Damsel in distress
Encyclopedia
Villain
A villain is an "evil" character in a story, whether a historical narrative or, especially, a work of fiction. The villain usually is the antagonist, the character who tends to have a negative effect on other characters...
or monster
Monster
A monster is any fictional creature, usually found in legends or horror fiction, that is somewhat hideous and may produce physical harm or mental fear by either its appearance or its actions...
and who requires a hero
Hero
A hero , in Greek mythology and folklore, was originally a demigod, their cult being one of the most distinctive features of ancient Greek religion...
to achieve her rescue. She has become a stock character
Stock character
A Stock character is a fictional character based on a common literary or social stereotype. Stock characters rely heavily on cultural types or names for their personality, manner of speech, and other characteristics. In their most general form, stock characters are related to literary archetypes,...
of fiction, particularly of melodrama
Melodrama
The term melodrama refers to a dramatic work that exaggerates plot and characters in order to appeal to the emotions. It may also refer to the genre which includes such works, or to language, behavior, or events which resemble them...
. Though she is usually human, she can also be of any other species, including fictional or folkloric
Folklore
Folklore consists of legends, music, oral history, proverbs, jokes, popular beliefs, fairy tales and customs that are the traditions of a culture, subculture, or group. It is also the set of practices through which those expressive genres are shared. The study of folklore is sometimes called...
species; and even divine figures such as an angel
Angel
Angels are mythical beings often depicted as messengers of God in the Hebrew and Christian Bibles along with the Quran. The English word angel is derived from the Greek ἄγγελος, a translation of in the Hebrew Bible ; a similar term, ملائكة , is used in the Qur'an...
or deity
Deity
A deity is a recognized preternatural or supernatural immortal being, who may be thought of as holy, divine, or sacred, held in high regard, and respected by believers....
.
The word "damsel" derives from the French demoiselle
Demoiselle
Demoiselle may refer to:* Demoiselle crane, a crane of central Asia* Demoiselle Stakes, a horse race held in New York* Demoiselle Creek, New Brunswick* Santos-Dumont Demoiselle, an early aircraft...
, meaning "young lady", and the term "damsel in distress" in turn is a translation of the French demoiselle en détresse. It is an archaic term not used in modern English except for effect or in expressions such as this, which can be traced back to the knight errant of Medieval songs and tales, who regarded the saving of such women as an essential part of his raison d'être.
The helplessness of the damsel in distress, who can be portrayed as foolish and ineffectual to the point of naïvete, along with her need of others to rescue her, has made the stereotype
Stereotype
A stereotype is a popular belief about specific social groups or types of individuals. The concepts of "stereotype" and "prejudice" are often confused with many other different meanings...
the target of feminist
Feminism
Feminism is a collection of movements aimed at defining, establishing, and defending equal political, economic, and social rights and equal opportunities for women. Its concepts overlap with those of women's rights...
criticism.
Antiquity
Ancient Greece
Ancient Greece is a civilization belonging to a period of Greek history that lasted from the Archaic period of the 8th to 6th centuries BC to the end of antiquity. Immediately following this period was the beginning of the Early Middle Ages and the Byzantine era. Included in Ancient Greece is the...
. Greek mythology
Greek mythology
Greek mythology is the body of myths and legends belonging to the ancient Greeks, concerning their gods and heroes, the nature of the world, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices. They were a part of religion in ancient Greece...
, while featuring a large retinue of competent goddesses, also contains helpless maidens threatened with sacrifice. One famous example is Andromeda
Andromeda (mythology)
Andromeda is a princess from Greek mythology who, as divine punishment for her mother's bragging, the Boast of Cassiopeia, was chained to a rock as a sacrifice to a sea monster. She was saved from death by Perseus, her future husband. Her name is the Latinized form of the Greek Ἀνδρομέδη...
, whose mother
Cassiopeia (mythology)
Cassiopeia is the name of several figures in Greek mythology.-Wife of Cepheus:The Queen Cassiopeia, wife of king Cepheus of Æthiopia, was beautiful but also arrogant and vain; these latter two characteristics led to her downfall....
offended Poseidon
Poseidon
Poseidon was the god of the sea, and, as "Earth-Shaker," of the earthquakes in Greek mythology. The name of the sea-god Nethuns in Etruscan was adopted in Latin for Neptune in Roman mythology: both were sea gods analogous to Poseidon...
. Poseidon sent a beast to ravage the land, and Andromeda's parents fastened her to a rock in the sea to appease him. The hero Perseus
Perseus
Perseus ,Perseos and Perseas are not used in English. the legendary founder of Mycenae and of the Perseid dynasty of Danaans there, was the first of the mythic heroes of Greek mythology whose exploits in defeating various archaic monsters provided the founding myths of the Twelve Olympians...
slew the beast, saving Andromeda. Andromeda's plight, chained naked to a rock, became a favorite theme of later painters. This theme of the Princess and dragon
Princess and dragon
Princess and dragon is a generic premise common to many legends and fairy tales. It is not a fairy tale itself, but along with Prince Charming, is a repeated cliché...
is also pursued in the myth of St George
Saint George and the Dragon
The episode of Saint George and the Dragon appended to the hagiography of Saint George was Eastern in origin, brought back with the Crusaders and retold with the courtly appurtenances belonging to the genre of Romance...
.
Another early example of a damsel in distress is Sita
SITA
SITA is a multinational information technology company specialising in providing IT and telecommunication services to the air transport industry...
in the ancient Indian epic
Indian epic poetry
Indian epic poetry is the epic poetry written in the Indian subcontinent, traditionally called Kavya . The Ramayana and Mahabharata, originally composed in Sanskrit and translated thereafter into many other Indian languages, are some of the oldest surviving epic poems on earth and form part of...
Ramayana
Ramayana
The Ramayana is an ancient Sanskrit epic. It is ascribed to the Hindu sage Valmiki and forms an important part of the Hindu canon , considered to be itihāsa. The Ramayana is one of the two great epics of India and Nepal, the other being the Mahabharata...
