The Princess And The Pea, If The Pea Were A Small Piece Of Mild Criticism

ONCE upon a time there was a prince who wanted to marry a princess; but she would have to be a real princess. He travelled all over the world to find one, but nowhere could he get what he wanted. There were princesses enough, but it was difficult to find out whether they were real ones. There was always something about them that was not as it should be. They seemed capable of absorbing criticism as well as compliments without letting it tear up their self-image. So he came home again and was sad, for he would have liked very much to have a real princess.

One evening a terrible storm came on; there was thunder and lightning, and the rain poured down in torrents. Suddenly a knocking was heard at the city gate, and the old king went to open it.

It was a princess standing out there in front of the gate. But, good gracious! what a sight the rain and the wind had made her look. The water ran down from her hair and clothes; it ran down into the toes of her shoes and out again at the heels. And yet she said that she was a real princess.

“Well, we’ll soon find that out,” thought the old queen. But she said nothing, went into the bed-room, took all the bedding off the bedstead, and laid a piece of mild criticism on the bottom; then she took twenty compliments and laid them on the criticism, and then twenty genuine, loving friendships on top of the compliments and then also a perfectly good life full of interesting work and fulfilling interests and rewarding relationships on top of that.

On this the princess had to lie all night. In the morning she was asked how she had slept.

“Oh, very badly!” said she. “I have scarcely closed my eyes all night. Heaven only knows what was in the bed, but I was lying on something painful, so unbelievably destructive, so that I am black and blue all over my body. It’s horrible!”

Now they knew that she was a real princess because she had felt the piece of mild criticism right through the twenty compliments and the twenty genuine, loving friendships and the perfectly good life full of interesting work and fulfilling interests and rewarding relationships on top of that.

Nobody but a real princess could be as sensitive as that.

So the prince took her for his wife, for now he knew that he had a real princess; and the piece of criticism was put in the museum, where it may still be seen, if no one has stolen it, but she never forgot it.

She never forgot it.

There, that is a true story.

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