We've all heard of Cinderella, the girl who went from maid to married. However, we've never herd it the way Anne Sexton tells it in her poem, Cinderella. Her version of the well-known story is one I did not recognize, one with the cutting of limbs and pecking of eyes and a white dove, instead of a fairy godmother. Not suitable for children, obviously.
I like the way she tells the story inside the poem, especially because she uses other scenarios to compare it to, like the woman who marries a wealthy man. I think it's interesting to look at Cinderella next to the stories of everyday people because it makes her less glamourous and definitely less memorable. Her story ends up not even feeling like a fairytale at all. Instead, she just turns into another rags-to-riches story that we hear about often.
Although it was one of those "childhood ruined" moments, I still like the dark and twisted story of her. I think that Sexton's point is that we shouldn't rely on fairytales because, when you examine them closely, they end up being like everyday stories, hiding behind a facade of magic and wonder.
I honestly loved the way Sexton wrote this poem. The poem had a dark side, but I think I preferred that over the regular tales of Cinderella. It was something new and almost kind of cool, and I appreciated the fact that it was real. I don’t think we should depend on fairy tales because they give us a false sense of reality, although I guess the point of a fairy tale is to escape reality. Either way, it’s better to see life as it is, not through the waves of a magic wand.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed this poem a lot as well. I like that she used some modern day correlations to help relate it to the readers. It also helped show a lot of Sexton's sarcasm as she talks about the Stepmother and sisters. Actually, her version is much closer to the original, which is told by the Grimm Brothers' Fairytails. If you compare it to that, it's incredibly close. I think her retelling shows the darker side of one of our most beloved stories from Disney- and that not every bright and happy story actually has a happy beginning.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed this poem as well and found my self smiling towards the end because it is such a fairytale that we all once dreamed about living when were young.
ReplyDeleteI really like how you described this poem as a "childhood ruined" moment. It is definitely horrible to think that this may the real side of Cinderella that we didn't know about. I think it is interesting to add this realistic outlook on the poem.
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