. In the epic, Sita is kidnapped by the villain Ravana
Ravana
' is the primary antagonist character of the Hindu legend, the Ramayana; who is the great king of Lanka. In the classic text, he is mainly depicted negatively, kidnapping Rama's wife Sita, to claim vengeance on Rama and his brother Lakshmana for having cut off the nose of his sister...
and taken to Lanka
Lanka
Sri Lanka is the name given in Hindu mythology to the island fortress capital of the legendary king Ravana in the great Hindu epics, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata...
. Her husband Rama
Rama
Rama or full name Ramachandra is considered to be the seventh avatar of Vishnu in Hinduism, and a king of Ayodhya in ancient Indian...
goes on a quest to rescue her, with the help of the monkey-god Hanuman
Hanuman
Hanuman , is a Hindu deity, who is an ardent devotee of Rama, a central character in the Indian epic Ramayana and one of the dearest devotees of lord Rama. A general among the vanaras, an ape-like race of forest-dwellers, Hanuman is an incarnation of the divine and a disciple of Lord Rama in the...
.
The Middle Ages
European fairy taleFairy tale
A fairy tale is a type of short story that typically features such folkloric characters, such as fairies, goblins, elves, trolls, dwarves, giants or gnomes, and usually magic or enchantments. However, only a small number of the stories refer to fairies...
s frequently feature damsels in distress. Evil witches trapped Rapunzel
Rapunzel
"Rapunzel" is a German fairy tale in the collection assembled by the Brothers Grimm, and first published in 1812 as part of Children's and Household Tales. The Grimm Brothers' story is an adaptation of the fairy tale Persinette by Charlotte-Rose de Caumont de La Force originally published in 1698...
in a tower, cursed the princess to die in Snow White
Snow White
"Snow White" is a fairy tale known from many countries in Europe, the best known version being the German one collected by the Brothers Grimm...
, and put Sleeping Beauty
Sleeping Beauty
Sleeping Beauty by Charles Perrault or Little Briar Rose by the Brothers Grimm is a classic fairytale involving a beautiful princess, enchantment, and a handsome prince...
into a magical sleep. In all of these, a valourous prince comes to the maiden's aid, saves her, and marries her (though Rapunzel is not directly saved by the prince, but instead saves him from blindness after her exile).
A number of tales in the One Thousand and One Nights (Arabian Nights) also feature damsels in distress. A particularly influential Arabian Nights tale of this type was "The Ebony Horse", which revolves around the Prince of Persia
Prince of Persia (disambiguation)
Prince of Persia may refer to these video games:*Prince of Persia, the video game franchise*Prince of Persia *Prince of Persia 2: The Shadow and the Flame, a 1993 video game*Prince of Persia 3D, a 1999 video game...
, Qamar al-Aqmar, with the help of his flying mechanical horse, rescuing his lover, the Princess of Sana'a
Sana'a
-Districts:*Al Wahdah District*As Sabain District*Assafi'yah District*At Tahrir District*Ath'thaorah District*Az'zal District*Bani Al Harith District*Ma'ain District*Old City District*Shu'aub District-Old City:...
, from a Persian
Persian people
The Persian people are part of the Iranian peoples who speak the modern Persian language and closely akin Iranian dialects and languages. The origin of the ethnic Iranian/Persian peoples are traced to the Ancient Iranian peoples, who were part of the ancient Indo-Iranians and themselves part of...
sage and then from the Byzantine Emperor
Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire during the periods of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, centred on the capital of Constantinople. Known simply as the Roman Empire or Romania to its inhabitants and neighbours, the Empire was the direct continuation of the Ancient Roman State...
. This story appears to have influenced later European tales such as Adenes Le Roi
Adenes Le Roi
Adenes Le Roi , also known as Adenez, Adans Le Roi, Roi Adam, Li Rois Adenes, Adan le Menestrel or Adam Rex Menestrallus, was French minstrel or trouvère...
's Cleomades and "The Squire's Tale" told in Geoffrey Chaucer
Geoffrey Chaucer
Geoffrey Chaucer , known as the Father of English literature, is widely considered the greatest English poet of the Middle Ages and was the first poet to have been buried in Poet's Corner of Westminster Abbey...
's The Canterbury Tales
The Canterbury Tales
The Canterbury Tales is a collection of stories written in Middle English by Geoffrey Chaucer at the end of the 14th century. The tales are told as part of a story-telling contest by a group of pilgrims as they travel together on a journey from Southwark to the shrine of Saint Thomas Becket at...
.
The damsel in distress was an archetypal character of medieval romances, where typically she was rescued from imprisonment in a tower of a castle by a knight-errant. Chaucer's The Clerk's Tale of the repeated trials and bizarre torments of patient Griselda was drawn from Petrarch
Petrarch
Francesco Petrarca , known in English as Petrarch, was an Italian scholar, poet and one of the earliest humanists. Petrarch is often called the "Father of Humanism"...
. The Emprise de l'Escu vert à la Dame Blanche
Emprise de l'Escu vert à la Dame Blanche
The Emprise de l'Escu vert à la Dame Blanche was a chivalric order founded by Jean Le Maingre and twelve knights in 1399, committing themselves for the duration of five years...
(founded 1399) was a chivalric order
Chivalric order
Chivalric orders are societies and fellowships of knights that have been created by European monarchs in imitation of the military orders of the Crusades...
with the express purpose of protecting oppressed ladies.
