Kissing the Witch- Annie Michelotti

My favorite story was the Tale of the Handkerchief. I liked it because I continued to find myself surprised by the plot twists. Initially, I enjoyed the fact that the servant refused to obey the princess because I thought that it was a nice change from the stereotypical obedience that servants were expected to have. The story leads you to believe that the “bad guy” (or the servant who steals the identity of the princess) will ultimately get what she deserves and will be stripped of her stolen royalty. You can’t help but feel pity for the princess who becomes the “goose girl.” You expect the real princess to regain her thrown and for the servant to regain her position as a peasant. Ironically, the princess does not want the role of being royal and is content with her new life. I thought that it was a pleasant twist on the stereotypical good vs. evil fairytale. Both girls refuse to accept the roles that are expected of them and choose what they want to do with their lives. I found the story to be very refreshing.

I thought that the Tale of the Spinster best captures the situation of women today. The girl in the story who takes over her mother’s spinning business ultimately becomes an independent business woman. She shows the reality of modern day where a woman is capable of having a successful business and who can hold her own in a male-dominated profession. She explains that, “we working women must stand by each other” which I believe is a statement that is true of today.

I think that “Kissing the Witch” is the title of the book because it is backwards in a sense. Normally in fairytales, the stories end with the main character kissing the prince. In most stereotypical fairytales the antagonist is a witch or a mystical character with supernatural powers. In these types of stories, the main character would NEVER kiss the witch, or the villain. In the tales that make up “Kissing the Witch” the female main characters do not resemble the stereotypical passive female characters that end up kissing the prince at the end. In these stories, the female characters do not always have a happy ending, but sometimes they end up being somewhat of a villain, like in the tale of the Handkerchief. Because the women in these stories save themselves and decide their own fate, they are opposite of the stereotypical woman in fairytales. I think that it is called “Kissing the Witch” because like kissing a witch is not typical in other fairytales, the women in the stories are not typical of the women in classic fairytales.