Eating and Martyrdom in “Vasilisa the Beautiful”
The folktale “Vasilisa the Beautiful” tells the story of a young woman who escapes the cruelty and persecution of her jealous stepmother and sisters with the help of a magical doll who guides and protects her. Vasilisa’s journey would be impossible without the assistance of her doll, which can only work magic when it has been fed. “Vasilisa the Beautiful”’s focus on food and eating presents an ugly dichotomy: rejection of food is rewarded, while appetite is implicitly denounced.
The majority of the magic in Vasilisa’s story revolves around food. Folktales often contain magical tests of character to verify the protagonist’s virtue; all of Vasilisa’s center on her willing and agreeable sacrifice of food. The magical doll that protects her from her stepmother and stepsisters requires “the choicest morsels” from Vasilisa’s own meals to work its magic (Afanasyev 439). Throughout the story, Vasilisa goes without meals or eats only pitiful scraps. In direct contrast to Vasilisa’s commendable sacrifices, the inhuman, sinister witch Baba Yaga is portrayed as a monstrous glutton who eats and drinks “enough for ten people” and leaves Vasilisa only the scraps--which, of course, go to her doll (Afanasyev 442). Baba…show more content… Tales like “Vasilisa the Beautiful” prime young girls to view the restriction of food as one more virtuous sacrifice they must make to achieve their destinies--and following folktale conventions, this destiny is marriage. The idea that the best way for girls to garner male attention is through noble and righteous starvation has persisted through the generations and developed from Vasilisa’s magic doll to the modern miracle diet. Goodness and rightness, along with their respective rewards, are achieved only by going