The theme also entered the official hagiography
Hagiography
Hagiography is the study of saints.From the Greek and , it refers literally to writings on the subject of such holy people, and specifically to the biographies of saints and ecclesiastical leaders. The term hagiology, the study of hagiography, is also current in English, though less common...
of the Catholic Church - most famously in the story of Saint George
Saint George
Saint George was, according to tradition, a Roman soldier from Syria Palaestina and a priest in the Guard of Diocletian, who is venerated as a Christian martyr. In hagiography Saint George is one of the most venerated saints in the Catholic , Anglican, Eastern Orthodox, and the Oriental Orthodox...
who saved a princess from being devoured by a dragon
Dragon
A dragon is a legendary creature, typically with serpentine or reptilian traits, that feature in the myths of many cultures. There are two distinct cultural traditions of dragons: the European dragon, derived from European folk traditions and ultimately related to Greek and Middle Eastern...
. A late addition to the official account of this Saint's life, not attested in the several first centuries when he was venerated, it is nowadays the main act for which Saint George is remembered.
Obscure outside Norway
Norway
Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
is Hallvard Vebjørnsson
Hallvard Vebjørnsson
Hallvard Vebjørnsson , commonly referred to as Saint Hallvard, is the patron saint of Oslo. He is considered a martyr because of his defence of an innocent woman.-Background:...
, the Patron Saint of Oslo
Oslo
Oslo is a municipality, as well as the capital and most populous city in Norway. As a municipality , it was established on 1 January 1838. Founded around 1048 by King Harald III of Norway, the city was largely destroyed by fire in 1624. The city was moved under the reign of Denmark–Norway's King...
, recognised as a martyr after being killed while valiantly trying to defend a woman - most likely a slave
Slavery
Slavery is a system under which people are treated as property to be bought and sold, and are forced to work. Slaves can be held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase or birth, and deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to demand compensation...
- from three men accusing her of theft.
17th century
In the 17th Century English balladBallad
A ballad is a form of verse, often a narrative set to music. Ballads were particularly characteristic of British and Irish popular poetry and song from the later medieval period until the 19th century and used extensively across Europe and later the Americas, Australia and North Africa. Many...
The Spanish Lady (one of several English and Irish songs with that name), a Spanish lady captured by an English captain falls in love with her captor and begs him not to set her free but to take her with him to England, and in this appeal describes herself as "A lady in distress".
The 18th and 19th centuries
Samuel Richardson
Samuel Richardson was an 18th-century English writer and printer. He is best known for his three epistolary novels: Pamela: Or, Virtue Rewarded , Clarissa: Or the History of a Young Lady and The History of Sir Charles Grandison...
Clarissa
Clarissa
Clarissa, or, the History of a Young Lady is an epistolary novel by Samuel Richardson, published in 1748. It tells the tragic story of a heroine whose quest for virtue is continually thwarted by her family, and is the longest real novelA completed work that has been released by a publisher in...
(1748), where she is menaced by the wicked seducer Lovelace.
Reprising her medieval role, the damsel in distress is a staple character of Gothic literature, where she is typically incarcerated in a castle or monastery and menaced by a sadistic nobleman, or members of the religious orders. Early examples in this genre include Matilda in Horace Walpole's The Castle of Otranto
The Castle of Otranto
The Castle of Otranto is a 1764 novel by Horace Walpole. It is generally regarded as the first gothic novel, initiating a literary genre which would become extremely popular in the later 18th century and early 19th century...
, Emily in Ann Radcliffe
Ann Radcliffe
Anne Radcliffe was an English author, and considered the pioneer of the gothic novel . Her style is romantic in its vivid descriptions of landscapes, and long travel scenes, yet the Gothic element is obvious through her use of the supernatural...
's The Mysteries of Udolpho
The Mysteries of Udolpho
The Mysteries of Udolpho, by Ann Radcliffe, was published in four volumes on 8 May 1794 by G. G. and J. Robinson of London. The firm paid her £500 for the manuscript. The contract is housed at the University of Virginia Library. Her fourth and most popular novel, The Mysteries of Udolpho follows...
, and Antonia in Matthew Lewis's The Monk
The Monk
The Monk: A Romance is a Gothic novel by Matthew Gregory Lewis, published in 1796. It was written before the author turned 20, in the space of 10 weeks.-Characters:...
.
The perils faced by this Gothic heroine were taken to an extreme by the Marquis de Sade
Marquis de Sade
Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade was a French aristocrat, revolutionary politician, philosopher, and writer famous for his libertine sexuality and lifestyle...
in Justine
The Misfortunes of Virtue
Justine is a classic novel by Donatien Alphonse François de Sade, better known as the Marquis de Sade. There is no standard edition of this text in hardcover, having passed into the public domain...
, who, arguably, exposed the erotic subtext which lay beneath the damsel-in-distress scenario.
Goethe's Faust
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Faust is a tragic play in two parts: and . Although written as a closet drama, it is the play with the largest audience numbers on German-language stages...
. According to the philosopher Schopenhauer:
The great Goethe has given us a distinct and visible description of this denial of the will, brought about by great misfortune and by the despair of all deliverance, in his immortal masterpiece Faust, in the story of the sufferings of Gretchen. I know of no other description in poetry. It is a perfect specimen of the second path, which leads to the denial of the will not, like the first, through the mere knowledge of the suffering of the whole world which one acquires voluntarily, but through the excessive pain felt in one’s own person. It is true that many tragedies bring their violently willing heroes ultimately to this point of complete resignation, and then the will-to-live and its phenomenon usually end at the same time. But no description known to me brings to us the essential point of that conversion so distinctly and so free from everything extraneous as the one mentioned in Faust (The World as Will and Representation.The World as Will and RepresentationThe World as Will and Representation is the central work of the German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer. The first edition was published in December 1818, and the second expanded edition in 1844. In 1948, an abridged version was edited by Thomas Mann....
, Vol. I, §68)
From Victorian melodrama to movie serials
The misadventures of the damsel in distress of the Gothic continued in a somewhat caricatured form in Victorian melodramaMelodrama
The term melodrama refers to a dramatic work that exaggerates plot and characters in order to appeal to the emotions. It may also refer to the genre which includes such works, or to language, behavior, or events which resemble them...
