Dancing with the Stars

I talk about the Twelve Dancing Princesses quite a bit on this blog. What I haven't yet confessed is that I have a real soft spot for the story, quite beyond the wish-fulfillment fantasy of being a princess who gets to wear spiffy new shoes and dance with a prince every night.

The Soldier, Clive Hicks Jenkins

The unnamed soldier who drives the story is my favorite fairy tale hero. Only the Beast rivals him in my affections. Prince Charming and all his ilk can scram. Give me a tricksy thinker any day of the week.

Why the soldier? Why a nameless late-arrival in a lesser-known fairy tale? Why a guy Disney hasn't supplied with a swoony animated face? Partly for the same reason that Beauty and the Beast is my favorite fairy tale: the complexity of his character, hinted at subtly but in every version I've ever heard. And partly because he's just awesome.

The fairy tale canon is stuffed to overflowing with heroes who are heroic because it's what they're supposed to do. Why does Cinderella's prince scour the kingdom for the girl with the tiny feet? Why does Sleeping Beauty's prince brave a gruesome death to save a girl he's never even seen? Why does Aladdin do anything? Because they're heroes. They know what's expected of them just like we do. They read their script, and they're going to perform the hell out of it, and no one needs to ask any questions.

The soldier is different. He's got motivation. He's a commoner who sees a chance to rise in the world - a near-impossible thing, given his position in a society hierarchical enough for the Princesses' father to permit only princes to investigate his daughters. Sometimes I've seen him played or written as wounded, which means his only form of income is gone. In the more draconian versions, where failed candidates get executed, the soldier is literally on his last chance. Solving the Princesses' mystery is the only path to survival open to him.

The Twelve Dancing Princesses, Anne Anderson

Be honest: in his situation, you'd allow yourself some time to panic, hyperventilate, engage in self-doubt, etc., yes? (I would, too. It's okay.) But this is where the soldier earns his stripes as a hero. He doesn't do any of that. He gets to the palace, persuades the king to let him have a go, and becomes goal-oriented like you wouldn't believe. He's three steps ahead of everyone, including the clever Eldest Princess who's been running circles around the rest of the palace chumps. After successfully tracking the Princesses on the very first night, instead of spilling the beans in a fit of glee, he has the sense to take all his allotted time to gather a whole mess of irrefutable proof. And during the day, he deploys his champion poker face to keep the Princesses from being suspicious, while probably courting them into the bargain (now that he knows he's going to win).

I don't care what you say. He is the textbook definition of cool.

Granted, if all we ever saw him do was track a bunch of girls through the woods at night, I'd be more concerned. But the very first time we meet him, we receive ample proof of his awesomeness. Remember, he's extremely down on his luck. No profession, no money, no prospect of long life and happiness. And yet he shares his lunch with a poor woman who has even less than he does. Was anyone surprised when she turned out to be one of those good witches who crisscrosses Fairy Tale Land rewarding good guys? Those characters exist for people like the soldier: unassuming decent people who just need one push in the right direction to turn their lives around.

Plus, there's that hilarious ending to one of the variants where, given his choice of bride among the Princesses, the soldier picks the Eldest Princess because neither of them are spring chickens and will suit each other best. Clever, pragmatic, and snarky? Sign me up! (Confession: I always think he marries the Eldest Princess anyway, regardless of their ages. The Youngest Princess - who, let's face it, is the only other real option - does nothing but squeal when he steps on her dress. The Eldest Princess is almost as smart and cunning as the soldier himself. They would suit each other best.)

There's just no one quite like him. For wit, quick thinking, sense, and goodness, no hero rivals the soldier. He's a self-made man in a universe that thrives on the status quo. He relies on his own talents and ambition - and of course, the charm that makes people like me fall head over heels for him. He is the complete package, and part of the fun of reading his story is learning just how much he deserves the good fortune that he earns.

How the Trickster Won His Spurs

Pretty much everyone agrees that honor and glory are nice things. We like them. We like people who have them. We especially like ourselves when we have them. Most of legend's "good guys" are honorable men. But sooner or later, every culture gets fed up with unblemished golden boys. There comes a time when we all just want to hear about someone who can think.

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you... the trickster!

The Theft of Apollo's Cattle, Elizabeth Phillips

We've all got one. Talk about a universal character. He fits into any story; he can get away with anything; he's the life of the party, the funniest guy around. There are tons of tricksters, from Anansi to Raven to Loki, and the second they appear onstage they steal everyone else's thunder. Nobody cares that Apollo just lost all his best cows; all we care about is how Hermes will get out of this one.

So yes, you've got to have a trickster. But that doesn't mean that everyone has to like him.

The trickster may be the most morally complicated character in any pantheon. He's the undeniable audience favorite, but he also screws everyone else over like it's going out of style. Poor stupid Tiger trusts Anansi once and gets his balls stolen forever. Puss in Boots gleefully murders a passing ogre to secure a comfortable life for himself and his master. When the Norse gods call on Loki to fix a crappy situation, it's even money that Loki himself created it. Just try telling these guys that crime doesn't pay. They'll laugh in your face, ruin your life, and saunter on back to their paradises.

Brer Rabbit and the Briar Patch, Disney

And then you start asking questions about the tricksters' companions. How can they be so blind? If Odin knows everything, why doesn't he cop to Loki's double-dealing? If Raven comes to court your daughter, why don't you just shut the door and hide the valuables? No matter what Brer Rabbit tells you, why would anyone with sense ever believe him? Honor, glory, and even plain old goodness undergo a very disconcerting alchemy in the presence of a trickster; they blend together into one single, unappealing, trait: stupidity.

Loki's Punishment, Tudor Humphries

Which may be why some cultures go out of their way to tell stories in which the trickster is humbled. When Raven, who wants lots of delicious dead eyeballs to eat, forbids humans from having more than one life, his furious subjects kill his son and daughter to make him understand their pain. Coyote once courts a beautiful girl who tries to commit suicide when their liaison becomes public knowledge; he finds her in the nick of time, but the two of them are turned into ducks and can never return to her people. Loki reaps the worst punishment: when his mischief turns to malice in the killing of Balder, he's bound in a cave with a serpent dripping venom on his face until Ragnarok, when he dies in battle against the Aesir. Mess with the higher powers one too many times, and they'll have something to say about it. No one likes being made to look a fool.

Coyote Went up the River, Frederick N. Wilson

But plenty of cultures let the trickster get away scot-free. The one time Hermes gets caught (and taken to court) by Hera, he pleads his own case so eloquently and hilariously that everyone votes not to punish him. Robin Goodfellow wreaks endless household havoc and never gets called to account; instead, he gets a whole ballad in which he boasts of his exploits. Seasoned tricksters even have get-out-of-jail-free cards. All it takes to resurrect Coyote is for his friend Fox (another notable trickster) to walk over his bones.

Audience sympathy is a powerful thing. When your creator can't bear even to punish you, let alone kill you off, it's a good sign that you're here to stay.

It makes the trickster the oldest outsider in the book. He exists to upset the status quo. Having him around makes life dangerous and unpredictable; it's no wonder that he has to con his way into good fortune, since most of his fellows avoid him and the chaos he brings. It's hard to say whether he's outcast because of his tricks, or whether his tricks created a scenario in which he had to be cast out.

And it's that trait, more than any other, that makes him the popular character audiences identify with. Of all the characters in any given pantheon, fixed and steadfast in what they represent, the trickster is the only one who can change.

No wonder we like him so much. We see most of ourselves in him. He's the one who not only adapts to a new world, but shapes that world to his liking. Who wants to be a boring paragon when you could be a dynamic change-maker? Who wants to sit still when you could have fun?