Connected Text Study: Cinderella and a Cinderella Story

Connected text Study

For my connected text study I have chosen to compare and contrast Cinderella and Cinderella story. There are many versions Of Cinderella and the one I have chosen seems to be the most common, it has been edited by Andrew Lang and published by David McKay 1948.

“Cinderella” is a classic story, told and retold for generations. There are variations of the story in nearly every culture, and many modern adaptations. One of the most recent and spotlighted offspring of “Cinderella”, is “Cinderella Story” Written by Leigh Dunlap and directed by Mark Rosman. “Cinderella Story” is an adapted version of Cinderella, and holds many of the same key aspects as the most well known version of Cinderella. However each text has its own particular Style, plot, Theme, structure and character profiling. What makes “Cinderella Story” and adaptation of “Cinderella” is that in both texts there is a beautiful and intelligent girl that is being used as a free maid/slave because of her evil stepmother’s jealousy of her. She somehow through trickery ends up at a ball/dance, where she meets a handsome young man that falls in love with her.

“Cinderella” is set in a time were there are still castles and princes, almost a medieval age. Opposed to “Cinderella Story” that is set in today’s times. “Cinderella Story” was made so that an audience of today can be able to understand and relate to it. To do this they made Sam an unknown high schooler, trying to juggle a job and school. Cinderella is a story that people of all periods of time should be able to relate to in some way or other. But Andrew Langs version is seemingly aimed to be a children’s bedtime story, with its quick pace and aura of innocence. And even though it is a children’s bedtime story Words such as “garret”, “looking glass” and “odious” are used, this vocabulary is not one that would be used in today’s children’s stories.

The beginnings in both texts are set out very different, but in the end portray the same feelings and message.

In “Cinderella” the story begins with an intro explaining the situation. Cinderella’s father has remarried to a woman that already has two daughters. The narrator uses a “good vs. bad” analogy, Describing Cinderella’s Stepmother as an overly proud and “haughty” Person who is jealous of Cinderella’s Sweet demeanour and “employ’s her in the meanest of works”. The author gives us descriptions of Cinderella, so that we as the audience feel Cinderella’s sadness and despair. “Cinderella slept in a miserable garret upon a wretched straw bed” “when she had done her work, she used to go into the chimney corner and sits down among the cinders and ashes.”

In “Cinderella Story” we are shown Sam’s life before her father marries; it seems perfect and filled with happiness. Not long after an earthquake occurs, killing her father and leaving her step mother “Fiona” responsible of Sam. The happy feeling the audience feels is suddenly crashed and turned into sadness and despair, the same feeling the beginning of “Cinderella” leaves you with.

The Endings are also different, but have two commonalities. Both Cinderella and Sam Are free of their stepmothers and get their man. The difference is that, Cinderella forgives her step sisters that were terrible to her and invites them to live with her in the palace. However In “Cinderella story” Sam gets her justice by having her step sister’s work for her.

There are small differences