. According to Michael Booth in his classic study English Melodrama the Victorian stage melodrama featured a limited number of stock characters: the hero, the villain, the heroine, an old man, an old woman, a comic man and a comic woman engaged in a sensational plot featuring themes of love and murder. Often the good but not very clever hero is duped by a scheming villain, who has eyes on the damsel in distress until fate intervenes to ensure the triumph of good over evil.
Such melodrama influenced the fledgling cinema industry and led to damsels in distress being the subject of many early silent movies, especially those that were made as multi-episode serials. Early examples include The Adventures of Kathlyn
The Adventures of Kathlyn
The Adventures of Kathlyn is an American motion picture serial released on December 29, 1913 by the Selig Polyscope Company. An adventure serial filmed in Chicago, Illinois, its thirteen episodes were directed by Francis J. Grandon from a story by Harold MacGrath and Gilson Willets and starred...
in 1913 and The Hazards of Helen
The Hazards of Helen
The Hazards of Helen is an American adventure film serial of 119 twelve minute episodes released over a span of slightly more than two years by the Kalem Company between November 7, 1914 and February 24, 1917....
, which ran from 1914 to 1917. The silent movie heroines frequently faced new perils provided by the industrial revolution and catering to the new medium's need for visual spectacle. Here we find the heroine tied to a railway track, burning buildings, and explosions. Sawmills were another stereotypical danger of the industrial age, as recorded in a popular song from a later era:
Jim Steinmeyer
Jim Steinmeyer is an internationally respected designer of magical illusions and theatrical special effects. His best known illusions include Origami, Interlude, and Walking Through a Mirror. He is also an author, consultant and producer....
identifies the beginning of this phenomenon as coinciding with the introduction of the "Sawing a woman in half
Sawing a woman in half
Sawing a woman in half is a generic name for a number of different stage magic tricks in which a person is apparently sawn or divided into two or more pieces.-History:...
" illusion. In 1921 magician P. T. Selbit
P. T. Selbit
P. T. Selbit was an English magician, inventor and writer who is credited with being the first person to perform the illusion of sawing a woman in half...
became the first to present such an act to the public. Steinmeyer observes that: "Before Selbit's illusion, it was not a cliche that pretty ladies were teased and tortured by magicians. Since the days of Robert-Houdin
Jean Eugène Robert-Houdin
Jean Eugène Robert-Houdin was a French magician. He is widely considered the father of the modern style of conjuring.-Early life and entrance into conjuring:...
, both men and women were used as the subjects for magic illusions". However changes in fashion and great social upheavals during the first decades of the 20th century made Selbit's choice of "victim" both practical and popular. The trauma of war had helped to desensitize the public to violence and the emancipation of women had changed attitudes to them. Audiences were tiring of older, more genteel forms of magic. It took something shocking, such as the horrific productions of the Grand Guignol
Grand Guignol
Le Théâtre du Grand-Guignol — known as the Grand Guignol — was a theatre in the Pigalle area of Paris . From its opening in 1897 until its closing in 1962 it specialized in naturalistic horror shows...
theatre, to cause a sensation in this age. Steinmenyer concludes that: "...beyond practical concerns, the image of the woman in peril became a specific fashion in entertainment".
The damsel-in-distress continued as a mainstay of the film, television, and comics industries throughout the 20th century. Character Ann Darrow, as played by Fay Wray
Fay Wray
Fay Wray was a Canadian-American actress most noted for playing the female lead in King Kong...
in the 1933 movie King Kong
King Kong (1933 film)
King Kong is a Pre-Code 1933 fantasy monster adventure film co-directed by Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack, and written by Ruth Rose and James Ashmore Creelman after a story by Cooper and Edgar Wallace. The film tells of a gigantic island-dwelling apeman creature called Kong who dies in...
, is among the most iconic instances. The notorious hoax documentary Ingagi
Ingagi
Ingagi is a 1931 Pre-Code exploitation film. It purports to be a documentary of Sir Hubert Winstead of London on an expedition to Africa, and it concerns a tribe of gorilla-worshiping women encountered by the explorer. It was produced by Congo Pictures and distributed by RKO Radio Pictures...
in 1930 also featured this idea and Wray's role was repeated by Jessica Lange
Jessica Lange
Jessica Phyllis Lange is an American actress who has worked in film, theatre and television. The recipient of several awards, including two Academy Awards, four Golden Globes and one Emmy, Lange is regarded as one of the première female actors of her generation.Lange was discovered by producer...
and Naomi Watts
Naomi Watts
Naomi Ellen Watts is a British actress. Watts began her career in Australian television, where she appeared in series such as Hey Dad..! , Brides of Christ , and Home and Away . Her film debut was the 1986 drama For Love Alone...
in remakes. As journalist Andrew Erish has noted: "Gorillas plus sexy women in peril equals enormous profits". Imperiled heroines in need of rescue were a frequent occurrence in black-and-white movie serials made by studios such as Mascot Pictures, Universal
Universal Studios
Universal Pictures , a subsidiary of NBCUniversal, is one of the six major movie studios....
, Columbia
Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production and distribution company. Columbia Pictures now forms part of the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, owned by Sony Pictures Entertainment, a subsidiary of the Japanese conglomerate Sony. It is one of the leading film companies...
and Republic Pictures
Republic Pictures
Republic Pictures was an independent film production-distribution corporation with studio facilities, operating from 1934 through 1959, and was best known for specializing in westerns, movie serials and B films emphasizing mystery and action....
in the 1930s, 1940s and early 1950s. These serials sometimes drew inspiration for their characters and plots from adventure novels and comic books. Notable examples include the character Nyoka the Jungle Girl
Nyoka the Jungle Girl
Nyoka the Jungle Girl is a fictional character created for the screen in the 1941 serial Jungle Girl, starring Frances Gifford as Nyoka Meredith. The character of Nyoka is often described as having been created by Edgar Rice Burroughs...
