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Recommended: Fairy tale analysis
Once upon a time, deep under the water, there lived a small beautiful mermaid. She was fascinated with the world above her. Nothing would make her happier than to see what it would be like to live among the humans. One day, she rescued a prince from a shipwreck. She fell hopelessly in love with the dashing young Prince. The little mermaid sold her voice to the Sea Witch and traded her gorgeous tail for legs. Though his love for the little mermaid, the Prince could not marry her, he was betrothed to maiden in another kingdom. This broke the little mermaid’s heart so she gave up her life on land and in the sea.
The Battle between Good and Evil archetype is displayed through the little mermaid towards the end. She has the option to become a
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She takes close watch over the little mermaid and fascinates her with her knowledge of the human world. She helps her son, the Sea King; with maintain the kingdom since he is widowed. She is looked highly upon among the mer-people. She yearns for the littlest mermaid to come back home, but is forgiving when she doesn’t and the little mermaid decides to carry on with their moral tradition.
The theme in Hans Christian Anderson’s The Little Mermaid, is knowing how to follow your heart and dealing with the consequences after doing so. The little mermaid makes up her choice to be with the prince. She has to leave all of her sisters, her father, and her beloved grandmother behind. She trades in her tail for legs that hurt her to walk on. All for a prince who does not end up loving her like the way she had hoped. These consequences that come after lay out her fate by the end of the fairy tale.
The values that the little mermaid has can be seen as positive. She values happiness, even if it is not her own. In the beginning, she seems to be more focused on her own happiness until she is hit with the reality of the scenario that she got herself into. She sacrifices all she has ever known and refuses to hurt someone so she can get it back. The little mermaid is a selfless character and continues to want the best for the ones she
The first reason why Ariel is most like myself is because of her love for adventure. In the film, The Little Mermaid, Ariel wonders off to ship wrecks and swims up to the surface to speak to birds to identify human objects. She is always on the run for an adventure, much like myself. If I am not at home taking care of my family, we are out at the Kermit sand hills, taking last minute trips to Indiana, or spending the weekend at my families’ lake house. Like the quote in The Little Mermaid and on “IMDb” says, “If only I could make him understand. I just don't see things the way he does. I just don't see how a world that makes such wonderful things could be bad,” I too agree, the world is a beautiful, magnificent place and taking adventures and exploring is something that has always been appealing to me.
In the Lion the Witch and Wardrobe, good vs. evil is teaching children the right from wrong in this book. Lewis uses the archetypes hero and villain very good throughout his novel to also portray right from wrong. His use of archetype the hero reminds readers that Aslan is the hero in his novel. He shows this by the many ways Aslan rescues and saves his people all throughout the novel. His use of archetype villain shows the readers that the White Witch is the villain in his
Anderson, Hans Christian. “The Little Mermaid.” Folk and Fairy Tales. 3rd ed. Eds. Martin Hallett and Barbara Karasek. Toronto: Broadview, 2002.
The Social Gender Expectations that we have formed as a society (which outline the unwritten gender roles) also influence the way that we interpret the story. Although the use of Gender Perspective by Andersen may have been unintentional it does have an impact on our view of certain characters. By following these specific expectations in TLM he draws comparisons between fiction and non-fiction which highlights the imperfections in both worlds.
Although Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Little Mermaid,” published in 1837, contains many patronizing nineteenth-century attitudes towards women, a value system that at least acknowledges the legitimacy of femininity shapes the fairytale. Unfortunately, Walt Disney’s 1989 film version of “The Little Mermaid” eliminates the values that affirm femininity in the original story (Trites 145)
The first archetype I can relate to is the mother archetype. I believe I act like a mom to a lot of people due to me always checking on people and making sure they are good. This archetype is good at times because it’s usually why a lot of people like me. At the same time it can be negative because I tend to want to have control in a lot of situations. This causes me to seem like a control freak. Being like a mother comes more into play when with my friends because I don’t want them to get hurt.
Moana is a heroic tale of a young girl who sets out on a journey to save her island. The opening scene tells a story of the shapeshifting god, Maui, who has stolen the heart of the goddess Te Fiti. After stealing the heart Maui battles a lava god named Te Ka and loses, disappearing for centuries.
