Cinderella Story

Cinderella is a folktale that has become a story that many people can relate to, whether they know it or not. The story has so many different variants, which is why it has spread across the world and become so popular. It’s popularity is with people of all ages, since the story is relatable to anything that is going on. Cinderella is a story of a young girl, who is treated as a servant, that has the desire to attend the ball. Her stepmother and stepsisters try to keep her as far away from that ball as possible, giving her extra work and things to do around the house. Cinderella dreams of going to the ball, until a fairy godmother appears to help her. The fairy godmother gets everything Cinderella needs to go to the ball and feel beautiful.
Adrian represents the newer, mass marketed, Cinderella. Jane Yolen mentions in her article, “For the sake of Happy Ever After, the mass market books have brought forward a good, malleable, forgiving little girl and put her in Cinderella’s slippers.” (Yolen 25). Yolen suggests that since mass media needs to please the public, Cinderella was turned into a different character. The new Cinderella is passive, simple and helpless, she is not capable of achieving anything without her fairy godmother. This applies to Adrian, because Adrian is very shy and in her own world, until Paulie helps set her up with Rocky. Paulie takes the position of the fairy godmother because he brings Rocky to their house and tells Adrian she needs to go on a date with Rocky. Without Paulie, Adrian would have never gone on the date with Rocky, and found her ‘Prince’. In “A Feminist’s View of “Cinderella””, Madonna Kolbenschlag, talks about the view of Cinderella from a feminism side and how Cinderella is such a weak woman, that people should not want to be like that. Kolbenschlag describes,“She really believes she belongs where she is. The paradox of this acceptance of a condition of worthlessness in the self, along with a conviction of the ultimate worthiness and heroism of one’s role, is part of the terrible appeal of the fairy tale.” (Kolbenschlag 3). Kolbenschlag intrigues readers by mentioning that the traits Cinderella has
Some changes to the story have been positive, nevertheless, some have also been negative. In the article, “A Girl, A Shoe, A Prince: The Endlessly Evolving Cinderella”, Linda Holmes discusses the durability of the Cinderella story and how it can be adapted to fit any story. Holmes describes, “In a sense, the classic tale often treated like our quintessential cultural romance had to be substantially adapted to allow for the existence of romantic love as we imagine it now, which does not occur in the complete absence of communication.”(Holmes 11). In this article, Holmes is trying to convey the idea that the tale is changed to whatever society thinks it is at that moment in time. With the story being so popular, it can easily be changed to accommodate for change in opinion over time. Jane Yolen also talks about this idea in her article, she discusses, “However, to truly mark this change on the American “Cinderella”, one must turn specifically to the mass market books, merchandised products that masquerade as literature but make as little lasting literary impression as a lollipop. They, after all, serve the majority the way the storytellers of the village used to serve. They find their way into millions of homes.” (Yolen 24). Jane Yolen is bringing the true explanation for the changing story to light in her article. She understands that people’s opinions and ideals