  Romance/Love
This week: Beauty and the Beast Edited by: Satuawany  
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Didn't you read the tale
Where Happily Ever After was to kiss a frog?
Don't you know this tale
In which all I ever wanted
I'll never have,
For who could ever learn to love a beast?
~From "Beauty and the Beast" by Nightwish
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Beauty and the Beast
"Beauty and the Beast" by Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve wasn't the first romance that focused on a character who had to see past something beastly in his or her love interest, but it showed it more plainly than any other. It gave visualization to the metaphor.
It's a difficult thing to do, convincing readers the character should see past the love interest's beastly qualities (read: flaws). In real life, overlooking certain flaws isn't romantic so much as dangerous. It's something to keep in mind, when trying to pull in the readers who have a harder time suspending their belief.
Then again, there is at least one version of "Beauty and the Beast" in which Beauty kills the beast for attacking her father and sisters.
I've been a fan of the tale since I was a child, but didn't understand how diverse it was until Disney put out its own version. Up until then, I had only my obscure version on VHS with the poorly done art and tracking that wouldn't even out.
Being on the cusp of puberty when Disney released its version, I didn't have a lot of brain cells open for critical thinking. That film did spark something, though.
First of all, it sparked anger, because I missed seeing Beauty ask for a rose, and the father pick one to start off the whole beastly mess. But what kept me from charging the screen was the fact that they had opened with the prince's back-story. This was news to me, that he was a little cuss and deserved having the enchantress transform him.
That got my mind to working. Taking someone who is beastly on the inside and putting it outside for all to see---that's pretty tough love. Especially when I did the math and realized he was eleven when he was given so harsh a sentence. But I can imagine that if one looks like a beast, and isn't a sociopath, the natural inclination is to clean up the inside.
I would kind of like to know what the enchantress was thinking, though, giving him that time limit. Seemed a recipe for mass kidnappings across the kingdom to me.
What I meant to say before I got so sidetracked is that the thing the Disney film sparked in me was the need to look up the "original" version of the tale. That took me about ten years, as it took that long for me to have regular internet access, reliable library access, and to remember my big decision to look up versions of "Beauty and the Beast."
And let me tell you, at that time, you went down a long, winding road of offshoot stories before you got to the name "de Beaumont," much less "de Villeneuve." But it was a good journey, as I got to see the story from all kinds of angles, from a variety of European and Asian countries. (I believe there was at least one from Africa, as well, but don't quote me on that.)
That's when I realized that every romance story I loved could be seen as a "Beauty and the Beast" story. Seeing all those versions, and watching as each one seemed a little further from the tales I knew, got my (admittedly slow) mind seeing just how far the story could change and still be itself at its heart.
How's that for a metaphor? If the story is the Beast, then who's Beauty? (The reader, of course.)
I digress.
It took me another ten years to find de Villeneuve's original version---rather than the incredibly abridged versions by Jeanne-Marie le Prince de Beaumont and Andrew Lang that are so popular. To be fair, I got distracted by Robin McKinley's retellings, Beauty and Rose Daughter. The second novel listed there probably contains my favorite ending of any "Beauty and the Beast" story.
It also pulls something of Beauty's background from de Villeneuve's version, which I only got to fully appreciate in retrospect. I don't want to spoil anything, but it added another twist to the story I never got a hint of before, and it's right up Fantasy-Romance Lane.
What really shook my foundation, though, was reading of the prince-turned-beast's background in the original French version. He wasn't a cuss! He was good, and the wicked fairy who turned him into a beast did so because he refused her advances.
Well, this was a foundation-rocker for someone who had spent a lot of quality time thinking of what the Beast must have gone through to transform himself from cuss to someone worthy of a romance heroine's love.
I love hearing new versions, and always have, but it kind of felt like cheating, to me. He was a good guy all along? And all Beauty ever had to do was see beyond appearances? That's it?
Yeah. That's it. It's such a simple thing, but I challenge just about every romance lead to be able to do it. I've read so many articles telling romance writers to make sure their leading characters are "attractive." I see where they're coming from, but I greatly prefer the writers who make it clear only the heroine sees the hero as over-the-top drool-worthy, and vice versa. I can totally get behind that.
It makes me imagine that the Beast never did change back into a "handsome prince," really. Just that, at the point Beauty realized her love for him, she could see such a beast as handsome.
I'm getting hung up on the physical here, but your characters' beastly traits very likely aren't as physical as the ones in this tale. But they still need someone to see past them, to see the good that's in there and help it grow. That's what the hero or heroine should be after in the love interest; not changing a lover, but touching the light and helping it become brighter.
And now I ask you, dear readers, how do your tales relate to "Beauty and the Beast"?
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rubasaeed writes:
I just like it. I wondered how a writer could impress the reader from the first 2 chapters in their novels. Now, things become a little bit clear in my eyes. that's a bundle :)
I admit; I'm not completely sure this was meant for me, but I hope so!
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Romance/Love: October 05, 2011 Issue [#4650]
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