Hiding Behind the Skin of Class

This essay will focus on the fairytale “Donkeyskin” by Charles Perrault and some of the subsequent adaption of this fairy tale, including a poem “Donkeyskin” by Midori Snyder, a short story “The Color Master” by Aimee Bender, and the 1970 film version of “Donkeyskin,” titled Peau d'Âne, by Jacques Demy. The fairy tale “Donkeyskin” follows the story of a princess who suffers at the incestuous advances of her father, the king. The story begins with the queen, her mother, being close to death, at which time the queen makes the king promise to only marry again if he can find someone more beautiful and wise than she. After the queen’s death, the king tries to fulfill his promise but can only find one person that fits the requirements: his own daughter. The princess goes to her fairy godmother for help, who advises the princess to ask for the impossible, first a dress like the sky, then a second like the moon, a third like the sun, and then finally for the skin of the treasured Master Donkey, a donkey who excretes gold and keeps the kingdom wealthy. The king manages to grant every request made by his daughter. Finding no other option, the princess runs away, at the advice of her fairy godmother, shrouded in her donkey skin. At this point in the story the connection between this fairy tale and the fairy tale “Cinderella” are clearly seen. The princess begins to work in a kitchen, and would only don her otherworldly gowns when she is alone, but the prince of the new kingdom where she abides spies her in her royal gown and falls in love with her. The prince asks for a cake to be made and coincidentally when Donkey Skin makes the cake, her ring accidently falls into it. The story also coincides with the “Cinderella” fairy tale when the pri...

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... plotline of “Donkeyskin” when the shop receives an order from the king for dress that matches the moon. Though the dressmakers in the shop are quite skilled, they require the special color-mixing talents of a local woman they call the Color Master. Unfortunately for the shop, the color master falls ill and cannot physically be there to work on the dress, so she picks Patty to take her place and to make the dress. The Color Master instructs Patty throughout the story on how to make the first dress, and then the following two dresses, that of the sun and of the sky, and she also instructs Patty to add anger to the dresses when making them so that the princess will have the strength and resolve to resist her father’s dark request. This story by Bender illuminates the importance of clothing in original fairy tale and how clothing plays a role in the princess’ fate.