Rapunzel's Salad Mix: Letting It All Hang Out

I am currently doing what I consider one of my better programs for kids using several books about Rapunzel.  I serendipitously happened on this theme, completely oblivious that Disney was in the process of releasing a Rapunzel of its own, Tangled, which I hope to see later today.  I actually picked this story because of my library's abundance of copies of Paul Zindel's beautiful, Renaissance-style, Caldecott-winning take on this Grimm (grim) classic which contains lots of horrible stuff; baby selling/abduction, the weird co-dependent relationship between the old witch and Rapunzel, child neglect, attempted murder, separated families, etc.   I am pairing the Zindel with Rachel Isadora's Eric Carle-inspired African version and doing a split reading of a bit from one and then a bit from the other till the tale is told to it's happily-ever-after-a-lot-of weird-and-disturbing-stuff finish.  I conclude my program with the more light-hearted parody version, Falling for Rapunzel by Leah Wilcox, where the prince ends up riding off into the sunset with Rapunzel's maid, leaving Rapunzel free to style her hair without interruption.

I finally watched some of the popular MTV show, 16 and Pregnant, and something about it reminds me of the darkness of the Rapunzel story.  Maybe there is a link between our cultural fascination with Rapunzel's tragedy and the stories of the teen-aged moms and their boyfriends/husbands/dads-to-be on 16 and Pregnant.  IMHO Rapunzel's story would make a pretty good episode.

Think about it.  Rapunzel's guardian/abductor, the evil sorceress, does not recognize or respect the vows of two teenage lovers and kicks Rapunzel out of the house/tower once she finds out that Rapunzel is pregnant and then tries to do in the prince when he shows up to visit his wifey.  At least the Prince doesn't cheat on Rapunzel like the dad in one episode of the show that I watched.  But then the Prince was blind because he cried so much or got thorns in his eyes depending on which version you read.  A person now-a-days that cried that much would probably be treated for depression.

Lots of the Grimm stories are fairly unpleasant, cautionary tales directed principally at young women.  According to Valerie Paradiz's book, Clever Maids, this is because Jacob and Wilhelm's principle sources for their stories were their sister, Lotte, and her friends, who told these stories as they sat together sewing, the classic work of women (check out Women's Work:  The First 20,000 Years by Dr. Elizabeth Wayland Barber for more on that).  Lotte ended up stuck at home caring for her brothers (a total of 5 guys) after their parents died.  Lotte is the real Cinderella because taking care of a houseful of guys was a lot of work for a woman in those days and supposedly Lotte was less than thrilled to be stuck doing it.  Maybe she really did hope that one day a prince would show up and take her away for real.  At least the girls of 16 and Pregnant have more opportunities open to them than Lotte did, even if their lives would probably be easier if they had waited to become parents when they were older.  Hopefully, like Rapunzel, they will have happy endings, too.  Bringing those babies to Story Time at their local library would be a great start.