An Importance to Dream in Cinderella Fairy Tale

Cinderella, a favorite fairy tale for all ages, shows that if one would truly believe in their hopes and dreams, they can achieve anything. The story of Cinderella is about a young girl, Cinderella, who lost her father at a young age, and became an almost slave to her devious step-mother and step-sisters. When the king and queen decided to hold a ball for the prince one day, all the maidens in town was all invited in hopes of finding the right woman for the prince. Hearing these news, Cinderella decides to also go and enjoy the ball only then to have her dress ruined by her step-mother. As she weeps about her broken dreams, a fairy godmother appears and lifts up her spirit of not giving up. The fairy godmother then helps Cinderella to get ready for the ball by giving her a beautiful dress and getting her to the ball. Once at the palace, the prince was quickly mesmerized by her beauty and fell in love in an instance once they started to dance. At the struck of midnight, she flees the palace leaving only a glass slipper behind. The prince set out to find the owner and finally found Cinderella after many trials of girls, and finally they lived happily ever after.

Now this fairy tale, acted and seen by many people, many times, can be a good influence on children of all ages. After all, the moral of the story is to be nice and respectful to everyone, and you will succeed. Likewise, if a person is bad, like the step-mother, or selfish and untruthful like the step-sisters, they will never be able to obtain the things they want. One of the key message was to treat others the way you would want them to treat you; Cinderella displays this when she always obediently does whatever her step-mother tells her to do. By doing so, Cinderella also got the same respect from others, such as the Prince. From the storyline, children are taught to always persevere no matter how harsh the situation is. Dreams are not meant to be thrown away, but one also must take action in order to make those dreams come true. On the outer surface, Cinderella is the typical role model for many people. She is kind, smart, and head-strong; and anyone would those qualities would help them succeed in life. Cinderella, whether it be a production or a movie, teaches kids these concepts of goodness, but is this the only traits that are taught to the young children?

Of course not all can be judged from just the outer appearances, as shown when Cinderella first met Prince Charming at the market, where he was faking to be a normal citizen. Outer appearance plays such a huge impact on the storyline, and although it is more discreet, it still sends out an equally powerful message to the audience about the importance the physical traits. During the ball scene, Cinderella quickly captivated the prince because she stood out amongst the other woman. She was described to be the most beautiful out of all, specifically described in the step-sister’s song; she is a “girl who’s merely lovely.” Had she not get transformed by the fairy godmother, she might have not been noticed by the prince. This goes to shows that without beauty, she would only be one of the many faces at the ball. Without beauty, one would make have a harder time to reach their dreams. If Cinderella was not as pretty, the prince might not taken the time to talk to her at all. Even the prince once made a comment on it; he sang “do I love you because you’re beautiful, or are you beautiful because I love you?” to show that he actually wasn’t sure if he really loved her at first sight because of physical appearance or her personality which makes her beautiful. Physical attributes contributed much to how the story was developed. Although it might not be obvious, children, who takes up all information around them, will unconsciously think that only the more attractive people will be get the best, meanwhile the less attractive person will have to work much harder and will never get notice.

Going along with the physical appearances, Cinderella also had to be unique in order to catch the prince’s eyes; this can be seen as a positive and negative thing. While it teaches little children that they should always be true to themselves, it tells them, in order to succeed, they would have to outshine everyone else. Cinderella was definitely more one-in-a-million type of girl, having the beauty inside and out but it was more to it. During the shoe fitting, the prince went around testing out all the women in town who would fit the shoe. Finally, Cinderella was the last one to try on the glass slipper, and only she was the one who was able to fit that shoe. Because she was the unique one, she was chosen to be his bride. In the world, only few come out at the top, and all of them have to display some type of rareness and Cinderella expose the reality of it in a very subliminal way.

Cinderella also displays a subtle gender role that teaches children a way to act in order to be perfect. For girls, Cinderella was seen as the perfect role model because she was obedient and nice to everyone, the traits of how all good little girls should be. Cinderella, like many other fairy tales, however traps little girls’ way of thinking of how females in society should act. They should always be in the house and do chores for their family, in order to be the good female. Compared to the other women in the play, she was actually quiet and soft, which made her stand out from the crowd. She also displays that women would always need help, no matter how strong they are. This can be shown towards the end, when the prince came knocking door-to-door looking for his true love. Without him, she might have never gotten out of that household and was stuck with her horrible life forever. Because of this, it establishes that boys should always be the hero and protect the girls from danger and not the other way around. Cinderella shows the female figures should be docile, and obedient while almost helpless in many situation, while the male figures should be the stronger of two sexes, making actions to save the women.

Cinderella on the outer surface is good for children; it teaches good things for children and using scare tactic, it makes them want to be a the better person. But looking deeper, Cinderella displays the inner truth about how one should act in order to achieve their goals in society. They would have to be the best in everything, which leads them to stand out amongst the crowd. Although subtle and discreet, this message can be send to all children in a negative way.