What are you doing in my swamp!?
TW: institutionalisation, violence and racism
Ogres and I have a lot in common: we like peace and quiet and routine, we hate noise, having our space invaded and our things touched, we enjoy a small number of reliable foods that we can eat over and over again, we’re happiest spending lots time alone and need very limited time in the company of others.
Moreover, I actively aspire to the ogre lifestyle. At sixteen my principal ambition in life was to become a hermit. Living alone in the woods, wearing hand-sown burlap and writing all day were the kind of fantasies that distracted me from the soul-crushing monotony of secondary school. Of course, at 16 I couldn’t admit to anyone that I wanted to be a hermit when I grew up. I would respond to that most tedious of questions by saying I wanted to be an artist or writer. These answers felt more socially acceptable, though still a little left of centre.
If you had met me as a teenager you might have said that I was less of a hermit and more like an actual ogre: foul tempered, foul mouthed and cranky. I certainly guarded entry into my bedroom with the same zeal Shrek guards his swamp. While my reclusive tendencies have only grown in recent years, I like to think my temperament has mellowed somewhat. Nevertheless, since discovering I’m Autistic I feel more kinship with Shrek and Fiona than ever before.
Shrek is a 2001 animated comedy blockbuster which has spawned multiple editions of the franchise and spin-offs. A reclusive ogre, Shrek (Mike Myers), who has been shunned by society for most of his life, finds his swamp invaded by a host of magical creatures. The Gingerbread man, Pinocchio, the Three Blind Mice, Donkey and others have been displaced from their homes by the land and power hungry Lord Farquaad (John Lithgow). Lord Farquaad also means to consolidate his rule of DuLoc by marrying a princess and, after perusing those still available on the marriage market, fixes on Princess Fiona (Cameron Diaz). She, however, is being held captive in a tower guarded by a fearsome dragon, awaiting rescue by Prince Charming. When Shrek, accompanied by Donkey (Eddie Murphy), confronts Lord Farquaad and demands his swamp back, Farquaad sends Shrek to retrieve Fiona in exchange for the deeds to his swamp. Shrek and Donkey manage the rescue the princess but things get complicated when Fiona and Shrek begin having mushy feelings for each other on the journey back to DuLoc.
On paper Fiona looks and acts like the typical fairy-tale princess waiting for her happily-ever-after from a knight in shining armour. Having spent years locked away in a tower she is dismayed when Shrek turns out to be her rescuer. We soon discover, however, that her indignation is not simply because Shrek ruined her chance of true-love’s first kiss with her very own Prince Charming. Charming’s kiss was also meant to lift a curse she has been forced to keep a secret for her entire life: that she becomes an ogre each day at sunset.
As the indignation begins to wear off, we see that Fiona is well able to look after herself when given the chance and that, perhaps, she never needed rescuing in the first place. Shrek, refusing to be anything other than his true ogre self, begins to win Fiona over and she allows herself to express her less princessy, more ogreish, side. The more time they spend together the more they vibe and Fiona comes into conflict with her desire to lead a “normal” human life. She begins to realise that ogres may not be the tarrying, detestable beasts she has been led to believe her whole life. Rather, they are woefully misunderstood creatures who have been unjustifiably shunned by society.
It’s a common topic of conversation in the neurodivergent community of our ability to spot our neuro-kin at ten paces, or the click that can happen when you meet someone neurodivergent and instantly start vibing. The signs are subtle but once you become attuned to the ways neurodivergent folk express themselves, physically, verbally or otherwise you begin to notice that we are everywhere! Even more amazing is the joy of dating another neurodivergent person and feeling completely free to be your self around them. This happens with so few people in our wider social or professional circles that when you find this person it can feel like coming home.
Unfortunately, Shrek and Fiona’s joyfully ogreish bubble is soon burst by intrusions from the outside world. Fiona tries to convince herself that a “normal” human life, rather than an ogreish existence with Shrek, will make her happy.
