Cesar Romero

Professor Hoehne

Fairy Tales and Rewritings

11 November 2019

Where’s the Fairy Godmother?

From the servant of her two stepsisters and stepmother to becoming the princess of the kingdom, Cinderella’s journey to the top has had a huge influence in the society we live in today. More notably, this ‘Cinderella complex’ can be interpreted in many ways, often based on the reader’s perspective. However, one profound interpretation that seems to stand out amongst the others and ‘tends to have the biggest influence is the expectation that everything is going to work out fine just like it did for Cinderella. As a result, this ‘Cinderella complex’ can present a false reality to readers, therefore negatively impact their view on life.

The idea presented by the ‘Cinderella complex’ about everything working out fine in the end is seen in the fairy tale in the form of the wishes that the godmother grants for Cinderella (Perrault 133). Women, when looking at this, expect there to be an ease in life where everything can just work out for their benefit. Particularly, when looking at women entering the work force in the post-World War II era, more than half the women in a survey of 255 had anticipated no conflict between their career and familial responsibilities (Wilson 137). Wilson describes this sort of attitude as naïve in females and believes that they need to be aware of the implications that their career may have on marriage and family life (137). This type of behavior and pattern is seen in the increase of women during the 1960s. Many of the women beginning to work had been women with pre-school aged children (Wilson 137). From this Wilson describes how this increasing pattern of women combining employment with their roles of motherhood is occurring a very demanding period in their family life (137). This added with the expectation that no trouble would come from this demonstrates the ‘Cinderella complex’ in women wanting to enter the work force by having them anticipate an easy transition between family and work life.

As women stay longer with their employer and begin to assume more responsibilities, requires more time to be invested with their career rather than their family life. As a result, role conflicts begin to surface in marriages as responsibilities shift between the male and female, often having both employed. Furthermore, studies show that when having an outside occupational role, performance in household responsibilities don’t particularly improve (Wilson 138). Women still tend to have responsibility over homemaking chores and child-care, and although there is slight tendency for the male and children to take up some responsibilities as well, much of it still falls onto the females back (Wilson 138). This is the reality that women face when deciding to enter employment. There is a lot of extra work added and time to be balanced equally. Unlike, Cinderella, women would have to charge here in order to get what they want and would have to realize that not everything is going to fall into place the way they want it.

Although these women have a false expectation when deciding to enter the workforce it isn’t their own fault. But rather the ‘Cinderella complex’ that not only leads to women having an expectation that everything would work out on its own, but also have a fear of independence. We see this with Cinderella when she chooses not to tell her father about the way her stepmother is treating her for fear of being scolded by him, as he is under her thumb (Perrault 130). Fairy tales often consist the main conflict as a princess in need of rescue by a prince, like how Cinderella is seen in her fairy tale, thus being automatically portrayed as weak (Prince 4). As a result, many critics such as Lieberman believe we interchange the word “protagonist” with that of “heroine”, since they are chosen for their beauty and not for anything they do, they exist passively until the hero comes in to save them, “They wait, are chosen, and are rewarded” (qtd. in Prince 4). This waiting around to be rewarded is seen by Colette Dowling when she mentions the transition in a woman’s life from dependency to independency, “she discovers that the rules have changed and she will no longer be rewarded for her compliance, as she has been, systematically, since she was a little girl” (47). This idea of reward brought on by compliance demonstrated by the ‘Cinderella complex’ is what may influence woman to fear independency as it would result in them relying on themselves after several years of being able to result on their parents and family.

However, when interviewing 40 women of various ages and backgrounds, Kay Stone discovered that many had openly admired the princesses and hoped to imitate them in a way (48). Although fairy tales like Cinderella can have their admirers, it is still clear the influence that the ‘Cinderella complex’ can have on young girls. Stone goes on to tell that one admirer told her, “I thought I’d just sit around and get all this money. I used to think that ‘Cinderella’ should be my story” (48). This quote from Stone’s article demonstrates the false expectation that the ‘Cinderella complex’ can have on the views on life of young children. It shows that although it may have its admirers, this complex still has a negative influence on the readers.

Cinderella’s journey from being a servant to becoming the princess of the kingdom with ease is what makes up the ‘Cinderella complex’. As a result, this complex can negatively influence the perspective of its readers on life and present them false expectations on life and responsibilities. Not only that, but it can lead them on to have a fear of independence. Thus, causing readers to lack the initiative to take charge of their lives and cause them to be solely dependent on others for help. The ‘Cinderella complex’ promotes the idea that dependency is better than independency.

 

Works Cited

Dowling, Colette. “THE CINDERELLA SYNDROME.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 22 Mar. 1981. Web, 11 November 2019

Perrault, Charles, and C. J. Betts. “Cinderella.” The Complete Fairy Tales, pp 130-141. OUP Oxford, 2009. EBSCOhost. Web, 2 October 2019

Prince, Lauren A. Fairy Tale Reinterpreted: Passive Protagonists Transformed into Active Heroines. Middle Tennessee State University, Ann Arbor, 2014, Proquest, Web. 2 October 2019

Stone, Kay. “Things Walt Disney Never Told Us.” The Journal of American Folklore, vol. 88, no. 347, 1975, pp 42-50. JSTOR. Web, 2 October 2019

Wilson, Marian L. “College Women and the Cinderella Complex.” Educational Horizons, vol. 56, no. 3, 1978, pp. 137–139. JSTOR. Web, 2 October 2019