“…it is likely that the “inner world” of our Western psychological experience, like the supernatural heaven of Christian belief, originates in the loss of our ancestral reciprocity with the animate earth. When the animate powers that surround us are suddenly construed as having less significance than ourselves, when the generative earth is abruptly defined as a determinate object devoid of its own sensations and feelings, then the sense of a wild and multiplicitous otherness (in relation to which human existence has always oriented itself) must migrate, either into a supersensory heaven beyond the natural world, or else into the human skull itself–the only allowable refuge, in this world, for what is ineffable and unfathomable.” - David Abram, The Spell of the Sensuous

Stories of humans transforming into animals, and vice versa, occur across vast periods of history, and numerous cultures. Since we originally transformed from animals, through evolution, it makes sense that a connection to the animal world as kin would be enduring.

I find the rich history of these beloved stories so compelling because there are so many aspects of self, of individual quests and psychic journeys, embodied in them. A story like “Beauty and the Beast” is iconic enough to leave an impression that the role of enchanted human is typically a prince. But there are numerous enduring examples of women in the form of ‘beasts,’ as well - two of my favorites are the Japanese folktale, “The Crane Wife,” and the myth of the selkie (which has clear ties to last month’s story, “The Little Mermaid”).

In psychology, the truth of this hidden animal aspect of our human selves might be referred to as the ‘shadow self.’ In storytelling, it might be exemplified by ‘the wild twin’: a second self, born with us but rejected (or unwilling to be tamed) who is thrown out the window of the birthing room (or leaps away), and toward whom we feel, for the rest of our days on earth, a distinctive longing.

Is that not a gorgeous metaphor for human evolution itself? Our births and transformations occurring simultaneously, not bound by the neatly colored timelines of science textbooks, but existing in an alchemy of time, spirit, intuition, and imagination…

So how did all of this get bound up, through the vessel of the story of “The Beauty and the Beast,” with a little thing called marriage?

"Underneath the confectionary spectacle of the wedding is a case study in how inequality bestows outsize information on women as compensation for making us disappear.” – Jia Tolentino, “I Three Dread”, Trick Mirror

Fairytales are entertaining, especially the animated film versions I grew up on, but they exist for the purpose of helping us understand being human. They are rooted in the ancient storytelling that gave us the foundations of literature, along with every scrap of holy and religious text that exist today, and the myriad versions of myths that have survived.

The union of marriage as a division between childhood and adulthood through the portal of sexual intercourse was - and in many ways, remains - a terrifying transformation. A leap into the unknown that is commonly associated with pain, violence, and fear for young women and girls. One of the interesting things I came across in my reading is a story that acknowledges that pain, violence, and fear for boys, as well. The vagina dentata, or “toothed vagina”, symbolized the male fear of being irreparably harmed, or irreversibly consumed, by the act of sex and the contract of marriage that came to be associated with it.

When I wrote “The Origin of the Prostitute,” I was thinking of the female experience, and specifically the impact of ownership of a female body under patriarchal rules: before a woman is owned by her husband, she is a girl owned by her father. The modern versions of “The Beauty and the Beast” tell an empowering tale of a woman in search of the key to free her love from an ugly enchantment. I’m interested in the underlayments of stories, the elements and signals and messages that may cause harm to the female psyche, without us even noticing they were there.

“Her ire tapped into my deepening anxiety that calling a woman “vulnerable” in relation to her writing was a way of praising her not for her artistry but for her exposure – for her willingness to make her fragility a public commodity.” – Leslie Jamison, “Cult of the Literary Sad Woman” (New York Times gift link)

A precursor to “The Beauty and the Beast” might be the myth of Demeter and her daughter, Persephone, abducted by Hades and dragged to his kingdom in the underworld. (Although Persephone’s father isn’t part of this story, to me that underscores the importance of Demeter as the goddess of creation, connecting back to a time when paternity was irrelevant.) Demeter, a name linked to the phrase ‘earth mother,’ is also associated with transformation into a female horse, or mare, a detail that immediately brought to mind the beautiful illustrations and poetry of Paul Goble’s, “The Girl Who Loved Wild Horses.”

Interestingly, when Demeter’s persistence in grieving for Persephone results in the temporary exchange of her companionship aboveground (the origin story of the seasons of spring and summer) with Hades’ possession of her below ground (autumn and winter), Hades binds Persephone to him by feeding her pomegranate seeds. I think it’s significant that such a powerful male god would need to engage in extra trickery to maintain that power. It’s something I see in other stories (a favorite example is “East of the Sun, West of the Moon”) as a complication of the marriage union, and how a husband’s effort to possess his wife’s body, heart, and mind meet a formidable foe in the the strength of a young woman’s bond to the mother who raised her.

The famous apple in the Biblical story of Genesis is thought to be a derivation of the pomegranate, a fruit which would have been common in what we now call Iran, where the Bible’s stories originated. In Genesis, Eve’s consumption of the apple results in the female body bearing the sins of the physical, while the mind, intellect, and spirit remain at home in man. Through “The Origin of the Prostitute,” I was thinking about how certain stories narrate the transformation of a girl’s experience of love to a woman’s experience of sex - and the accompanying wild freedom of her sexual desire - so that it becomes bound by male determination.

“…to me it symbolizes something harsher, which is the vulnerability of the female body to attack and the difficulty of assimilating the experience of objectification. The artist locates herself between power and victimhood, knowing that creativity has to survive the porousness that is the essence of artistic individuality.” – Rachel Cusk, “Can a Woman Who Is an Artist Ever Just Be an Artist?” (New York Times gift link)

If that isn’t enough analysis for you, I have one last thread to pull, and that is the presence of the ever-important threes in this poem. A common number in fairytales, three is also represented by the myth of Persephone through the life cycle: descent into the underwold as loss or death, Demeter’s search as the journey of life, and Persephone’s ascent as a reunion, rebirth, or afterlife.

The colors black, white, and red, are a series of three that also carry heavy symbolism in storytelling. Black was seen to be a ‘dissolving of one’s old values’, red was ‘sacrifice of one’s previously held illusions,’ and white a ‘new light, new knowing that comes from having experienced the first two.’

Recently, I read Judith Herman’s, Truth and Repair, and it reminded me that no matter how many times I hear that acknowledgement is key to healing, or recognize a name for something I didn’t have a name for before, I feel my heart burst open each time with the truth of it.

It strikes me that the ‘truth serum’ of true love’s kiss in a story like “Beauty and the Beast” is a version of that naming or acknowledgement. Only when we get to the stage of trauma where we can name it do our hearts take that first step to reopening.

“Only if words are felt, bodily presences, like echoes or waterfalls, can we understand the power of spoken language to influence, alter, and transform the perceptual world.” - David Abram, The Spell of the Sensuous

In May, I will have a preorder link to share, along with the full list of poem titles to mull over. In June, we’ll celebrate.

And then I’ll take some time to think about the evolution of this newsletter (other than a place to share dates where I’ll be reading). What do you most want to hear about…new work in progress? The daily struggle of meeting the page? Thoughts and ideas on the evolution of creative spirituality? Let me know what has resonated the most, and what you long for.

I’ll see you in April for a meditation on our sixth story, the myth of Ariadne and her golden thread, and what this famous tale has to do with gender identity.

Thank you for reading,

D.

archive

February 9: Seven Stories: The Little Mermaid

January 9: Seven Stories: Thumbelina (sort of)

December 9: Seven Stories: The Sleeping Beauty

November 9: Seven Stories: Snow White

October 9: Frankenstein Edition

September 9: On Longing

August 9: Productivity and Process

July 9: On Wolves and Women

June 9: Book Announcement

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