In most fairytales, there is a character that stands out as a visionary; the one who defends happiness, and leads the way allowing others to find their destiny. This person usually has the will power to influence not only them self, but also has the ability to influence the person who seems to be the least likely to accept another’s view of the world, especially if they’re living in a world that is detached from everyone else's. In Gregory Maguire’s book, Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister, the visionary to see beyond her own sanity and look into the depths of another person’s chaos is Iris. It is with no question that without Iris’s willingness to explore the world, not just through her eyes, but the eyes of everyone around her, Cinderella may have never been released from her shackles that bound her to live the life of a changeling, and invalidate what inkling she had of creating the idea in the first place; the idea of a new journey to escape the fears brought on by childhood, and escape to a life of reason; the life where adults make decisions based on reason, not fear. Even though there are others who surround Clara’s transformation into womanhood, Iris is undeniably the big sister that Clara so desperately needed. When first introduced to Clara, Iris’s curiosity is over powered with the mere hint that Clara might be a child of mystery, a changeling. Even her vision is overtaken by what she sees while peering into the windows of the van den Meer house, never knowing if what she saw was real or not. “Why does everything hide its true face here?” (68) says Iris, referring to the mysterious feeling she gets while visiting the van den Meer home. These feelings of darkness push Iris to seek the unanswered, to find the clu... ... middle of paper ... ...e if she attends the ball, and the burdens that will be overpowered if she is chosen to live her life with the Prince; a life that only beauty could bring, something Iris doesn’t hold, and although a person may only have beauty as a strength, there is always a darker weakness preventing them from exploring the disfigured world that surrounds them. With the unfortunate events that transpired causing Iris and her family to evacuate death’s curse, find shelter, and start a new beginning, tragedy has brought the harmony of Clara’s outer beauty and Iris’s inner beauty together, allowing Clara to transform into the creature in which God truly intended her to be, not by magic, but by the words of wisdom, and the visionary power of Clara’s newly found sister, Iris. Works Cited Maguire, Gregory. Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister. New York: HarperCollins, 1999. Print
In Jeannette Walls memoir The Glass Castle, the Walls show characteristics of good parents. They are imaginative, very smart, and caring.
Indeed, when Clara’s life is examined independently of her father and husband specifically, it is a rather difficult one. Her mother left Clara when she was five, and her father, Friedrich Wieck, a controlling and dictatorial but musically informed...
Tragic mulatto characters such as Clare transport unforeseen horrors when they make the selfish decision to reinsert themselves back into the world they so desperately desired to flee. Larsen makes this point clear through the diction she uses when describing the self-esteem destruction Irene undergoes once Clare has reinserted herself into Irene's life, and the situations Irene finds herself as a direct result of Clare. Prior to Clare’s reentrance into her life Irene is a self-assured, independent, and confident woman; however, she soon turns self-conscious, dependent, and hesitant. Upon viewing Clare at the hotel Irene is struck by Clare’s ...
Even though Iris has an exceptional side of her personality such as being determined and giving, she also has poor qualities. She demonstrates an exceptional personality due to the fact that she is giving and is willing to legitimately sell herself for her father. But, Iris also demonstrates poor qualities such as being blunt, when she carelessly says things about her sister. In many passages, she writes that she is tired of caring for her sister before and after her mother’s death. “I was tired of keeping an eye on Laura, who didn’t appreciate it. I was tired of being held accountable for her lapses, her failures to comply.” This statement proves that she is self –centered and tired of carrying her sister on her
story points out that beauty has its cost as well, the power of being beautiful holds a great
Instead, she takes her burdens as they come. Clare R. Ferrer noted in her article, “heroines are not allowed any defects, nor are they required to develop, since they are already perfect.” At the beginning of the story, Cinderella is described as “remaining pious and good” in-spite of the loss she endured. Cinderella is such a good person, that she takes the abuse from her step-sisters with grace and never asks for anything, nor does she reveal to her father or the Prince the type of life she has succumbed to living. Beauty goes hand-in-hand with being a good woman. According to Parsons, “a high premium is placed on feminine beauty…Women are positioned as the object of men’s gaze, and beauty determines a woman’s ...
