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Personal news to share along with some interesting things I’ve learned while researching fairy tales and history! Listen to this:
History
August 26 this year, the United States marked the 100th anniversary of the 19th amendment which recognized women’s right to vote in America. When writing my book Spindle, I dove into the early suffrage movement and found many inspiring stories about why women wanted the right to vote.
Always keen to see a melding of literature and history, I noticed that Elizabeth Cady Stanton often alluded to literature in her speeches. In the “Solitude of Self,” she brings up Robinson Crusoe (1), Shakespeare’s play of Titus Andronicus (2), and Jesus’ time of suffering in the Bible (3)… see numbered excerpts below.
The part of Stanton’s speech that I quote in Spindle is one that jumped out at me as ready-made for the book because the line started with “The girl of sixteen, thrown on the world to support herself…” which went perfectly with my story about an orphaned teen having to care for her siblings.
Here are some excerpts from Stanton’s “Solitude of Self” speech:
(1) The point I wish plainly to bring before you on this occasion is the individuality of each human soul; our Protestant idea, the right of individual conscience and judgment—our republican idea, individual citizenship. In discussing the rights of woman, we are to consider, first, what belongs to her as an individual, in a world of her own, the arbiter of her own destiny, an imaginary Robinson Crusoe with her woman Friday on a solitary island. Her rights under such circumstances are to use all her faculties for her own safety and happiness.
-excerpts from Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s “Solitude of Self” speech 1892
(2) Shakespeare’s play of Titus and Andronicus contains a terrible satire on woman’s position in the nineteenth century—“Rude men” (the play tells us) “seized the king’s daughter, cut out her tongue, cut off her hands, and then bade her go call for water and wash her hands.” What a picture of woman’s position. Robbed of her natural rights, handicapped by law and custom at every turn, yet compelled to fight her own battles, and in the emergencies of life to fall back on herself for protection.
(3) From the mountain tops of Judea, long ago, a heavenly voice bade His disciples “Bear ye one another’s burdens,” but humanity has not yet risen to that point of self-sacrifice, and if ever so willing, how few the burdens are that one soul can bear for another. In the highways of Palestine; in prayer and fasting on the solitary mountain top; in the Garden of Gethsemane; before the judgment seat of Pilate; betrayed by one of His trusted disciples at His last supper; in His agonies on the cross, even Jesus of Nazareth, in these last sad days on earth, felt the awful solitude of self. Deserted by man, in agony he cries, “My God! My God! why hast Thou forsaken me?” And so it ever must be in the conflicting scenes of life, in the long, weary march, each one walks alone. We may have many friends, love, kindness, sympathy, and charity to smooth our pathway in everyday life, but in the tragedies and triumphs of human experience each mortal stands alone.
Here is a website for the 100th anniversary that is a nice hub for other sites like the national archives.
Women’s Vote Centennial (Click on Learn, then scroll down for the Explore More button. It’s not super obvious.)
Fairy Tale Quotes
Can you guess the fairy tale? Scroll down for the answer:
But it happened once that when the queen was bathing, there came a frog out of the water, and he squatted on the ground, and said to her: “Thy wish shall be fulfilled; before a year has gone by, thou shalt bring a daughter into the world.”
*
It happened one day, she being already fifteen years old, that the king and queen rode abroad, and the maiden was left behind alone in the castle. She wandered about into all the nooks and corners, and into all the chambers and parlours, as the fancy took her, till at last she came to an old tower.*
Then the wedding of the Prince and Rosamond was held with all splendour, and they lived very happily together until their lives’ end.
A Personal Note
Last week I formally requested my publishing rights back for my book Spindle.
Spindle is a Sleeping Beauty story set during the time of the American Industrial Revolution and early women’s rights movement.
It came out four years ago during the contentious USA election, and let me tell you, what a terrible time for a book to come out. Although, 2020…(!)
Anyway, back then, I thought the subplot of women’s rights would have been timely and of interest, but the book never quite found its audience. In fact, because of the low initial sales on that book, Snow White’s Mirror, due to come out the next year, was canceled and those rights reverted back to me before even being published.
My publisher was open about what was going on and invited me to submit something else. However, I had certain creative goals in mind and wanted to finish what I started.
Thus began my journey into becoming an indie author.
Short version for those of you who don’t know: I waited until I could get the rights back on Cinderella’s Dress and Cinderella’s Shoes. Then I re-released the books under my own imprint, Amaretto Press, pulling the stand-alone books into a series so I could market them easier. Snow White’s Mirror was next, followed by Beauty’s Rose.
Spindle will now be brought under the umbrella of the Fairy-Tale Inheritance Series. The final book in the series is the mermaid book I keep talking about!
A new cover is already in the works for Sleeping Beauty’s Spindle (name change) and will highlight more of what the book is about. I’ll have a cover reveal for you next Friday, along with a preorder link. I’ve seen it, and the cover is amazing! I think you’re going to love it.
Until next Friday, happy reading!
-Shonna
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Answer: Fairy tale quotes are from Grimms’ Little Briar Rose (Sleeping Beauty) Were you surprised about the prophesying frog?
