspects of fairytales” (Cummins, 23). This romanticization of the plot, it accentuates the most sentimental and romantic aspects of the story at the expense of its moral and psychological complexity. This romanticization is paralleled through the changing role of the trope of the rose.
In Disney’s version, Belle has no association with roses, while a rose has everything to do with the Beast. This redistribution of the trope reflects an unbalanced dynamic in the relationship that is perpetuated throughout the story, exemplifying a diminishing role for Belle in the relationship. Belle is initially presented as an independent, well-educated woman, with a deep love for her father. Though her love for her father drives her to sacrifice herself to save him, it becomes Belle’s duty to break the spell for the Beast, and her independent interests are completely disregarded, “Belle’s desires, her interest in exploration and education, have no meaning except in terms of how they can be manipulated into a romance to benefit the Beast and the bewitched servants” (Cummins, 24). This denigration of the female side of the relationship can be symbolically represented by Belle’s lack of love for roses. The audience loses the symbolism of the “thorns” she must overcome, and her blossoming female sexuality, as well as her personal development through this change in the trope of the rose. Belle’s independent traits she began with are diminished, and the emphasis is placed purely on her loving characteristics that could be used to break the spell, “The emphasis is on Belle’s nurturing tenderness, her beauty, her sexuality, and her happily ever after commitment to the beast. Each of the refreshing traits set up at the beginning of the story is diminished or eliminated” (Cummins, 27). Belle’s desires and aspirations are reduced, except to when they can be romantically manipulated into breaking the spell. An example of this is Beast giving Belle the library, at the prodding of the enchanted objects. The prompting of the enchanted objects towards the Beast to give Belle the library indicate the library’s use as a mechanism for Belle to be wooed into loving the Beast. Another example is the fact that the only time Belle is actually seen reading is when she is reading to help teach the Beast, “[T]his scene emphasizes Belle and the Beast reading together and thus developing their relationship more than it conveys the idea that Belle is reading to increase her knowledge or pleasure. Here is a crucial indication that Belle’s quest for adventure and education will be swallowed by the romance plot” (Cummins, 25). Instead of emphasizing Belle’s growth, Disney solely emphasizes Belle’s individual traits as being significant for how they can break the spell, and thus eliminates Belle’s character development.There is virtually no character development present in the story for Belle, which is in direct contrast to the clear portrayal of Beauty’s maturation and growth in Beaumont’s version. In contrast, Beaumont made it clear that Beauty and Beast’s establishment of a deep friendship connection was the result of concrete communication at nightly, shared dinners. This is removed in Disney’s version, “[T]his period of mutual education is collapsed into a few moments of screen time… [It] is clear here who evolves and who stays essentially the same. Disney consciously discarded the dinner scenes, diminishing the reciprocity and mutual growth on which Beauty and the Beast’s relationship rests” (Cummins, 26). This diminishing role of Belle in the relationship, her lack of character development, and the significance of her individuality directly parallels her lack of association with roses. Belle’s lack of association with roses, and the heightened importance of roses’s to the Beast, alludes to the fact that Belle’s sole purpose in the story is to fall in love with the Beast and undo the spell. Through this, Belle becomes purely an object of desire, who is only necessary in the plot to transform the Beast and break the spell. The story becomes completely about the Beast’s metamorphosis.