![]() Interpretations seem to vary, depending on which translation or retelling of the fairy-tale one reads-and depending on the academic or professional lens through which a particular critic views the story.ĭespite all of its magical trappings-and all of its many interpretations-at its heart La Belle et la Bête remains a simple and timeless fairy tale. Still others claim that the story is primarily a means of tackling the subject of conflict between the aristocracy and the bourgeoisie. Some critics argue that Beauty and the Beast promotes the idea that women should be submissive and self-sacrificing. Once she has gone from her father’s house, she can finally accept the part of her which is animal-like and sexual, thus transforming from girl to woman. Indeed, some modern scholars state that the Beast is merely a symbol for Beauty’s animal nature. ![]() Over the years, critics have argued that the story contains psychological themes, feminist themes, and themes of erotic pleasure. Metempsychosis is just one of the many themes which have been read into the tale of Beauty and the Beast. Lord, we know what we are, but we know not what we may be.”īeauty and the Beast, London: George Routledge and Sons, 1874. “ They say the owl was a baker’s daughter. When the baker’s daughter refuses to feed him, he changes her into an owl. Humans who have been transformed into animals figure in many stories which pre-date the first publication of La Belle et la Bête. As Hardwick points out, Shakespeare “has several remarkable references to this superstition.” For example, during one scene in Hamlet, Ophelia recites a portion of the legend of The Baker’s Daughter in which Christ, in the guise of a beggar, visits a baker’s shop, begging for a loaf of bread. “It appeared to Landor that Pythagoras, who settled in Italy, and had many followers in the Greek colony of the Phocaeans at Marseilles, and engrafted on a barbarous and bloodthirsty religion the human doctrine of the metempsychosis for that finding it was vain to say, ‘Do not murder,’ as none ever minded that doctrine, he frightened the savages by saying, ‘If you are cruel even to the beasts and insects, the cruelty will fall upon yourselves you will be the same.’” To explain this, Hardwick quotes from an earlier essay on the origins of the religion of the Druids: Or, at least, not to commit murder or other savageries. The belief that a soul could migrate into the body of another creature was added incentive to treat creatures kindly. ![]() Illustration from Beauty and the Beast by Eleanor Vere Boyle, 1875. “It is especially the object of the Druids to inculcate this-that souls do not perish, but, after death, pass into other bodies and they consider that, by this belief more than anything else, men may be led to cast away the fear of death, and to become courageous.” ![]() In his 1872 book Traditions, Superstitions, and Folklore, Charles Hardwick explains the reasoning behind metempsychosis during the time of the Druids, writing: Metempsychosis, or the transmigration of souls, was the idea that a human soul did not perish at death, but instead moved on to another physical body-often that of an animal. In fact, according to one Victorian scholar, tales of humans cursed to live as animals owed more to the ancient belief in metempsychosis than to morality and romance. However, there was far more to the tale of La Belle et la Bête than simple advice to young ladies that they must look deeper than surface appearances. A lesson on choosing a worthy (though possibly less attractive) man instead of a handsome rake or a scoundrel. This is a lesson which many an eighteenth and nineteenth century parent would have sought to drive home to their daughters. A young woman learns which qualities are most important in a prospective husband and, only by choosing wisely, does she earn her happy ending. Taken as a whole, La Belle et la Bête appears, on its face, to be more of a morality lesson than a fairy tale. Cover of Beauty and the Beast, An Illustrated Picture Book by Walter Crane, 1874.
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