In Cinderella, Lady Tremaine was harsh towards her own stepdaughter. Not only was Lady Tremaine in a pugnacious relationship with Cinderella, so were the evil stepsisters. The stepsisters constantly wanted to perform better than Cinderella at everything. When Lady Tremaine disregards Cinderella’s desire to attend the ball, she takes her stepsisters in place of her. This caused the failure of Lady Tremaine and the stepsisters to create a familial relationship with Cinderella.
Both authors indicate parental and business opinions of princesses in pursuance of appealing to many readers. Orenstein expresses her dislike towards Disney princesses by proposing that young girls learn incorrect values from the original princess movies, since they teach women unrealistic love and beauty standards. However, Poniewozik believes that recent live action princess movies demonstrate women achieving their personal goals before seeking true love in order to teach independence and convey his supporting views of modern princesses. While Poniewozik and Orenstein want to see the next generations of females become strong, self-sufficient women that do not need a fairytale lifestyle they disagree with how princess movies in general teach these lessons to young
The Helpless, the Hero and the Villain: A Narrative Look at Gender Roles In fairy tales, often specifically from the earlier, patriarchal societies of the pre-1900s, there are explicit gender roles that are followed. The girls are seen as hopeless, naïve, and sometimes stupid, whereas the males are seen as heroic figures to assist the girls. While Charles Perrault’s “The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood” and Brothers Grimm’s “Little Red Cap” are no different, they exemplify these roles as they fit into three specific characters in their tales: the helpless, the hero, and the villain. The helpless shows the constraints that are placed on women in both fairy tales and in real life, the hero shows the male privilege exemplified in these patriarchal times, and the villain is a role that can be filled by either gender, but still happens to show the privilege men get even when placed in these roles.
Did you know that Cinderella is a story used all around the world and there were always villains involved to all Cinderella stories? Who are the antagonists in the Cinderella stories and what motif or archetype in the stories reveals the culture it originated from? In a few of the most known stories in the world, Cinderella and Yeh Shen, the antagonists, the stepmother and stepsisters, have a lot of characteristics that are similar and different. One way the antagonists in the story have in similar is that the stepmothers are both very jealous of Cinderella’s and Yeh Shen’s goodness and beauty.
Disney inspired fairy tales have a certain universality, everything is romanticized and there usually is an evil antagonist making situations worse. In Disney’s Enchanted, Giselle the protagonist is the typical gender stereotyped fairy tale princess. She is a cartoon character in a fictitious place called Andalasia, who later turns into a real woman in New York City after getting pushed into a magic well. This happened because Giselle’s prince’s evil step mother Narissa thought Giselle is marrying the prince to get Narissa dethroned. Similarly, in Sleeping Beauty, Aurora a passive, beautiful princess is cursed to fall into a deep slumber when she is pricked by the spinning needle.
Similarly, in Walt Disney’s “Cinderella,” she is also treated horribly, and awarded a beautiful outfit by her fairy godmother, letting her attend a ball, encountering her true love. Cinderella gets married to the prince, however, the step-sisters are forgiven and live with Cinderella at the castle unlike the original story. Both stories have many similarities, especially in the climax. However, the
As Snow White takes a lace, the Queen tightly ties her up with the lace, and Snow White faints. The Queen walks away, leaving Snow White to die. Luckily, the Dwarfs return just in time and save Snow White by removing the lace. The Queen finds out about Snow White’s survival and tries to murder her again with a poisoned comb. The Dwarfs save Snow White again, angering the Queen so much she resorts to dark magic as a third and final attempt to get rid of Snow White.
In the story "Cinderella", Cinderella is a young girl who is abused and treated as a servant by her evil step-mother. This story can be analyzed from a feminist perspective. The story portrays the women using common negative stereotypes. For example, Cinderella's evil stepmother is widowed, old, ugly, and mean. She represents the stereotypes that women are cruel and jealous.
Overall, the sister is portrayed as the nemesis figure because she rewards Oochigaeskw for all her good intentions and later punishes Oochigaeskw’s older sisters for being immoral. When she is being introduced, Nowlan quickly states that she has two sisters who are quite abusive. As stated in her introduction, “The two older girls considered the youngest a great nuisance and shamefully mistreated her; kicking and cuffing her about and burning her hands and face intentionally.” The two older girls appear to be similar in character to the stepsisters of Cinderella. Unlike her older sisters, Oochigeaskw decides to do what she feels is right and chooses not to do anything negative.
The need for power in Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm’s “Snow White” is evident in the evil stepmother’s actions. Upon looking at herself in the mirror every day she asks: “‘Mirror, Mirror, here I stand. Who is the fairest in the land?’” (148). Being accustomed to the mirror telling her that she is in fact the fairest in the land, she is in a state of dismay to find out, for the first time, it is her step daughter who is more fair than her.
wise,/ Then wrought a spell of glamour old,/ That bound the poppies on his eyes,/”(Bridges) Morgan is a clever women and uses the poppies to cast a sleeping spell on Launcelot. After she cast her spell she took him, with the other queens, to her castle “there she woke him from the spell”(Bridges). She wakes him up demanding he marry her and love her, but when she rejects him she is furious and keeps him as a
This passage is from the book Cinderella Ate My Daughter, by Peggy Orenstein. The overall purpose of this book is to inform the readers of the stereotypes girls must face as adolescents. The author is able to express her opinion as a parent and give advice to other parents with daughters of how to overcome the stereotypes so girls do not succumb to the girly culture that bombards the media. The book touches on Orenstein’s role as a mother to her daughter Daisy and the challenges she faces due to all the stereotypes for young girls. This passage focuses on girls conforming to the stereotype regarding pink is the color for females.
Throughout history, authors of fairy tales have used morals and themes to convey the meanings of their work. Though there are an infinite amount of themes and topics within these stories, one major theme that is consistent in several tales is the theme of control or empowerment. Examples of tales that accurately portray this theme are Cinderella, Hansel and Gretel, and Bluebeard. In CInderella, a daughter is neglected by her father, tortured by her step-family, and oppressed by a prince. In the story of Hansel and Gretel, two children are abandoned by their starving parents and kidnapped by a cannibalistic witch, and must find a way out of their misery alone.
As children grow up, they tend to forget the stories that once made up their lives and look down upon what they deem as “child’s play”; however, these stories raise children where parents are not present. Fairy tales characters for children are the construction workers of the adult world, and as the children mature into adulthood, the gates of imagination are opened and the storybook characters morph into newspaper headlines; suddenly, the clock strikes twelve and the glitz and glamour disappear as the realization that “human nature is not innately good, that conflict is real [and] life is harsh before it is happy” (Tatar 306) sinks in. James Braddock, as he attends the ball, assumes the role of Atlas, holding the weight of the working class