Katie Woodencloak

I must say I found Tartar's argumentation for the reading of Cinderella and Donkeyskin together, while I believed her argument about the connection between the two stories as the story of the abused daughter makes sense, but I thought the difference between the two situations seemed a little tenuous. It is not so much that I thought the ideas of abuse are not irreconcilable, and I was able to see the connection between the riches to rags to riches story arc. Nevertheless, something about the connection seemed too academic to me, too contrived, to be honest it seemed very...Bettelheim to me. I know that sounds strange, however I couldn't really shake that feeling, while I didn't mind the connection being made, I didn't think the connection was really in the stories, rather it was just superimposed over the stories, and I was just unable to draw the full connections. That is, until I read "Katie Woodencloak," because I felt like the story actually connected the dots for me, because the story was simultaneously a Cinderella story and a Donkeyskin story at the same time. I am not sure that the story isn't a purposeful combination of the two, seeing how it was written in 1888. I think what I found so helpful was the fact that it helped mix the two for me, and made me see that the stories as not artificially connected through scholarship. Despite the fact the talking ox and the travels through the woods sort of threw me off, the three dresses, the help of the "fairy" ox (okay, that sounds strange) and the arc with the prince also really helped me see the plot connections between the two stories and how they are actually very, very similar despite the differences between two parts that are often compared, ie the roles of the neglecting stepmother or the incestuous father.