Recently, I watched the Disney movie “Beauty and the Beast” , and also heard the IPPC’s stark report on climate change reported in the Irish news. Two events that seemed polar opposite- one was a child’s fantasy with a happy ending for all, the other, a report of a dire future that awaits us as our planet drowns and burns.
Watching Beauty and the Beast started off as pure escapism, I admit, maybe I needed to go to a happy place. However, as the film went on, I began to watch it on two levels- one as a medieval children’s story, and the other, as an archetypal tale that could perhaps hold timeless wisdom. The two worlds of myth and modernity began to fuse together. I began to wonder, how might this archetypal tale serve as a map to us, here and now, in our modern times, as humanity faces into an existential climate crisis? Is there something about the power of story, that can allow us to engage with crisis, speak to the heart and imagination, in a way that hard cold facts can never do?
The story begins in a castle, where the handsome prince lives a life of decadence. In love with his own beauty and slave to his needs, he eats, drinks and dances all day long, living a life of luxury that is paid for by his impoverished citizens. Selfish and shallow, he cares nothing for others, and instead uses and abuses them at will. Cue capitalist metaphor.
Interestingly, in the story, we learn that his mother dies when he is very young, leaving him to be raised by his father alone. Without the feminine influence, he becomes vain and selfish, arrogant and decadent. (This also reminded me of the article in the Guardian this week, which described the boarding/ public school upbringing of Boris Johnson and crew). Refusing refuge one night to an elderly lady who begs for help, who turns out to be a witch, he is cursed, and turned into the Beast, a creature who is reviled and feared.
His ugliness on the inside, is now visible on the outside, for all to see. A rose kept in a glass jar marks the time remaining for the Prince/ Beast to learn true love; each petal that drops, takes him and his enchanted kingdom closer to a final death. There is a sense of time running out, as outside, the terrain is in the throes of winter, again, speaking to the feeling of time running out for humanity in the face of climate catastrophe.
Inside, all the other people in the castle become material goods- one becomes a clock, another a closet, one becomes tea cup, another a tea pot. The castle’s citizens therefore have lost their humanity, and become machines and commodities- another clear nod to the capitalism which engulfs our world. The castle itself holds a west wing, which no one is allowed to enter- a shadow part, hidden from view, holding secrets that are kept under lock and key, speaking to the shadow parts that each of us hold- fears, anger, avoidance- that if remain locked up, are equally part of the curse that threatens to consume us.
Belle, or Beauty, lives in a village, longing for a larger life, hungry for change. She comes into the story as the embodiment of integrity, love and compassion. She sacrifices herself so that her father, captured by the Beast, can go free. She tends to the Beast’s wounds, when he is attacked, and helps to heal him. She must overcome her deep fear of him, to find a love that transcends. As she does, a miraculous transformation happens- the Beast experiences an awakening to life around him, and the love within him.
Vulnerability, love, touch, mysticism and magic, relationships, self-reflection- all aspects of the archetypal feminine, create the change that brings the Beast back to being human again, and eventually sets them all free, just as the last of the rose’s petals falls.
The Prince recognises that although he was Master of all, he was alone, a black star imploding the life of all around him. His shallowness and selfishness nearly brought not only the end of his own life, but all life. Through his encounter with Belle, the Feminine, he learns to live beyond the needs of his ego alone, and to care once again. His soul is saved along with the life and soul of the kingdom.
Belle lives the larger life she dreamed of, with access to books and knowledge and uplifted from her small, confined life, part of something greater now.
The themes of this story, which speak of the hyper masculine which runs rampant in the world, leading to the world’s near destruction, are clear parallels to our world today. The beacon of hope for us now, as shown in this story, is a re-storing of the feminine values of compassion and care, to wed those of the tempered and healthy masculine. To limit selfish ego drives and instead let the heart lead, with its capacity to care for all life. To draw on the gifts of the masculine to uplift and expand us. To know that the imprisoned feminine and tyrannical masculine can live in each of us. As with all great myths, the truths held within are timeless, yet perhaps never so needed as in our current times.
