Shapeshifting - Themes in Shapeshifting

Themes in Shapeshifting

Shapeshifting may be used as a plot device, as when Puss In Boots tricks the ogre into becoming a mouse so he may eat him, or Jared disposes of the ogre in The Spiderwick Chronicles by convincing him to become a swallow; it may also include a symbolic significance, as when the Beast's transformation at the end of Beauty and the Beast indicates Belle's ability to accept him despite his appearance.

An important aspect of shape-shifting, thematically, is whether the transformation is voluntary. Circe transforms intruders to her island into swine, whereas Ged, in A Wizard of Earthsea, becomes a hawk to escape an evil wizard's stronghold. When a form is taken on involuntarily, the thematic effect is one of confinement and restraint; the person is bound to the new form. In extreme cases, such as petrifaction, the character is entirely disabled. Voluntary forms, on the other hand, are means of escape and liberation; even when the form is not undertaken to effect a literal escape, the abilities specific to the form, or the disguise afforded by it, allow the character to act in a manner previously impossible.

Hence, in fairy tales, a prince who is forced into a bear's shape (as in East of the Sun and West of the Moon) is a prisoner, but a princess who takes on a bear's shape to flee (as in The She-Bear) escapes with her new shape.

In modern fantasy, more than in folklore, the extent to which the change affects the mind can be important. Poul Anderson, in Operation Chaos, has the werewolf observe that taking on wolf-form can simplify his thoughts. A similar effect is noted in Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series. This can be more dangerous in other writers' works. In her Harry Potter series, J.K. Rowling observed that a wizard who became a rat had a rat's brain (although the Animagus talent bypasses this problem), and in her Earthsea books, Ursula K. Le Guin depicts an animal form as slowly transforming the wizard's mind, so that the dolphin, or bear, or other creature forgets it was human and can not change back, a voluntary shapeshifting becoming an imprisoning metamorphosis.

Beyond this, the uses of shape-shifting, transformation, and metamorphosis in fiction are as protean as the forms the characters take on. Some are rare — Italo Calvino's "The Canary Prince" is a Rapunzel variant in which shape-shifting is used to gain access to the tower — but others are common motifs.