Ever After Class

Paper 3 Proposal

bollesbeaven — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 21:29:44 +0000

In my paper I plan to compare and contrast The Disney version of The Little Mermaid with the original written version by Hans Christian Anderson. Of course, of the main differences are the idea of happily ever after, what love means, and what marriage symbolizes in each version. I think I will take a more Darnton based approach by saying that theses differences are brought about by the times during which they were made. Ideas of love an marriage were very different in the 1830s , when Anderson was writing, as compared to the 1990s.

I also found some really interesting symbolism is the original story that is paralleled in the Disney movie. Things I never would have made the connection too if I hadn’t read the tale. For example, Anderson goes on to say how she loved her garden of flowers, especially the red ones because they remind her of the sun. That made me think of a scene in the movie where she has a peachy colored flower for her hair, maybe a coincidence, but maybe there are more instances of small similarities. Not to mention the reason she really wants to become human is different, the relations between the human and mer world are different between the tale and the movie. I plan to explore those, but I think I will really focus in on how the way they show love and marriage is based on their time periods. If I can find a biography of Hans Christian Anderson, I will tie parts of the story to things in his personal life (if anything seems like an obvious connection).

If I don’t focus on marriage, I was thinking of focusing on how the difference change the moral of the story. Since they are so different, the tale takes on a completely new meaning. I haven’t decided if that is a better topic than the love/marriage angle or if they are connected. The original story emphasized her wish for an immortal soul and how a prince couldn’t possibly marry her, whereas Disney focuses on this idea that anything can happen if love is true enough. That changes how the tale is internalized and what we take away from it.

1. McCaughrean, Geraldine, and Sophy Williams. Treasury of Fairy Tales. New York: Barnes & Nobel Inc., 2003.

2. The Little Mermaid. Dir. Ron Clements and John Musker. Perf. Jodi Benson, Christopher Daniel Barnes and Pat Carroll. Disney, 1989. DVD.

3. Zuk, Rhoda. “The Little Mermaid: Three Political Fables.” Project Muse. Web. 7 Nov. 2009.

4. Anderson, Hans C. “The Little Mermaid.” Hans Christian Anderson Faiy Tales and Stories. Zvi Har’El. Web. 10 Nov. 2009. .

5. Lee, Matthew T. “State of ‘The Union’: Marriage and Free Love in the Late 1800s.” Contemporary Sociology 35.5 (2006): 479-480. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Web. 11 Nov. 2009.

6. Cave, Eric M. “Marital Pluralism: Making Marriage Safer for Love.” Journal of Social Philosophy 34.3 (2003): 331-347. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Web. 11 Nov. 2009.

7. Trites, R. “Disney’s sub/version of Andersen’s The Little Mermaid.” Journal of Popular Film & Television 18.4 (1991): 145. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Web. 11 Nov. 2009.

8. Dundes, Lauren, and Alan Dundes “The Trident and the Fork: Disney’s ‘The Little Mermaid’ as a male construction of an Electral fantasy.” Psychoanalytic Studies 2.2 (2000): 117-130. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Web. 11 Nov. 2009.

9. Hastings, Waller A. “Moral Simplification in Disney’s Little Mermaid.” The Lion and The Unicorn 17.1 (1993) 83-92. Project Muse. Web. 9 Nov, 2009

10. Bottigheimer, Ruth “Fairy Tales Old Wives and printing presses.” History Today 54.1 (2004): 38-44. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Web. 11 Nov. 2009.

HW 10/20

bollesbeaven — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 00:49:21 +0000

For paper two I think I will agree with both Bettelhiem and Darnton. Darnton says that fairy tales contain history and Bellelhiem says that fairy tales hold universal meanings that can help children grow into functioning adults. I don’t see why those have to be opposing views. The fact that the tales contain history show us what certain things we still think are worthy of teaching our children. A reader can also see how the morals of some stories have changed slightly over time based on what was important to the reader. Like Perrault’s Little Red Riding Hood was all about rape in the courts, where as these days anyone reading that tale will just think the lesson has to do obedience and following directions. Childhood lessons have changed over time, changed throughout history. Right?

I guess i would start there and then go into Bettelhiem’s agruments, about stories being good for children and about lessons. And then go into Darnton’s ideas about history in tales. I’ll probably say something how we infuse history into things we write unintentionally and how what society thinks directly impacts what is viewed as important for children to learn. So the two go hand in hand. Then I’ll probably just see where it goes from there. I’m not sure what I’d use to support anything or what kind of sources I’ll use, maybe something about history, or something more along a sociological line of thinking, about cultures etc.

Ultimately though I think I’ll just try to summarize their ideas and then say why and how they go together and how they are not really opposite sides of an issue. It isn’t history or lessons, its lessons through history. Its how things change over time, and how we can track history as we track new versions of classic tales. In my mind they aren’t opposing views on one subject, they are different pieces to a similar argument.

