I agree with Tatar’s argument that the stories should be read together largely because I like the contrast in the stories of the agency given to the lead female roles and I think it is interesting to see how different cultures adopted these different stories seemingly according to social and gender norms. As Tatar writes of Jane Yolen, “she asserts that the shrewd, resourceful heroine of folktales from earlier centuries has been supplanted by a “passive princess” waiting for Prince Charming to rescue her”(102). I like that when you read both the Cinderella stories and the Donkeyskin stories you get a more dynamic interpretation of the character of this lead female character. I also think it is really intresting to see how, as Tatar argues, society tends to choose the Cinderella stories with horrible stepmothers and poor girls with little ability and self-determination versus the strong-willed and able girls being chased by incestuous fathers.

Another interesting point is how these stories interpret virtue and apply it to the different stories. In both stories piety, chastity and beauty are upheld but also in Donkeyskin ingenuity, daring, and manipulation in a way are also seen as virtues. For example, in All-Kinds-of-Fur on the Ashliman site it says of the daughter, “The princess was horrified at his godless intentions, but because she was clever, she told the king that he should first get her three dresses…” and later she takes initiative and runs away. However in other Cinderella stories like “Doralice” on the Ashliman site the daughter Doralice escapes her father by hiding in a trunk because her servant told her to and then she is literally sold into her next husband. In that story she has no agency, I think reading stories like these next to each other help establish the daughter in these stories as a more well developed character.