Tungalag Ganbold
English 314
Julie Booche
April 4, 2012
Villains in Fairy Tales
Research paper All children love to listen to fairy tales. When we were young, we ask our parents to tell us stories. People are not sure why fairy tales are so interesting and why every children love them. While it is entertaining, it is also moral lesson to young children. They learn from the fairy tales about good and evil. They learn how to distinguish good and evil, wise and foolish, and moral and immortal. Children learn many lessons from the characters of fairy tales and it is very interesting to see that they love heroes in the fairy tales and do not like the bad guys in the stories. When I was thinking about the research topic, the one thing pulled my attention was why there are villains in almost all fairy tales. It is very interesting to think that all fairy tales have villains. In this paper I am going to talk about who the villains in the story are, why authors talk about villains in their stories and what readers learn from them. I will use mostly about fairy tale villains such as my favorite fairy tale’s villain, Cinderella’s stepmother.
When we read the stories, we can tell who the villain in the story is. They are usually described as stepmothers, witches, monsters, sneak, thief, robber and traits. For example, in the Cinderella story, Lady Tremaine is a villain. In the article “Top 10 Most Evil Disney villains”(Antonia) the author described the Lady Tremaine as self centered and wicked person. She physiologically abuses Cinderella. When I see the characters I listed above, they all are wicked.
It is easy to see that some stepmother usually abuses their children. A student wrote on her term paper about step mother as “Sadly, the term stepmother is almost unheard of unless the word "wicked" is attached to the front of it. To become a stepmother one must first become a bride, and aren't brides, like mothers, usually associated with positive images? Yet, if upon becoming a bride that woman also becomes a stepmother, it's amazing how fast that image can be disposed of and replaced with the wicked stepmother syndrome.” Therefore, when women marry to goys, they all wanted to have happy lives. But in years later they somehow, do not like their step children. Therefore, according to this student’s research most stepmothers become wicked which is very sad. Just like this student wrote, Cinderella’s stepmother was happy to marry Cinderella’s father. But after he died she shows her true face and hates Cinderella so much. Therefore, readers evaluate her as villain in the story.
Villains are usually described as trouble makers. They always try to make things complicated and doesn’t want the hero of the story to reach his goals. For example, after the ball, prince is looking for a girl who came to the ball and danced with him. He sends his people to look for the girl in every family in the kingdom. When king’s servants come to Cinderella’s house and made her to try the shoe on, her stepmother tries to stop her. In the Cinderella’s story, Cinderella’s stepmother says “That awful untidy girl simply cannot have been at the ball, snapped the stepmother. Tell the Prince he ought to marry one of my two daughters! Can't you see how ugly Cinderella is?”(Allan) We can see that she didn’t want Cinderella to marry the prince. Therefore we can see that Cinderella’s step mother is a villain in the story. She is qualified to have villain’s characteristics already.
The villains have different characteristic than the other characters in the story. It is very interesting to see that most villains in the stories have strong characteristics and behaviors. Sometimes they are stronger than our hero. In the article “Five characteristics of an Epic villain” the author, Antonio Del Drago wrote that “Great villain are staggeringly powerful. In other words, they have a way of making things bend to their will.” In Cinderella’s story, we can see that Cinderella’s stepmother and her two stepsisters have more power than Cinderella. They made her to work all day, but they never had done the housekeeping themselves. Therefore, we can see that they a power over on Cinderella.
Most of the time villains are intelligent. They always come out with the idea that they can interrupt the hero. That means they are thinking and making their brain to work. We can see it on Cinderella’s story. When Cinderella wanted to go for the ball, her stepmother made her to work and didn’t buy any gowns for her “Cinderella, of course, was put to work altering the gowns, taking up the hems, and letting out the waists”. (Peat. 2010) Because she had no dress to wear, she couldn’t go to the ball. Her stepmother knew that she will not go there because she has no dress. We can see that the stepmother is smart enough to think of it and never buy new clothes for her because she didn’t want Cinderella to go to the ball.
We see that fairy tales are usually end up with hero’s victory and villains fail. That means villains are immortal. That is one of the characteristics of villains. They do not win even if they are powerful and intelligent. Because their goal is not for people’s peace or happiness, they are made with immortal end. In Cinderella’s story, step mother never be her mother, she only thinks about herself, her wealth and her daughter’s happiness. In the Disney version of Cinderella story, she asks her stepmother” What do you think? You are the only mother I have ever known. Was there ever a time, even in its smallest measurement, that you loved me at all? But her stepmother says: How can anyone love a pebble in their shoe?”(1998) We can see that the stepmother never care of Cinderella. Villains believe that the things they are doing are right and no more to see the normal standards of normal characters. That’s why they end with their fail. We can see that when Lady Tremaine was saying these words to Cinderella, she never thought someday she will hear these words herself. She thought she is doing right to Cinderella at that time.