, who was created by Edgar Rice Burroughs
Edgar Rice Burroughs
Edgar Rice Burroughs was an American author, best known for his creation of the jungle hero Tarzan and the heroic Mars adventurer John Carter, although he produced works in many genres.-Biography:...
for comic books and was later adapted into a serial heroine in Republic productions such as Perils of Nyoka
Perils of Nyoka
Perils of Nyoka is a 1942 Republic Movie serial directed by William Witney. It starred Kay Aldridge as Nyoka the Jungle Girl, a character who first appeared in the Edgar Rice Burroughs-inspired serial "Jungle Girl."-Plot:...
. Another classic damsel in that mould was Jane Porter
Jane Porter (Tarzan)
Jane Porter is a major character in Edgar Rice Burroughs's series of Tarzan novels, and in adaptations of the saga to other media, particularly film.- In the novels :...
in both the novel and movie versions of Tarzan
Tarzan
Tarzan is a fictional character, an archetypal feral child raised in the African jungles by the Mangani "great apes"; he later experiences civilization only to largely reject it and return to the wild as a heroic adventurer...
.
One of the earliest, and most frequently cited examples of a damsel in distress in comics is Lois Lane
Lois Lane
Lois Lane is a fictional character, the primary love interest of Superman in the comic books of DC Comics. Created by writer Jerry Siegel and artist Joe Shuster, she first appeared in Action Comics #1 ....
, who is eternally getting into trouble and needing to be rescued by Superman
Superman
Superman is a fictional comic book superhero appearing in publications by DC Comics, widely considered to be an American cultural icon. Created by American writer Jerry Siegel and Canadian-born American artist Joe Shuster in 1932 while both were living in Cleveland, Ohio, and sold to Detective...
. Another is Olive Oyl
Olive Oyl
Olive Oyl is a cartoon character created by Elzie Crisler Segar in 1919 for his comic strip Thimble Theatre. The strip was later renamed Popeye after the sailor character that became the most popular member of the cast; however Olive Oyl was a main character for 10 years before Popeye's 1929...
who is in a near-constant state of kidnap
Kidnapping
In criminal law, kidnapping is the taking away or transportation of a person against that person's will, usually to hold the person in false imprisonment, a confinement without legal authority...
, requiring her to be saved by Popeye
Popeye
Popeye the Sailor is a cartoon fictional character created by Elzie Crisler Segar, who has appeared in comic strips and animated cartoons in the cinema as well as on television. He first appeared in the daily King Features comic strip Thimble Theatre on January 17, 1929...
.
Critical and theoretical responses
Damsels in distress have been cited as an example of differential treatment of genders in literature, film, and works of art. Feminist criticism of art, filmFeminist film theory
Feminist film theory is theoretical film criticism derived from feminist politics and feminist theory. Feminists have many approaches to cinema analysis, regarding the film elements analysed and their theoretical underpinnings.-History:...
, and literature
Feminist literary criticism
Feminist literary criticism is literary criticism informed by feminist theory, or by the politics of feminism more broadly. Its history has been broad and varied, from classic works of nineteenth-century women authors such as George Eliot and Margaret Fuller to cutting-edge theoretical work in...
has often examined gender-oriented characterization and plot, including the common "damsel in distress" trope. Many modern writers, such as Angela Carter
Angela Carter
Angela Carter was an English novelist and journalist, known for her feminist, magical realism, and picaresque works...
and Jane Yolen
Jane Yolen
Jane Hyatt Yolen is an American author and editor of almost 300 books. These include folklore, fantasy, science fiction, and children's books...
, have revisited classic fairy tale
Fairy tale
A fairy tale is a type of short story that typically features such folkloric characters, such as fairies, goblins, elves, trolls, dwarves, giants or gnomes, and usually magic or enchantments. However, only a small number of the stories refer to fairies...
s and "damsel in distress" stories or collected and anthologized stories and folk tales that break the "damsel in distress" pattern. Often, such stories reverse the gender disparity by "empowering
Misandry
Misandry is the hatred or dislike of men or boys.Misandry comes from Greek misos and anēr, andros . Misandry is the antonym of philandry, the fondness towards men, love, or admiration of them...
" the "damsel", or by placing boys or men in distress to be rescued thereby.
Whilst late twentieth century feminist criticism may have highlighted alternatives to the damsel stereotype, the origins of some alternatives are to be found elsewhere. Joseph Campbell
Joseph Campbell
Joseph John Campbell was an American mythologist, writer and lecturer, best known for his work in comparative mythology and comparative religion. His work is vast, covering many aspects of the human experience...
's work on comparative mythology has provided a theoretical model for heroes throughout the history of literature, drama, and film, which has been further developed by dramaturgical
Dramaturgy
Dramaturgy is the art of dramatic composition and the representation of the main elements of drama on the stage. Dramaturgy is a distinct practice separate from play writing and directing, although a single individual may perform any combination of the three. Some dramatists combine writing and...
writers such as Christopher Vogler
Christopher Vogler
Christopher Vogler is a Hollywood development executive best known for his guide for screenwriters, The Writer's Journey: Mythic Structure For Writers.-Career:...
. These theories suggest that within the underlying story arc of every hero is found an episode known as the ordeal, where the character is almost destroyed. By surviving fear, danger, or torture the hero proves he or she has special qualities and ultimately emerges re-invented to progress to ultimate victory. Within this theory the empowered "damsel" can be a female hero rendered powerless and imperiled during her heroic ordeal but who ultimately emerges as a strong figure who claims victory; yet the male and female versions of such ordeal and empowerment still differ at a fundamental level, in that when there is a character doing the rescuing (sometimes referred to as "help unlooked for"), he is almost invariably male.
The Perils of Pauline (1914 serial)
The Perils of Pauline is a motion picture serial shown in weekly installments featuring Pearl White as the title character. Pauline has often been cited as a famous example of a damsel in distress, although some analyses hold that her character was more resourceful and less helpless than the...