Let me be clear, I am not saying Autistic people are ogres. Autistic people already have enough negative stereotyping to deal with. But I have always found Shrek and Fiona’s stories relatable. The Autistic experience of being rejected, shunned and forced to hide our true selves from the neurotypical is not unlike Shrek and Fiona’s own encounters with the non-ogreish world. Shrek feels he must isolate himself in his swamp to avoid social rejection and Fiona is desperate to “cure” her “curse” with true love’s first kiss, even if it means marrying a toad like Lord Farquaad. Fiona’s journey speaks to the, often overwhelming, pressure on Autistic people to mask our true selves, much of which, like Fiona, comes from our first families.
Autistic people, whether diagnosed or not, receive constant negative messaging from our earliest years about how difficult or troublesome Austistic people can be. Media coverage on Autism is rife with stories about the urgency of finding a “cure” for our ‘condition’: a magic potion that will make all our disagreeable traits disappear so that we can fit seamlessly into the social expectations of the neurotypical world. We only find out in Shrek 2 the lengths to which Fiona’s family have gone to keep her ogreness hidden from the rest of the world and their Faustian pact to cure it by matching her with Prince Charming.
Autistic people have and continue to be the subjects of behaviour modification therapies so that we appear more neurotypical to the outside world. Such therapies are too often mandated for the ease and comfort of those around us, with almost total disregard for the distress and trauma they can cause Autistic people. Far too often, Austistic people are locked away, not in towers guarded by dragons, but in prison or psychiatric facilities where they are “treated” or “cared for” by people who are largely unqualified to support them.
Even without these extremes, expressing our true selves - unmasking as it’s called in neurodivergent circles - can lead to social rejection and even violence from those around us. Just this week a young, unhoused, Autistic man - Jordan Neely - was brutally murdered on the New York subway by a white passenger. This man felt he had the right to use deathly restraint while Jordan was quite possibly in the middle of a meltdown. This case demonstrates the shocking intersection of racism and ableism and the tremendous vulnerability of Autistic people of colour to acts of violence by individuals and institutions.
It feels deeply dissonant to mention Jordan’s murder in an essay about a children’s comedy as irreverent as Shrek. But it would feel remiss to pretend as if it has not just happened and as if I had not spent this whole evening thinking about the terrible injustice of it.
If things in the real world feel impossibly grim, with the daily onslaught of war, death and attacks rights, almost too much to bear, at least Shrek and Fiona get a happy ending. (It lasts the length of their honeymoon, but see Shrek 2 for more on that). Fiona learns that this thing she has been told she must hide from the world, this grotesque being that inspires fear and violence, might not be all that the world has claimed it to be. It might actually be beautiful in its divergence. The part of her she believed was cursed turns out to be her true nature. You might say that Shrek is living his best, unmasked, ogre life and Fiona is on a journey to embrace her true ogreish self.
20+ years later there are many, many issues with Shrek, not least the very dated soundtrack. The protagonist’s repeated lack of respect for women, his mistreatment of Donkey, the transphobia and fatphobia, the tired Disney princess tropes and Fiona’s relegation to damsel in distress, then wife, then mother are all discussed lovingly by the queens form The Bechdel Cast over multiple episodes. Feminism ruins everything, right?
Well actually, not quite. I still love Shrek, though maybe not as much as Caitlin and Jamie who have seen Shrek The Musical and even designed some badass Shrekian merch. Moreover I still want to be a hermit!
As a teenager my hermetic inclinations were a result of overwhelm from school, family and people in general. I craved nature, alone time and the freedom and space to read, write and think in peace. Those desires lay dormant for nearly 20 years as I filled my life with travel, work, hobbies and people to distract me from the looming abyss. Then the pandemic hit and my existence became (and remains) more hermit-like than ever. (So long FOMO!) Luckily, I met someone who is even more anti-social than me and our dream is to become hermits together. Once we have saved enough to buy our own little piece of swamp, we plan on living our best hermit life away from the world along with some cats, dogs, goats and maybe even a Donkey!
PS. After this viewing I began to suspect Donkey might have ADHD: his constant chatter, leaping from one conversation to another, not picking up on social cues, etc. But I also suspect he might be the most likeable character. Leave your thoughts on all things Shrekian below!
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