Coursera Spring 2013: Fantasy and Science Fiction: discussion
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OK, I'll comment on this.I like your observations. If you've seen the videos that were posted after the assignment was due, then you know that most of the stories seem to have a sexual connotation, and I think this is the case here, as you suggest by referring to Freud.
Your conclusion sounds reasonable, however, if you read the story as a story of a girl finally agreeing to lose her virginity, then we can see that the unhappy ending is a result of the girl failing to hold to her cultural moral values.
Short commentary: interesting take! I particularly like the way you treat the cabbage field, and the Freudian take.If I had to give a possible suggestion for improvement, I'd say your reference to "3" and the rabbit's attitude towards the straw bride don't add much to your original line of argument, they might even distract from it.
Thank you Bailish. Isabelrt, I agree with you. Those points do not make much sense, considering what my thesis is about... Wait what is my thesis about? About desire or about the Freudian symbolism? Ah, maybe that is why I get such bad grades in English...
i find online deadlines more pressing than rl ones ;)
Alonso wrote: "i find online deadlines more pressing than rl ones ;)"True :D
The Rabbit's Bride
The Rabbit’s Bride is a very enigmatic story, which, I believe, has a lot hidden symbolism behind it.
The story starts off by saying ‘There was once a mother who lived with her daughter in a beautiful Cabbage garden’. So, this cabbage field, we can safely guess, was the major source of the family’s income/food. Now this rabbit is taking away the only possession of the family.
When the mother asks the girl to drive the rabbit away, the rabbit mysteriously beckons the girl to ‘come and sit on my tail to go to my rabbit hutch’. Rabbits are not known to have long tails, and the asking somebody to ‘sit on them’ seems especially weird. I could only think of a Freudian interpretation to this rather odd behaviour.
The rabbit does this three times, and the girl agrees to ‘sit’ the third time, shockingly, considering this was the very 'thing' that has possibly destroyed their family's chances of survival. I also could not help wondering if the number three had any special significance. After all, we have long given the number three a mysterious significance - three wise men, the holy trinity. Even in the story of 'Faithful John' the three ravens warn John of things to come.
It is interesting to note how the girl is depicted as completely powerless in front of a rabbit, shown as a slave to her whims.
Also, the way the story ends is rather weird. As the straw figure of the bride stumbles down, the rabbit naturally assumes it to be dead, which, is very unusual.
The story might be trying to give us a picture of how desire works. Thought the rabbit destroys the cabbage patch, clearly portraying the rabbit’s character as evil, the girl is strangely fascinated by it and agrees to its demands, but later starts regretting it. The rabbit’s happiness on the other hand, is also short lived.
Perhaps the story is trying to tell us how desire always leads to unhappiness and therefore, is better to be stayed away from or that how we should always be very careful about making our decisions and not get carried away. The rabbit was clearly evil and yet the girl was tempted to try her luck, and suffered as a consequence.