(1914), in fact provides at least a partial counterexample, in that Pauline, as played by Pearl White
Pearl White
Pearl Fay White was an American film actress, the so-called "Stunt Queen" of silent films, most notably in The Perils of Pauline.-Early life:...
, is a strong character who decides against early marriage in favour of seeking adventure and becoming an author. Despite common belief, the film does not feature scenes with Pauline tied to a railroad track and threatened by a buzzsaw, although such scenes were incorporated into later re-creations and were also featured in other films made in the period around 1914. Academic Ben Singer has contested the idea that these "serial-queen melodramas" were male fantasies and has observed that they were marketed heavily at women. The first motion picture serial made in the United States, What Happened to Mary?
What Happened to Mary?
What Happened to Mary is the first motion picture serial made in the United States...
(1912), was released to coincide with a serial story of the same name published in McClure's Ladies' World magazine.
Empowered damsels were a feature of the serials made in the 1930s and 1940s by studios such as Republic Pictures
Republic Pictures
Republic Pictures was an independent film production-distribution corporation with studio facilities, operating from 1934 through 1959, and was best known for specializing in westerns, movie serials and B films emphasizing mystery and action....
. The "cliffhanger" scenes at the end of episodes provide many examples of female heroines bound and helpless and facing fiendish death traps. But those heroines, as played by actresses such as Linda Stirling
Linda Stirling
Linda Stirling was an American showgirl, model and actress. In her later years, she had a second career as a college English professor for more than two decades...
and Kay Aldridge
Kay Aldridge
Kay Aldridge was an American model and actress. She is best known for playing feisty and frequently-imperiled heroines in black and white serials during the 1940s.-Life and work:...
, were often strong, assertive women who ultimately played an active part in vanquishing the villains.
C.L. Moore's 1934 story "Shambleau
Shambleau
"Shambleau" is a short story by American science fiction and fantasy writer C. L. Moore. Though it was her first professional sale, it is her most famous story. It first appeared in the November 1933 issue of Weird Tales and has been reprinted numerous times...
" - generally acknowledged as epoch-making in the history of Science Fiction
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
- begins in what seems a classical Damsel in Distress situation: The protagonist, space adventurer Northwest Smith
Northwest Smith
Northwest Smith is a fictional character, and the hero of a series of stories by science fiction writer C. L. Moore.- Story setting :Smith is a spaceship pilot and smuggler who lives in an undisclosed future time when humanity has colonized the solar system....
, sees a "sweetly-made girl" pursued by a lynch mob intent on killing her and intervenes to save her, but finds her not a girl nor a human being at all, but a disguised alien creature, predatory and highly dangerous. Soon, Smith himself needs rescuing and barely escapes with his life.
These themes have received successive updates in modern-era characters, ranging from 'spy girls' of the 1960s to current movie and television heroines. In her book The Devil With James Bond (1967) Ann Boyd compared James Bond
James Bond
James Bond, code name 007, is a fictional character created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short story collections. There have been a six other authors who wrote authorised Bond novels or novelizations after Fleming's death in 1964: Kingsley Amis,...
with an updating of the legend of St George and the "princess and dragon
Princess and dragon
Princess and dragon is a generic premise common to many legends and fairy tales. It is not a fairy tale itself, but along with Prince Charming, is a repeated cliché...
" genre, particularly with Dr. No
Dr. No
Dr. No is the sixth novel in Ian Fleming's James Bond series, first published in the UK by Jonathan Cape on 31 March 1958. The story centres on Bond's investigation into the disappearance in Jamaica of a fellow MI6 operative, Commander John Strangways and his secretary, Mary Trueblood. He...
's dragon tank. The damsel in distress theme is also very prominent in "The Spy Who Loved Me ", where the story is told in the first person by the young woman Vivienne Michel
Vivienne Michel
Vivienne "Viv" Michel is the main fictional character in Ian Fleming's James Bond novel The Spy Who Loved Me. She has not appeared as a character in a James Bond film, as Danjaq, the copyright holder to the characters, elements, and other material related to James Bond on screen agreed never to use...
, who is threatened with imminent rape by thugs when Bond kills them and claims her as his reward.
The female spy Emma Peel
Emma Peel
Emma Peel was a fictional spy played by Diana Rigg in the British 1960s adventure television series The Avengers. She was born Emma Knight, the daughter of an industrialist, Sir John Knight.-Casting:...
in the 1960s British television series The Avengers
The Avengers (TV series)
The Avengers is a spy-fi British television series set in the 1960s Britain. The Avengers initially focused on Dr. David Keel and his assistant John Steed . Hendry left after the first series and Steed became the main character, partnered with a succession of assistants...
was often seen in "damsel in distress" situations. The character and her reactions, as portrayed by actress Diana Rigg
Diana Rigg
Dame Enid Diana Elizabeth Rigg, DBE is an English actress. She is probably best known for her portrayals of Emma Peel in The Avengers and Countess Teresa di Vicenzo in the 1969 James Bond film On Her Majesty's Secret Service....
, differentiated these scenes from other movie and television scenarios where women were similarly imperiled as pure victims or pawns in the plot. A scene with Emma Peel bound and threatened with a death ray in the episode From Venus with Love is a direct parallel to James Bond's confrontation with a laser in the film Goldfinger
Goldfinger (film)
Goldfinger is the third spy film in the James Bond series and the third to star Sean Connery as the fictional MI6 agent James Bond. Released in 1964, it is based on the novel of the same name by Ian Fleming. The film also stars Honor Blackman as Bond girl Pussy Galore and Gert Fröbe as the title...
