The Little Lame Prince and his Travelling Cloak

"The Little Lame Prince and his Travelling Cloak" (often published under its shorter title "The Little Lame Prince") is a story for children written by Dinah Maria Mulock Craik and first published in 1875. In the story, a young prince whose legs are paralysed due to a childhood trauma is given a magical travelling cloak by his fairy godmother; he uses this cloak to go on various adventures, and develops great wisdom and empathy in the process.

Plot

The new prince of the country of Nomansland receives twenty-four names on his christening day, but the only name he is known by is the name given him by a mysterious little lady all in gray, who calls herself his godmother. She names him Prince Dolor after his mother the Queen, whose given name is Dolorez, and who passes away on the very day of her son's christening.

Born beautiful and healthy, the Prince becomes pale and sickly after his mother's death. Unknown to nearly everyone, the state nursemaid whose job it was to carry Prince Dolor to his christening accidentally dropped him at the foot of the marble stairs, and this accident has cost the young prince the use of his legs. When the King dies, the Prince Regent points out that Prince Dolor, who would ordinarily ascend the throne, is merely a child and a cripple. Control of the kingdom is ceded to the Regent, and a short while later it is reported that Prince Dolor has died while taking a journey to the Beautiful Mountains. In reality, the Prince lives on in exile, imprisoned inside Hopeless Tower on a blasted plain, with a condemned woman to care for him.

As the Prince grows older, learns to read, and discovers some of the literature of his own country, he becomes very melancholy and develops a great desire to see some of the world outside his tower. When he wishes aloud for a friend, the little lady in gray appears and talks to him. She leaves for the Prince a small, shabby bundle of green fabric tied up in knots—a magical travelling cloak. When Prince Dolor unties the cloak, spreads it on the floor, sits in the middle and says the magic words, the cloak conveys him out of the tower like a magic carpet. He also receives a pair of gold spectacles which allow him to see faraway objects as though they were close, and a pair of silver ears through which he can hear the sounds of things happening from a great distance. With these magical gifts at his command, Prince Dolor sets out to see the world.

On one of his excursions, the Prince asks the cloak to show him a little boy about his own age. Unwilling but obedient, the cloak does so. When the Prince sees a healthy little shepherd boy and watches how fast he runs, he begins to feel sorry for himself and upset that his own legs do not work.

The Prince becomes more curious about his own existence, and begins asking his nurse questions. She reveals to him that he is truly a king, and that his uncle has usurped the throne. Once he has learned the truth about himself, Prince Dolor develops a strong desire to be independent, to learn the things he needs to learn, and to use whatever power he may have to help other people. He visits Nomansland and sees the body of his uncle, who has recently died, then views the bloodshed and horror of revolution as the people realise they have no king.

When the Prince finally returns to his tower, he discovers that his nurse is gone. For the next five days he lives alone in the tower, caring for himself as best he can. On the sixth day he discovers that his nurse went away to spread the word from town to town throughout Nomansland that the Prince was still alive and well, locked up in the tower. He receives another visit from his dear godmother before the people of Nomansland convey him away to become King; all he carries away from the tower with him is his magic travelling cloak.

Prince Dolor becomes an excellent king, with the help of his godmother and his travelling cloak. He pardons his old nurse, abolishes the death penalty, recalls the family of his uncle and reinstates them as royalty. At the end of his days as king, he says goodbye to his people and flies away toward the Beautiful Mountains on his magical cloak.

An "inverted fairy tale"

"The Little Lame Prince" has a number of external similarities to classic fairy tales such as "Sleeping Beauty", "Snow White" and "Rapunzel"—for instance, it features a fairy godmother, an orphaned royal child banished by a pretender to the throne, a prison in the form of a tall tower, etc.—but it also inverts these motifs in unexpected ways. The common theme of a maiden in distress is changed to that of a lame, imprisoned prince; the prisoner in the tower is rescued from within by a magical visitor, who comes when he wishes for her; the primary instigators of evil are not witches or other magical creatures, but human beings with various faults and failings. Most notably, "The Little Lame Prince" suggests that a protagonist need not be transformed into physical perfection in order to create a good, noble, worthwhile life with a fairy-tale ending. The transformation which occurs in this story happens not to the Prince's outer form, but to his inner life, as he learns the things he must know in order to be a wise and just king.

ubtext

Although ostensibly written as a story for her daughter, Craik suggests that "The Little Lame Prince" is a parable, with a deeper meaning than that of other fairy tales: "If any reader, big or little, should wonder whether there is a meaning in this story deeper than that of an ordinary fairy tale, I will own that there is. But I have hidden it so carefully that the smaller people, and many larger folk, will never find it out, and meantime the book may be read straight on, like 'Cinderella,' or 'Blue-Beard,' or 'Hop-o'my-Thumb,' for what interest it has, or what amusement it may bring." ["The Little Lame Prince and his Travelling Cloak", Chapter V, paragraph 1]

Possible subtextual meanings may be found in the person of the Prince's godmother, who appears to represent the unconditional love of Deity and its effect on human life. Craik's own father was a fiery nonconformist minister, and the character of the godmother—wise, gentle, honest, loving, and often funny—seems written as a counter-argument to her father's conception of a wrathful, angry God.

Sally Mitchell, professor of English at Temple University, has suggested that the life of Prince Dolor reflects the social conditions of the lives of many Victorian women: "rejection, enforced helplessness, a discovery of inner self-determination which may not alter worldly status but does make life bearable, and compensation found by living for and through others." [ [http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/craik/mitchell/5.html "Books for Children: Dinah Mariah Mulock Craik" by Sally Mitchell] ]

References

External links

* [http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/496 The Little Lame Prince] at Project Gutenberg
* [http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/craik/mitchell/5.html#prince The Multiple Fantasies of "The Little Lame Prince"] at Victorian Web