HW 10/13

bollesbeaven — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 00:51:21 +0000

I much preferred the version by Charles Perrault. I love the idea that love changes us for the better, makes us feel beautiful or smart. It was a more positive ending where both the eldest princess and the Riquet with a Tuft got what they wanted in the end, as well as learned a lesson. The lesson being that everyone can be more than what they seem and that beauty isn’t everything. The second tale confused me however, what exactly was the point to the story? Mama’s intelligence did not get her a happy ending. She was doomed to be only intelligent at times, live underground, and have her lover transformed into a beast. Mama could no longer tell which was the man she could tell everything to and which was her husband. No one won in that situation and it was depressing to read.

HW 9/30

bollesbeaven — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 17:55:26 +0000

I got started with my paper by taking my summaries of the Bettelhiem reading and combining them to make an introduction paragraph for my paper since I both agree and disagree with Bettelhiem. After that, I was not sure what the next step would be, so I referred to the assignment which suggested the use of tales we read and I added Little Red Riding Hood into my paper. That paragraph will ultimately be removed since it does not really fit the argument, but I used it as a jumping of point. Getting started was the hardest part and the editing should be easier, since the work is already done. The peer review was fine, getting someone else to read it affirmed the things I had done well and helped me to see things that were wrong (and how to fix them). I disliked having to read my draft aloud because I am not very good at reading aloud and so things that worked sounded wrong in some places. But all in all, it was helpful.

HW 9/14

bollesbeaven — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 17:37:11 +0000

1. Bruno Bettelheim, a child psychologist, makes an excellent point about fairy tales today. Parents encourage that children should read the ‘happily ever after’ type of tale, that children “should be exposed to only the sunny side of things.” Bettelhiem however persuades that kids need to be shown the darker side of these classic stories because they “[confront] the child squarely with the basic human predicaments.” How can children fully understand life if they are only given a one sided, optimistic view? A view that doesn’t include death and challenges against evil in all people. Hardship is part of life, and fairy tales tell readers that if one “steadfastly meets unexpected and often unjust hardships, one masters all obstacles and… emerges victorious.” While parents might say that it is better to shelter children from the hardships of life, exposing them to the ‘real world’ through the things they read gives them a better idea of life without putting them in danger. It teaches children how to be strong, and that can only help them “grow safely into maturity” when they find themselves facing difficulties.

2. According to Bruno Bettelheim, children need to be exposed to the “dark side of man” in order to “succeed in wringing meaning out of his existence.” Parents however, wish to show their children a so called “one sided” view that includes “conscious reality or pleasant and wish-fulfilling images.” Bettelheim is suggesting that we take the carefree quality out of childhood by bombarding youth with dark tales. While they might gain some sort of understanding of hardship through reading, there is plenty of time as an adult to experience difficulty. He expresses that dark tales “offer new dimensions to a child’s imagination which would be impossible for him to discover as truly on his own.” This however is an exaggeration, children are not blind to the world, and they have more imagination that most adults. Adults know the darker aspects of things and that is what keeps them from dreaming such big dreams. So while the newer ‘happily ever after’ fairy tales might be “one sided”, they are a part of the innocence that is childhood.

HW 8/31

bollesbeaven — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 19:29:55 +0000

1. A fairy tale is a story, often passed down from generation to generation, that involves supernatural elements. They usually contain a moral, a conflict, as well as characters with an extreme social class (ex. princes, peasants).

2. Writing is something that everyone has to do, in school, and maybe at work. And some see writing as a chore, as only essay or paper writing. Literature is so much more than that too me. I love writing and reading in terms of a story, of characters and life. Personally, I enjoy writing and reading poetry and works of fiction. But you can see the effects of language everywhere, in the songs you hear, and in how people talk. That’s what I love about writing, trying to make distinct characters that have a poetry and a style to their speaking. I enjoy metaphors and trying to be creative with wording of simple things.

I write fairly often, sometimes just stream of consciousness and sometimes with more form. I usually just write for fun, just to see how different personalities look in type. Sometimes I write as a way of reinventing myself at no personal cost. You can try anything through words and I’ve become decently good at writing as characters who are not like me. I’ve tried to start more big scale stories, but I have a hard time with plots. I never know how to plan a story or what is original. Organization is sometimes a problem of mine. I have a hard time planning what to write.

My biggest problems with writing comes when I am writing for class. I have a hard time with introductions and conclusions especially. Mine always look the same and are never as captivating as I would like them. I usually do the safe thing, rephrase the question/assignment in my own words, but that often leads to loose introductions that are too short to be a real paragraph. I would really like to work harder on that because if I can get a good beginning, I am sure I can make a better body of the essay or paper.

Practice makes perfect, and so doing a little writing outside of class, to me, sounds like a good idea. I try to get a little writing in as many days as I can, just to have a better handle on language and how to use words to make ideas come alive.