After the novel, I needed another anthology. And since the last convention books are anthologies from the three dollar table, that seemed like a good bet. I wanted to avoid dark fantasy for a bit, so I figured I’d go for the one that didn’t involve vampires.
I probably should’ve picked Sword and Sorceress instead.
Sure, The Armless Maiden is a fairy tale anthology. But Terri Windling’s collection has the full title of The Armless Maiden and Other Tales for Childhood’s Survivors. I really shouldn’t have ignored the subtext because this book is chock-full of abuse, rape, and incest. It is meant for people, authors and readers alike, to come to terms with their own childhoods.
It’s not a subject we like to think about. Oh sure, everyone knows there are children suffering. All over the world, right at this moment. But that’s different than accepting that someone you know personally comes from such a disastrously broken home, so much so that you have to wonder if it was ever whole.
And I have to speak in terms of “people I know” because compared to many of these, my childhood was idyllic. My parents are good people and made sure I had a good, loving home. So I have no personal experience of abuse. I don’t doubt that it happens, but I don’t personally know.
I’d like to think that if someone brought me a tale of being abused that I’d believe them without reservations. That I’d offer what help I could and be the friend they needed. I can’t know because my resolve hasn’t been tested.
So, this is what we’ve got in the book. Stories of people (mostly but not always women) being abused, manipulated, and taken advantage of. Fairy tales like “The Armless Maiden”, “Sleeping Beauty”, “Hansel and Gretel”, and many more. And no Disney to be found to mitigate the horror and pain of these tales. Well, okay, some of the authors chose to be less cruel in their renditions, but that’s a personal choice.
It’s also worth noting that The Armless Maiden is the first anthology I’ve read edited by Terri Windling alone. Previously I’ve only seen her with her partner-in-crime, Ellen Datlow. And my impression, having read some of Datlow’s solo anthologies, is that Windling is a mitigating influence on Datlow’s interest in horror.
Obviously that mitigation only means so much given the very concept of today’s book. And it’s probably worth pointing out that The Armless Maiden was published in 1995. That was the same year as the third Fairy Tale anthology Datlow and Windling put out, and I distinctly recall that as being a turning point for that series, going more into fantasy and less into horror. Perhaps Windling was try to separate things a little more than she had in the past. Or, given that it says The Armless Maiden was three years in the making, perhaps she’d decided she’d wallowed enough in darkness and wanted some lighter fare for other publications.
The fact is though, Terri Windling is a talented editor. It’s my own fault that I failed to heed the warning I was given. So the subject matter was darker than I wanted, but the handling of the book was well done. The stories are broken up, mostly by poems, but sometimes with essays. The poems are generally also fairy tales and the abuse inside them, but at least they’re lighter and more lyrical by their very nature. The essays tend to be personal introspection from authors. Sometimes reflecting on what they contributed to the book, sometimes their own experiences, whatever they felt was needed.
One of these is from Windling herself, the final essay and the penultimate contribution in the volume. And it’s…brutal. I would never have guessed – because I never consider it as an option – that Terri Windling was an abuse survivor. That she was raised by alcoholic parents and her stepfather sexually abused her for a decade. That her brother has blocked out so many childhood memories that he didn’t remember her living with them for years. It’s hard to read because this is a real person’s account of things that really happened. And the worst thing is…I doubt it’s unusual in the least.
I’m not going to go through all of the contributions in this book one by one as I normally would. Like I said, close to half of them are poems, which I rarely have much to say about. And as for the rest, what more do I really need to say? Fairy tales have dark tones, dark endings often times. The Armless Maiden features many of these, and leans into that darkness. For the most part, I think the poems are evocative and the prose well-written. It’s a good anthology. It’s simply one that comes with a content warning.
I don’t know that I want to keep it. Partly that’s because I didn’t realize what I should expect when I first opened it up and was in for a shock. And partly this is because I, like so many people, would rather shy away from the darkness. In this case it’s mostly because I feel a bit overloaded for the moment, and really do want some lighter, happier fare to offset it.
That being said, do I think it’s worth keeping? For me…no. No I don’t need this. There’s some good stories, good essays, but nothing that I’m going to hang my hat on or specifically look up years later to reread. There are stories that I do seek out randomly, even after years and decades. I remember exactly what book they’re in, I find them, I revisit them. None of these have that spark for me.
Again, this is nothing against the quality of the writing or the book. Just that I am not the person it will resonate with most strongly. I have had a very different life, which I’m grateful for, but it means that this book cannot touch me as deeply. Hopefully someone who can appreciate it better will find it next.
mouse Reads Books 