McKinley: feminist fairy tales

>I just remembered one of my other favorite
books when I was little - "The Ordinary
Princess," by M.M. Kaye. It's out of print, but
there are lots of copies around... I love the
illustrated hardcover. The story is pretty
awesome, too, all you lovers of 'girls who do
things.' She doesn't exactly go out and kill
dragons, but she's not a layabout, delicate
>little blond angel of a princess, certainly.

Danielle, then you've GOT to read "Happily Ever After" by Anna Quinlen. A
review of it says:

Quindlen adds a lively entry to the popular 1990s genre of feminist fractured
fairy tales. "I rescued myself!" It's a magic baseball mitt that transforms
fourth-grader Kate into a princess in a medieval castle. Then the tomboy
discovers she is supposed to spend her time watching from windows, sewing
tapestries, and listening to the prince sing boring love songs. Instead, Kate
slits her long skirt, helps slay the dragon, teaches the witch and the troll
to play jacks and "tic-tack toe," and sets up a baseball game between the
maids and the ladies-in-waiting. Much of the fun is in the contemporary parody
of the age of chivalry ("Princess, schmincess--in baseball, effort is what
counts"), and Stevenson's line-and-watercolor illustrations combine the
laid-back, the silly, and the wild.

It is such a cute story. A friend of mine read it and immediately bought a
copy for my younger daughter, in memory of her older sister (also my
daughter), a midshipman at USNA, who died in '93. Neither girl is the
retiring, lay-about type!

Betty

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Received on Fri Aug 6 18:34:16 1999