. Both are examples of the classic hero's ordeal as described by Campbell and Vogler. The serial heroines and Emma Peel are cited as providing inspiration for the creators of strong heroines in more recent times. Ranging from Joan Wilder in Romancing the Stone
Romancing the Stone
Romancing the Stone is a 1984 American action-adventure romantic comedy. Directed by Robert Zemeckis, it stars Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner and Danny DeVito. The film was followed by a 1985 sequel, The Jewel of the Nile....
and Princess Leia Organa
Princess Leia Organa
Princess Leia Organa of Alderaan is a fictional character in the Star Wars universe...
in Star Wars
Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope
Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, originally released as Star Wars, is a 1977 American epic space opera film, written and directed by George Lucas. It is the first of six films released in the Star Wars saga: two subsequent films complete the original trilogy, while a prequel trilogy completes the...
to "post feminist
Antifeminism
Antifeminism is opposition to feminism in some or all of its forms. Modern antifeminists say that the feminist movement has achieved its aims and now seeks higher status for women than for men.-History:...
" icons such as Buffy Summers
Buffy Summers
Buffy Summers is a fictional character from Joss Whedon's Buffy the Vampire Slayer franchise. She first appeared in the 1992 film Buffy the Vampire Slayer before going on to appear in the television series and subsequent comic book of the same name...
from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Sydney Bristow
Sydney Bristow
Sydney Anne Bristow , played by Jennifer Garner, is the main character and protagonist on the television series Alias. She is an American woman with Russian-American family background who works as a spy for the CIA....
from Alias
Alias (TV series)
Alias is an American action television series created by J. J. Abrams which was broadcast on ABC for five seasons, from September 30, 2001 to May 22, 2006...
, Kim Possible from the series of the same name
Kim Possible
Kim Possible is an American animated television series about a teenage crime fighter who has the task of dealing with worldwide, family, and school issues every day. The show is action-oriented, but also has a light-hearted atmosphere and often lampoons the conventions and clichés of the...
and Veronica Mars
Veronica Mars (character)
Veronica Mars is a fictional character in UPN/The CW the television series, Veronica Mars, which aired on the UPN and CW networks from 2004 to 2007. She is portrayed by Kristen Bell.- Background and details of plot :...
also from the series of the same name
Veronica Mars
Veronica Mars is an American television series created by Rob Thomas. The series premiered on September 22, 2004, during television network UPN's final two years, and ended on May 22, 2007, after a season on UPN's successor, The CW Television Network. Veronica Mars was produced by Warner Bros...
.
Reflecting these changes, Daphne Blake
Daphne Blake
Daphne Anne Blake is a fictional character in the long-running American animated series Scooby-Doo. Daphne, depicted as coming from a wealthy family, is noted for her red hair, her fashion sense, and her knack for getting into danger...
of the Scooby-Doo
Scooby-Doo
Scooby-Doo is an American media franchise based around several animated television series and related works produced from 1969 to the present day. The original series, Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!, was created for Hanna-Barbera Productions by writers Joe Ruby and Ken Spears in 1969...
cartoon series (who throughout the series is captured dozens of times, falls through trap doors, etc.) is portrayed in the Scooby-Doo film
Scooby-Doo (film)
Scooby-Doo is a 2002 American comedy film based on the Hanna-Barbera television cartoon series Scooby-Doo about a group of young detectives and their talking dog. It is the first installment in the Scooby-Doo live action film series...
as a wisecracking feminist heroine (quote: "I've had it with this damsel in distress thing!"). The 2009 film Sherlock Holmes
Sherlock Holmes (2009 film)
Sherlock Holmes is a 2009 action-mystery film based on the character of the same name created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The film was directed by Guy Ritchie and produced by Joel Silver, Lionel Wigram, Susan Downey and Dan Lin. The screenplay by Michael Robert Johnson, Anthony Peckham and Simon...
includes a classical damsel in distress episode, where Irene Adler
Irene Adler
Irene Adler is a fictional character featured in the Sherlock Holmes story "A Scandal in Bohemia" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, published in July 1891...
(played by Rachel McAdams
Rachel McAdams
Rachel Anne McAdams is a Canadian actress. After graduating from a theatre program at York University, Toronto in 2001, she worked steadily as an actress until finding fame in 2004 with starring roles in teen comedy Mean Girls and romantic drama The Notebook...
) is helplessly bound to a conveyor belt in an industrial slaughterhouse, and is saved from being sawn in half by a chainsaw; yet in other episodes of the same film Adler is strong and assertive - for example, overcoming with contemptuous ease two thugs who sought to rob her (and robbing them instead). In the film's climax it is Adler who saves the British Empire
British Empire
The British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom. It originated with the overseas colonies and trading posts established by England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. At its height, it was the...
, dismantling at the last moment a device set to poison the entire membership of Parliament.
In the final scene of the 2007 Walt Disney Pictures
Walt Disney Pictures
Walt Disney Pictures is an American film studio owned by The Walt Disney Company. Walt Disney Pictures and Television, a subsidiary of the Walt Disney Studios and the main production company for live-action feature films within the Walt Disney Motion Pictures Group, based at the Walt Disney...
film "Enchanted" the traditional roles are reversed when male protagonist Robert (Patrick Dempsey
Patrick Dempsey
Patrick Galen Dempsey is an American actor, known for his role as neurosurgeon Dr. Derek Shepherd on the medical drama Grey's Anatomy. Prior to Grey's Anatomy he made several television appearances and was nominated for an Emmy Award...
) is captured by Queen Narissa (Susan Sarandon
Susan Sarandon
Susan Sarandon is an American actress. She has worked in films and television since 1969, and won an Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in the 1995 film Dead Man Walking. She had also been nominated for the award for four films before that and has received other recognition for her...
) in her dragon form. In a King Kong
King Kong
King Kong is a fictional character, a giant movie monster resembling a gorilla, that has appeared in several movies since 1933. These include the groundbreaking 1933 movie, the film remakes of 1976 and 2005, as well as various sequels of the first two films...
fashion, she carries him to the top a New York skyscraper, until Robert's beloved Giselle climbs, sword in hand, to save him.