In the story’s villains are always jealous of heroes. That’s why they always try to interrupt the goals of heroes and want to make something bad for them. It seemed like Cinderella’s stepmother and her sister’s were jealous of Cinderella’s beauty. I always had thought that way. I’m sure most readers think that way. But in the story it says “The woman had brought two daughters into the house with her, who were beautiful and fair of face, but vile and black of heart. Now began a bad time for the poor step-child.” (Taylor. 1884) We can see from this quote that they were actually beautiful. So why were they jealous of Cinderella? The quote says their heart were black. That means they are being a wicked, malignant disposition and morally bad. So we can see that they actually were not jealous of Cinderella’s beauty; they were just bad people. Because they are morally bad people, they always try to do bad things. So their target became Cinderella. Cinderella also only weren’t beautiful, she was generous and loving, and something they didn’t have. Even if they try to be like Cinderella, they couldn’t be like her. Therefore, they hurt Cinderella’s feeling and make themselves feel better which is only bad people can do.
It is very interesting that almost all stories have villains. Why authors always put villain’s characters in their stories? If there is everything good and everything goes smoothly, the might be not interesting. Let’s imagine that there is no stepmother in Cinderella’s story. How would the story be like? Since there is a no stepmother, Cinderella would go to ball with no interruption. There will not be a God Mother. She will just meet her prince and marry him. That’s all would be happened. Because there is villain in the story, the story is more interesting and can full the reader’s attention.
Also, there must be villains because no one can go without the law of opposite. According to the law of opposite, there must be good and evil, good and bad. We have to follow this law even if we do not want it. In the article of The Law of Opposites Contains the Seed of Succeed, the author said “Everything in this universe has its opposite. Light could not exist if there wasn't darkness. Hot can't exist without cold. There could be no peace without hatred. Prosperity doesn't exist without poverty. Male cannot exist (or endure) without female. Get the point? That's polarity, the law of opposites.” Therefore, the stories always have villains, while there are heroes. It makes the story more interesting and more attractive to read. I would also say authors follow the law of universe. Since there is everything is made by law, writing stories also has to follow the law too.
According to my research, it is lots of thoughts and work to write about villain and make them to be interesting in the stories. The Author Hillary Bell said “Writers often complain that they have trouble making the middle of their novel exciting. A villain, who acts, instead of simply sitting around thinking evil thoughts, is the best possible cure for a sagging middle-book. First, the villain should have his own credible, well-thought-out goal. Then he needs a logical plan to achieve it. And when he acts on this plan, it should require the villain to do things that will bring his nefarious plot to the attention of the hero. Trying to figure out who the villain is, what he's doing, and how to thwart him, gives your hero plenty to do in the middle of the book. And once the hero's efforts come to the villain's notice, the villain can try to stop, mislead, and remove/kill the hero, which produces even more drama and action.” According to his words in order to make villain’s character in the story, she has to think about it and how the villain should make more drama in the story. I can see that author of Cinderella story thought about the character of Lady Tremaine. She made her to be bad enough. We see it from reader’s perspectives. Almost all readers do not like Lady Tremaine because she made Cinderella sad and tried to stop her to go to the ball and meet her prince.
Villain influences the hero to do good things or to achieve his goal. It seems like most readers see the story in hero’s point of view and even if villains sometimes do right things they do not agree him and still don’t like him. “The Villainous counterpart to the Hero's quality of being the Main Character is the Influence Character. While the audience or reader sees things from the Main Character's point of view, the Influence Character represents the opposing moral outlook, alternative view, or contrasting paradigm. In short, the crux of the message is argued between the Main Character and the Influence Character. It is the function of the Influence Character to provide the strongest temptation for the Hero to change his point of view. Now, with stereotypical Heroes and Villains, the Main Character point of view held by the Hero will be the correct one, and the Influence Character point of view held by the Villain will be wrong. But this doesn't have to be the case and, in fact, it is often swapped around the other way.” When we see Lady Tremaine with hero’s point of view, she was “cold, cruel, and sadistic: pampering her own selfishly spoiled daughters, while forcing Cinderella to become a maid in her own home, causing the stately chateau to fall into disrepair.” In other hand, if we see her with her point of view she looks completely different. She was from a good family. She was a widow herself and has two daughters from her previous marriage. Since she has her own daughter’s she must love them. Therefore she should understand Cinderella too because Cinderella lived her for many years and thinks her as a mother. In the Disney version of Cinderella tells Lady Tremaine “You are the only mother I have ever known.” We can see that Cinderella had been thought Lady Tremaine as her mother. Therefore, there must be times that Lady Tremaine being nice to Cinderella. If she wasn’t so, Cinderella never has thought she is the only mother she has.
It also must be very difficult Lady Tremaine’s point of view. In her blog, Author Zong said “The stepmothers are just sad, sad people that are often misunderstood, by the vast majority of people, who only see the beautiful young girl, and ignore elder women who had been through so much.” According to her, if we try to understand Lady Tremaine we see so much different point of view. We also should remember that Lady Tremaine has lost her 2 husbands. It must be very sad to her and take care of her own daughters and her stepdaughter. We can see in this way that every morning she wakes up she worries about her daughters and think how she can take care of them by herself. They all are girls and they are growing up. Probably, she didn’t want Cinderella to depend on her beauty and become a lazy one. She wanted all best for her.