Although the film received rave reviews and substantial profit, I argue that the Disney adaptation loses the fundamental elements of Andersen’s original story and presents a new narrative laced with negative values and inferior moral lessons. The changes in the Disney remake are closely connected to cultural and social aspects of America in the late 1980’s, making it arguably more relatable and successful for current audiences of the time. However, Disney’s adaptation of The Little Mermaid perpetuates negative American ideals and incorporates classic Disney fairytale elements, ultimately erasing the positive moral overarching theme of Hans Christian Andersen’s original story. The historical, cultural, and social setting of both the original fairytale and the Disney adaptation of The Little Mermaid are incredibly important when analyzing the differences between the two. Hans Christian Andersen wrote The Little Mermaid in 1837 in Denmark.
In both Hans Christian Andersons “The Little Mermaid,” and Disney’s version of the story, the main character— a young and beautiful mermaid— waits anxiously for her fifteenth birthday to venture from her father’s underwater castle to the world above the water. As the story carries on the mermaids priorities change; her modest and selfless nature is revealed towards the end in Andersen’s version. However, Disney’s version encompasses a rather shallow ending and plot throughout. The theme found in comparing the two versions reveal that Andersen’s substance trumps Disney’s entertainment factor in fairy tales.
“The mermaid swam with her prince toward the beach. She laid him in the fine white sand, taking care to place his head in the warm sunshine, far from the water. She also had to give up her voice, which she had done so willingly, endure tremendous amounts of pain to have the legs of a human, and give up her life as a mermaid as well as never be able to be with her sisters at the bottom of the ocean again. The little mermaid passed all of the tests that the universe threw at her, but in the end, she did not get to marry the prince and this is a great example of a message from the author that life can be unfair sometimes.
As children, we hear many stories about the interactions between good and evil. Since each story or fable have different characters, the description of evil and good are different from one another. The good character will have different characteristic compared to evil one.
Even though fairy tales don’t always end the way we want them to, we usually expect them to end with prince charming saving a princess. However, according to the Grimms Brothers version, “The Frog King,” the princess actually saves the prince. An innocent naive princess comes across a frog that once was a prince. Therefore, the only way he can overcome this curse is to ask a princess to fully have her assurance into becoming his companion. The moral of this fairy tale is express how appearances are deceiving. We don’t fully have an understanding what true beauty looks like until it is standing in front of us. The three main symbols that emphasize the true beauty in this fairytale is the frog, the fountain, and the golden ball.
According to A. Waller Hastings Ariel didn’t have to face her consequences. The movie ends with Ariel’s father trading his life to the sea witch in order to save her. “Once again Disney’s heroine survives to find happiness thanks solely to the heroism and sacrifice of male characters” (O’Brien). Because of this, Ariel doesn’t grow or mature. Instead, everyone lives happily ever after thanks to the men in Ariel’s life (Hastings). Now, there’s nothing wrong with living happily ever after. However, this perpetuates an unrealistic expectation of life for impressionable viewers that abide by Mulvey’s theories on narcissism and how viewers may relate themselves to the object on the screen (Storey, 110). The image of a helpless damsel in distress being saved by men with no further consequences to her life is harmful because it may give viewers a distorted view of reality. The damsel in distress stereotype erases all of Ariel’s prior independence due to the fact that she has to be
The text I will be deconstructing is the Walt Disney Feature Animation film The Little Mermaid released in 1989. The film was directed by Ron Clements and produced by John Musker. The Little Mermaid (1989) is the story of a young mermaid who gives up her voice in order to become human and find her one true love Prince Eric. I find the film to be incredibly significant, not only in its portrayal of feminine roles, the human body, and the willingness to sacrifice for true love, but in the film's vast audience and popularity. I will be using the feminist framework, as described in Critical Media Studies: An Introduction by Ott and Mack (2010), to deconstruct The Little Mermaid (1989).
First, the theme of The Little Mermaid really impressed me when I first read this story because it conveys a more realistic and cruel perspective about life. I always think this story is really special for kids because the end of this story is not as usual as normal fairy tales. From the original version of The Little Mermaid, readers can know that at the end of the story, The Little Mermaid actually became the foam because the prince got married with another girl. So, to make it simple, the whole story is about a mermaid who sacrifices her voice for feet in order to get married with her “Mr. Right”, but ends up her life miserably. I think the theme of this story is actually about “sacrifice”, and that is also what I’ve learned from this story. First sacrifice that The Little Mermaid had made is her voice, and what I learned from this is if you want something so badly you have to sacrifice although you may feel painful. And the second sacrifice The Little Mermaid had made is her life, and in order to see her lover...