Thoughts on “Heroinism” in French Fairy Tales

Fairy tales starring cross-dressed knights who make war present a clear case of “heroinism.” What, then, of other female characters who populate the corpus of 1690s France? Can famously persecuted heroines like Cinderella be said to do anything brave and worthy of note? I take the motif of war as an opportunity to reflect on heroinism as broadly conceived in French fairy tales. Active heroines manage their domestic spheres, and other heroines rhetorically maneuver their way out of binds. Viewed against the spectacle of war, these ordinary actions may seem quiet, but they are no less heroic.