Reading B: Japanese Myth

To no surprise my favorite story from Reading B was The Story of Princess Haze ! Princess Haze is the daughter of a Prince and his wife, who died when Haze was young. She is now raised by her un-kind step mother who hates and envies the princess because of her talent in music and poetry. It is so interesting the number of different cultures that have some variation of this story - it makes you wonder if people were remarried often enough for this to be a sort of universally recognized experience? Despite having heard the story of Cinderella told in about 10000 different ways, during the story of Princess Haze it really hit me how strange it is that the princesses birth mother would be so lovely but that her step mother is always evil and bitter - and whats with the father letting someone that awful being around his daughter. Clearly men were not around much during this time and, at least in this story, it appears that he remarried at least in part to have someone take care of Haze and the home, but it still strikes me as odd.

I know this seems like the part of my write up where I would start railing about the way that Japanese culture clearly values women for being submissive (and they totally do, at least here) but just like manny girls who grew up on Cinderella there is definite appeal in a story about someone who meets adversity and envy with patience and kindness. Which perhaps proves what I've been saying all along - that the myths in certain cultures reflect the values that those cultures think are important and reinforce them in young people. Growing up on Cinderella and other fairytales, there is a certain appeal to me in women who put up with being treated poorly and just return in with kindness and hard work. Overall the Japanese myths were a lot of fun and really matched up more than I would have thought with some of the more western stories we have been reading!