For many of us growing up, our mothers have been a part of who we are. They have been there when our world was falling apart, when we fell ill to the flu, and most importantly, the one to love us when we needed it the most. In “Two Kinds” by Amy Tan, it begins with a brief introduction to one mother’s interpretation of the American Dream. Losing her family in China, she now hopes to recapture part of her loss through her daughter. However, the young girl, Ni Kan, mimics her mother’s dreams and ultimately rebels against them.
“Her face was fair and pretty, with eyes like two bits of night-sky, each with a star dissolved in the blue.” This elaborate simile creates a mental image of the natural beauty of the young princess, Irene, by comparing her eyes to the night sky. The simile also parallels the depth of Irene’s soul to the dark, endless night sky.
Alexander Stowe is a twin, his brother is Aaron Stowe. Alex is an Unwanted, Aaron is a Wanted, and their parents are Necessaries. Alex is creative in a world where you can’t even see the entire sky, and military is the dream job for everyone and anyone. He should have been eliminated, just like all the unwanteds should have been. He instead comes upon Artimè, where he trains as a magical warrior- after a while. When he was still in basic training, and his friends were not, he got upset, he wants to be the leader, the one everyone looks up to.
Despite being within the dark aspect, Irene still benefits from her first encounter with her grandmother and thus undergoes a small change. Due to meeting her grandmother, Irene realizes that sometimes it is wise to keep her own counsel.
she was pretty and that was everything” (225). This captivation with herself along with the constant looking in the mirrors and thinking her mother was only pestering her all the time because her mother’s own good looks were long gone by now (225) shows a sign of immaturity because she believes everything revolves around whether or not someo...
Clara from Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister by Gregory Maguire is considered as a round, dynamic, indirectly characterized character. Cinderella, who is Clara in this novel is considered to hold an extraordinary beauty. She is treated as an object of admiration and not expected to learn or interact with every other outside the world, which leads herself to treat her as a changeling child. Firstly, Clara is round character by having many motivations which led her to have complex emotions. "A long time ago happened to me, and I was a changeling. The crow man changed me. That's all" (Maguire 169). Her story starts from the past. When she was a child, she was kidnapped and kept inside the hostage of a windmill by a man, who received an enormous
The stories setting takes place in Western Colorado. In Western Colorado in a home of a retired nurse named Annie is where the whole story takes place. Annie's home is a two story log cabin out in the middle of nowhere. The closest neighbors are miles away. It takes place in the middle of winter snow storms.
Throughout the history of folklore and fairytales, many interpretations of tales have been created and introduced. When exchanged, many details have been lost in translation, only to be redistributed as a similar tale following a certain moral. But throughout the life of the tale “Cinderella,” one objective has never been misconstrued; the social structure and the status Cinderella falls and rises to. Many fairytales display a rise and fall of a protagonist, often in the case of social classes. The many versions of “Cinderella,” including Ever After, exhibit a definite, strong, monarchical settlement with a defined arrangement of classes that create and develop the beloved character of Cinderella, or Danielle De Barbarac, herself.
It is this element of hope in a true fairytale that creates the support for a protagonist to overcome the opposing force that has been thrust onto them. A genuine fairytale is said to have the element of, “A innocent character [placed against] the evil character who normally loses somehow,” (Gokturk) which is seen as Cinderella is chosen by the prince over the evil step-sisters at the ball. As human beings with a developed moral system, it has been seen that the more deserving, mistreated character is favored to succeed in the story. Cinderella is seen as this “underdog” character in her quest to find love with the prince and overcome her step-sisters’ mistreatment. As Cinderella is mistreated by her new family, sympathy is built for the emerging protagonist and hope of her to conquer her situation follows. The underdog of this story grows in favorability to be picked by the prince due to the societal belief that the more deserving candidate should overcome their opposition. If there was no sense of hope thought the story of Cinderella, this story could not be categorized as a true embodiment of a