We can also think that Lady Tremaine thought one day her late husband’s inheritance will be gone. At that time day will need to take care of them. Since Cinderella is beautiful she can marry someone who is rich. But her daughters are not beautiful as Cinderella; they might have hard time to find husbands. That’s why she wanted one of her daughter to marry a prince. The author Zong said Cinderella had a history of cheating her neighbors and merchants in the market in the Movie of Cinderella story. It must be one of the worries that Lady Tremaine think of Cinderella. She might worry about her future and her behavior too. So she made Cinderella to work in the house and do everything. But instead of doing it by herself, she got help from little animals. Therefore, she is more concerned about her. At the end, Cinderella married to a prince and left the house. That’s Cinderella’s stepmother’s point of view. As readers, it is important to understand the stories in every character’s view.
As we read books and watch movies we learn important lessons from each of the characters. It doesn’t have to be hero. We also learn from the villains. Even if they are wicked and not good characteristics to observe, we can learn why we cannot be like them. When I was child I used to read a book very much. Nowadays, young generation seems like they don’t read books because of new technologies. If we read books, we will learn some important lesson.
I learned from Cinderella’s step mother that I will never make my kids suffer like Cinderella. I understand that it is not fair to treat kids like Cinderella even if they are not mine. I have a daughter. I will help her with everything. She will have times to deal with others and times to make her decisions. I will be with her side when she needs my help. Cinderella’s story is my favorite story and I have read this story many times since I was a child. I learned many important moral lessons from it. But I never think about Lady Tremaine and her point of view. Looking at her point of view, I learned more lessons from her character. I should make my kids to work hard and learn have to be dependable. But of course, I will not treat them as Cinderella. If they work hard they will learn how to work. In that way they will be successful in their life and effective in every field they work. They also learn how to manage their times and how to work in the team.
Children watch adults and learn from their examples. It is very important for adults to learn their way and watch their behaviors in everywhere even in their home because there are children are watching them and learning what they are doing and what they are saying. Therefore it is very important for us to be good examples. On her article, author Melody Rhodes wrote that “The cruel and distant stepmother character teaches children that adults are not always fair and they do not always show kindness. By identifying with Cinderella and how she must feel, children learn that those who are unkind cause suffering to others.” So if we are behave like Cinderella’s stepmother, it is more possible our kids to become not very good behaved people. Therefore, if we want our kids to be more respectful and good people, we have to be good examples and threat them well. We have to play with them and have activities with them. We also need to spend more time with them. We need to show our love.
In conclusion, it is very important to understand the villains in the stories and learn some moral lesson them. Villains are not very bad characters as we think. Because they are in the stories, stories are more interesting. They motivate the heroes to try to achieve their goals. They are intelligent and powerful characters. They teach us to learn important lessons from them.
If we see the villains in different perspective, we see that they are actually not very bad characters. Because of them, stories become more interesting and make the readers analyze the stories. If there was no villain, the law of opposite will not be true too. In order to fulfill the law of opposite, there must be villains in the stories. Therefore, there are many things we learn from each of the characters in the stories.

Works Cited
“ Wicked step mothers, Fact or Fiction?.”
“Ever After: A Cinderella Story (1998).” IBMb: Memorable quotes. < http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120631/quotes>
“Top 10 most evil Disney villains.” Listverse. June, 2009 http://listverse.com/2009/06/09/top-10-most-evil-disney-villains/
Bell, Hillary. “Villains: because a good bad guy is the author’s friend.”Blue Hound Visions. 04 July 2011.
Drago, Antonio. Five characteristics of an epic villain. Mythic Scrybes: the art of fantacy storytelling. <http://mythicscribes.com/character-development/5-characteristics-epic-villain/>
Peat, Allan, Peat, Julie. 50 Ways To Retell A Story: Cinderella: Creative Educational Press, Ltd 2010.
Peters, Amy. Cinderella. Net places: Fairy tales. <http://www.netplaces.com/fairy-tales/princesses-and-princes/cinderella.htm>
Rhodes, Melody. “What Children Learn From Cinderella Characters.” Children’s books. 09 Aug 2009. <http://melodyrhodes.suite101.com/what-children-learn-from-cinderella-characters-a137568>
Taylor, Margaret. “Cinderella: The brother Grimm (1884).” About.com http://classiclit.about.com/library/bl-etexts/grimm/bl-grimm-cinderella.htm
The Law Of Opposites Contains The Seeds Of Success. <http://www.creative-wealthbuilding.com/law-of-opposites.html>
Zong, Zong. “Continuation of fairy tales, Cinderella:The stepmother's real thought.” Those Moments, 06 May 2010. http://stillyoungiguess.blogspot.com/2010/05/continuation-of-fairy-tales.html