Was MLP G1 a rip off of the Last Unicorn?

[Galactica]

I read a book that went through the history / myth of unicorns and it had that little tidbit!  Also, the maiden should have a mirror.  The unicorn would look into it and become fascinated by its own reflection.  Apparently unicorns are vain??

Totally makes sense to me- 

[Zapper]

I recently went to the Last Unicorn Movie where Peter Beagle (and his group) spoke-  and I learned that Peter Beagle was the first author to refer to the Unicorn as female.  Apparently books had previously referred to the unicorn generally as male.  (He confessed that he had had no idea at the time).  Kinda interesting....

This is really interesting! For years I thought he did the gender change on purpose. I knew I read somewhere the unicorn was often associated with the masculine because of the long... horn. And therefore only a virgin girl would be able to calm them *insert naughty joke here*

I think I like Beagle's interpretation more

[Roseprincess1]

I recently went to the Last Unicorn Movie where Peter Beagle (and his group) spoke-  and I learned that Peter Beagle was the first author to refer to the Unicorn as female.  Apparently books had previously referred to the unicorn generally as male.  (He confessed that he had had no idea at the time).  Kinda interesting....

This is really interesting! For years I thought he did the gender change on purpose. I knew I read somewhere the unicorn was often associated with the masculine because of the long... horn. And therefore only a virgin girl would be able to calm them *insert naughty joke here*

I think I like Beagle's interpretation more

I remember reading about the gender thing too... Typically unicorns were seen as male and in many works from ancient or mideval artists, the unicorn, who represented purity, would often represent the figure of christ with the dragon representing the figure of satan.
I had to do a report onthis for art history its pretty facinating.

Most of the mlp unicorns are female tho, so i think because they are such delicate critters its very easy to think of them in femme terms.

[Galactica]

I recently went to the Last Unicorn Movie where Peter Beagle (and his group) spoke-  and I learned that Peter Beagle was the first author to refer to the Unicorn as female.  Apparently books had previously referred to the unicorn generally as male.  (He confessed that he had had no idea at the time).  Kinda interesting....

This is really interesting! For years I thought he did the gender change on purpose. I knew I read somewhere the unicorn was often associated with the masculine because of the long... horn. And therefore only a virgin girl would be able to calm them *insert naughty joke here*

I think I like Beagle's interpretation more

Yeah I liked Beagle's unicorn better too.   I think probably there just wasn't much of ANY literature written about unicorns prior to '68, and books written with female main characters were fairly few and far between as well. 

But I guess there isn't any way of knowing (without taking a time machine preventing the book from having ever been made thereby preventing the movie 14 years later)  what impact Beagle's portrayal of the unicorn as female had long term on how society/consumers/Hasbro saw the gender of unicorns.   And I certainly would never do that.   

[Sarah Jo]

Not at all..