A similar role reversal is evident in Stieg Larsson
Stieg Larsson
Karl Stig-Erland Larsson , who wrote professionally as Stieg Larsson, was a Swedish journalist and writer, born in Skelleftehamn outside Skellefteå. He is best known for writing the "Millennium series" of crime novels, which were published posthumously...
's "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is an award-winning crime novel by Swedish author and journalist Stieg Larsson. It is the first book in the trilogy known as the "Millennium series"....
", in whose climatic scene the male protagonist is captured by a mass murderer, locked in an underground torture room, chained, stripped naked, and humiliated when his female partner enters to save him and destroy the villain.
Fetish
The figure of the damsel in distress is a feature of certain established fetishesSexual fetishism
Sexual fetishism, or erotic fetishism, is the sexual arousal a person receives from a physical object, or from a specific situation. The object or situation of interest is called the fetish, the person a fetishist who has a fetish for that object/situation. Sexual fetishism may be regarded, e.g...
within the field of BDSM
BDSM
BDSM is an erotic preference and a form of sexual expression involving the consensual use of restraint, intense sensory stimulation, and fantasy power role-play. The compound acronym BDSM is derived from the terms bondage and discipline , dominance and submission , and sadism and masochism...
. In particular, actresses playing damsels in distress in mainstream movies and television shows are often shown bound or restrained, resulting in images that appeal to some bondage
Bondage (BDSM)
Bondage is the use of restraints for the sexual pleasure of the parties involved. It may be used in its own right, as in the case of rope bondage and breast bondage, or as part of sexual activity or BDSM activity.- Private bondage :...
fetishists.
There is a damsel in distress fan community supported through various websites and forums, which feature discussions as well as alerts for potential occurrences of scenes in forthcoming shows and movies. Enthusiasts post and share still images and video clips, generally editing the material to show only the parts where actresses are in some form of restraint. The term "Didcap" has been coined to describe a screen shot of this type. It is a portmanteau between DiD, for "Damsel in Distress" and vidcap, for "video capture".
Outside the mainstream, the fetishistic subculture of specialized bondage magazines and videos that has thrived since the late 1970s is a variation on the damsel in distress of literature, but with one major difference. Here, the helplessness of the bound and gagged victim is eroticized and celebrated as an end in itself, occasionally with no rescuing hero or hope of escape.
See also
- Muriel Bagge
- Princess and dragonPrincess and dragonPrincess and dragon is a generic premise common to many legends and fairy tales. It is not a fairy tale itself, but along with Prince Charming, is a repeated cliché...
- Princess PeachPrincess Peachis a character in Nintendo's Mario series of video games. She is the Princess of the fictitious Mushroom Kingdom, and often plays the damsel in distress role within the adventure series. In 2007, Princess Peach landed on Forbes magazine's Wealthiest Fictional People list, with a fortune upwards of...
- Princess ZeldaPrincess Zeldais the name of a fictional character in The Legend of Zelda series of video games. The name has applied to every female member of Hyrule's royal family, which includes several distinct characters in Hyrule legend. Though she is the eponymous character, the player controls the main protagonist, Link...
- Portrayal of women in video gamesPortrayal of women in video gamesThe portrayal of women in video games has often been the subject of both academic studies and controversy. Two recurring themes are the level of independence of female characters from their male counterparts, and their objectification and sexualization....
- Feminist film theoryFeminist film theoryFeminist film theory is theoretical film criticism derived from feminist politics and feminist theory. Feminists have many approaches to cinema analysis, regarding the film elements analysed and their theoretical underpinnings.-History:...
- Final girlFinal girlThe final girl is a trope in thriller and horror films that specifically refers to the last woman or girl alive to confront the killer, ostensibly the one left to tell the story...
- Femme fataleFemme fataleA femme fatale is a mysterious and seductive woman whose charms ensnare her lovers in bonds of irresistible desire, often leading them into compromising, dangerous, and deadly situations. She is an archetype of literature and art...
- Pearl WhitePearl WhitePearl Fay White was an American film actress, the so-called "Stunt Queen" of silent films, most notably in The Perils of Pauline.-Early life:...
- IngenueIngenue (stock character)See also Disingenuous, which is not quite the antonym that it may seem!The ingénue is a stock character in literature, film, and a role type in the theatre; generally a girl or a young woman who is endearingly innocent and wholesome. Ingenue may also refer to a new young actress or one typecast in...
- Scream queenScream queenA scream queen is an actress who has become associated with horror films, either through an appearance in a notable entry in the genre as a frequent victim or through constant appearances as the female protagonist...
- Missing white woman syndromeMissing white woman syndromeMissing white woman syndrome or missing pretty girl syndrome is a term used by some media and social critics to describe the seemingly disproportionate degree of coverage in television, radio, newspaper and magazine reporting of a misfortune, most often a missing person case, involving a young,...
- White Slavery
- Feminist science fictionFeminist science fictionFeminist science fiction is a sub-genre of science fiction which tends to deal with women's roles in society. Feminist science fiction poses questions about social issues such as how society constructs gender roles, the role reproduction plays in defining gender and the unequal political and...
- Feminist literary criticismFeminist literary criticismFeminist literary criticism is literary criticism informed by feminist theory, or by the politics of feminism more broadly. Its history has been broad and varied, from classic works of nineteenth-century women authors such as George Eliot and Margaret Fuller to cutting-edge theoretical work in...
- Target girlTarget girlTarget girl is a term sometimes used in circus and vaudeville to denote a female assistant in "impalement" acts such as knife throwing, archery or sharpshooting. The assistant stands in front of a target board or is strapped to a moving board and the impalement artist throws knives or shoots...
- Women in RefrigeratorsWomen in RefrigeratorsWomen in Refrigerators is a website that was created in 1999 by a group of comic book fans. The website features a list of female comic book characters that had been injured, killed, or depowered as a plot device within various superhero comic books...
- Predicament escapePredicament escapeA predicament escape is any form of magic trick or escapology stunt in which the performer is trapped in a dangerous situation and is required to escape from it...