{"id":11064,"date":"2012-06-18T09:00:06","date_gmt":"2012-06-18T08:00:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.badreputation.org.uk\/?p=11064"},"modified":"2012-06-18T09:00:06","modified_gmt":"2012-06-18T08:00:06","slug":"kickass-princesses-part-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/badreputation.org.uk\/2012\/06\/18\/kickass-princesses-part-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Kickass Princesses, Part 2"},"content":{"rendered":"

When I think about everything about womanhood that hamstrung me with fear when I was thirteen it all came down, really, to princesses. I didn\u2019t think I had to work hard to be a woman (which is scary but obviously eventually achievable). I thought I had to somehow magically – through superhuman psychic effort – transform into a princess instead. That\u2019s how I\u2019d get fallen in love with. That\u2019s how I\u2019d get along. That\u2019s how the world would welcome me.<\/p>\n

– Caitlin Moran, How to be a Woman<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Welcome to part two of Kickass Princesses \u2013 a look at some subversive female protagonists in children’s literature. You can read Part 1 here.<\/a><\/p>\n

The more children’s books I read and the more princesses I come to know, the more I realise that ‘kickass’ probably wasn’t the best term to use. Some of these characters do kick ass, but the main feature is turning out to be simply that they make unconventional princesses.<\/p>\n

As the archetype of a fairytale princess is so ingrained, it takes looking at a wide variety of ‘unprincessy’ examples to unpick exactly what some of our starting assumptions are. A closer look at the ‘unconventional’ princesses here, and in my previous post, reveals that these women and girls have agency, interests, and are more than just a beautiful, delicate, unsullied physical appearance. Sometimes they aren’t even beautiful at all. What they are \u2013 what, we realise, makes them ‘unprincessy’ \u2013 is often simply the fact that they are two-dimensional characters.<\/p>\n

Ouch. This stereotype needs subverting roughly forever ago. On with the show…<\/p>\n

The Ordinary Princess<\/h3>\n

\"Cover<\/a><\/p>\n