Last Unicorn

The Anti-Disney Fairytale
Fantasy stories are know to have at least these four things, a prince in a far away land, a princess that will fall in love with the prince, a major conflict, and of course a happy ending. Peter S. Beagle changes the face of traditional fantasy stories in his book The Last Unicorn. A unicorn embarks on a journey to save all the other unicorns and along the way she meets Schmendrick, a failed magician, and an old maiden named Molly. Together they travel to King Haggard’s castle to search for the unicorn’s enemy, red bull, who is holding all the other unicorns captive. During her journey to the castle, the unicorn learns about the joys and sorrows of being human before meeting her true love Prince Lir. In the end, the unicorn is forced to leave her true love forever. At first glance, The Last Unicorn may seem like a fun children’s book, but it is actually filled with sophisticated themes such as identity, true heroism, reality, and human emotion. Everyone was born a certain way. Trying to change what is natural is almost impossible. Schmendrick is a failed magician who almost killed the unicorn when he tries to save her. But he still believes that he is able to become a mighty magician just by accompanying the unicorn on her journey, “The magic is not mine to command, not yet. That is why I too must go on to the castle.”(152) In the end he never really becomes that powerful magician. Instead, he realizes that he can never get to that point. He settles for being just who he is. Molly Grue is another example, she lost her childhood and innocence at a young age. When she finds the unicorn, she yells at her, “where have you been?” “Where were you twenty years ago ten years ago?” (97) Molly always dreamt that a unicorn would come to save her from her pathetic life serving fugitives as their camp cook. When she sees Schmendrick leaving with the unicorn, she decides to accompany them and try to help the unicorn with her journey in any way she can. But even after waiting for years for the unicorn, she will never get her childhood back. In the end she discovers that she needs to move on with her life. Each character has tried to change who they truly are, but in the end they are still the same person. Every fairytale has to have a hero. The idea of the perfect hero is apparent in The Last Unicorn. The Unicorn, Schmendrick, and Molly Grue travel through a small village where they see Robin Hood. Captain Cully explains the need for humans to create heroes, “Men have to have heroes, but no man can ever be as big as the need.” (88). Humans create heroes to satisfy the need to look up to someone. However, when they create those heroes, they are also creating a so-called perfect person. The problem is, no one is truly perfect. Once those heroes make a mistake, no one considers them heroes anymore. Prince Lir is considered a real hero. Bur when Prince Lir first sees Lady Amalthea, the unicorn in human form, he tries flattering her by explaining that because he is a hero, so he “understood weeping women and knew how to make them stop crying---generally you kill something.” (208) His perception of heroism is off. He believes that he can be a hero just by showing off, rather than doing something actually heroic like helping someone in need. Later on, Schmendrick clarifies what a true hero is. “‘Then what is magic for?’ Prince Lír demanded wildly. ‘What use is wizardry if it cannot save a unicorn?’” Schmedrick did not turn his head. With a touch of sad mockery in his voice, he said, ‘"That's what heroes are for.”’ Here Schemdrick tells Prince Lir exactly what a true hero is, someone who does not rely on magic and someone who is willing to save people. Prince Lir obviously does not understand what a true hero is, but Schmendrick helped him to truly understand. Fairytales often give a very optimistic perspective of the ending of a story, or the “happily ever after”. A problem does not usually have a happy ending. Even though the problem is resolved, more problems can occur in the process, or some problems just go unresolved forever. In The Last Unicorn, Beagle makes it clear that happy endings do not occur all the time. Although in the end the unicorn succeeds in freeing all her fellow unicorns, she was forced to separate from her true love, Prince Lir. Schemndrick is still a failed magician and Molly still lost her childhood even though she finally finds a unicorn and manages to fall in love again. Prince Lir comes back to life and beecomes king, but he is forced to leave his true love, the unicorn. Beagle also remarks that, “Happy endings cannot come in the middle to the story.” Although in the middle of conflict, there may seem like the happy ending has come, there is usually another problem that will come up. “There are no such things as happy endings, because nothing truly ends.” Once a problem is resolved, another one will most likely appear. Even when one dies, those problems will not die with them. Instead, it remains on Earth where the next generation has to deal with it and all the problems there after. Human nature and emotions are extremely complex. The unicorn, as an immortal creature, does not usually have to deal with these emotions. However when she was turned into a human, her life was completely flipped, “You can love, and fear, and forbid things to be what they are, and overact.” Unicorns only fear Red Bull, and are incapable of falling in and out of love. When the unicorn became human, she fell in love with Prince Lir, and felt afraid, “if you’d become human enough to cry there is not magic in the world” (224). When she turned back into a unicorn, she understood the complexity of human emotions and still felt love and despair for Prince Lir. This also ties into how humans require heroes. Although many people understand that heroes are usually imaginary, humans still cling onto that sliver of hope that someday a true hero will come and rescue them. Schemndrick and Molly are both human. When they were captured and put into prison, they were afraid of what was going to happen. The unicorn was also human and also became afraid. But before the unicorn was human she had to face the Harpy, the most feared immortal creature other than red bull. She remained calm and collected, compared to Schmendrick who shrunk away in fear. A huge weakness that humans have is the capability to express emotion. Molly Grue was too afraid to ever quit her mediocre job, so she suffered for a huge part of her life. Schmendrick did not want to practice magic for a while because he did not trust himself, “The magician’s arms fell to his side, ‘I dare no more’ he sighed heavily.” (47); therefore he never reached his full potential. Most negative emotions that humans express are imagined. When one thinks that nothing is scary, suddenly nothing is scary anymore. It is all inside our heads, nothing is truly stressful, scary, or sad. The Last Unicorn is filled with themes seem different than the traditional fairytale. The story richly includes, identity, true heroism, reality, and human emotions that captivate the reader’s attention.