“Sometimes you must shed your skin to save it.”
Donkeyskin sheds her early identity as a princess in order to escape her father and survive, doing so by dressing in a donkeyskin and becoming a servant. She represents a larger theme of the book: that in order to survive in a world that oppresses women, they must shed their identities and privileges and make different lives for themselves.
“So then she took me home, or I took her home, or we were both somehow taken to the closest thing.”
Cinderella does not have a real home at the start of her story, and thinks that she can find a home with the prince. When she realizes that the prince isn’t what she wants, and she instead wants the fairy godmother. This quote represents her realization that while the life she dreamed for herself may not be the life that she actually wants, she can still have a happy life, and even if it doesn’t meet expectations, it still brings her happiness.
“I’ve seen enough men in my time. Whoever he is, he’s not worth what you’ll pay.”
One of the overarching themes of Kissing the Witch is that men are untrustworthy and will never be worth the effort and sacrifice it takes to be with them. The witch warns Ariel of this, and she’s true: her prince runs off with another woman and Ariel is forced to return home. Men are not worth sacrifice and effort, and women are ultimately safer without them: alone or with other women.
“This was a strange story, one I would have to learn a new language to read, a language I could not learn except by trying to read the story.”
Belle finds an entirely new world with the beast that’s unlike anything she was expecting, and realizes that the beast is not only a woman, not only something other than a monster, but something that she can love, takes time. Her story is similar to those of many of the other protagonists from Kissing the Witch, as they encounter new lives and are given no choice but to jump in.
