These stories have changed over time because of the culture of each individual writer. In some cases, "storytellers, upon hearing the defective versions, correct it in the retelling" (Goldberg 95). These three writers have their own version of a "Cinderella" type fairy tale. .
The main characters in fairy tales seem to be predominately females. By using women to play the main roles, the writers "allow for women's voices and needs to be heard"(Zipes 25). These voices are simply a way in which the problems of that time period can be portrayed through the author's writing. There is a "standard canon representing catatonic females flat on their backs waiting to be brought to life by charming princes"(Zipes 25). Basically, a female is helpless until a prince comes and rescues her and they live happily ever after. The importance about the ""feminist"" utopian tales is not so much the strength shown by the female protagonists but the manner in which they expose oppression and hypocrisy and challenge fixed categories of gender" (Zipes 129). Females are usually stereotyped as being weak and a higher authority usually oppresses them. The similarity in the Cinderella stories, mentioned above, is having a woman as the main character. In all three stories the main character is a woman. .
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3 Another common thread among all that the stories is the main character is always a nice, obedient, good girl. In Sexton's "Cinderella," Cinderella's mother tells her to "Be devout. Be good. Then I will smile down from heaven in the seam of a cloud" (Sexton 562). She is basically saying to be a good girl no matter what happens and good things will eventually come to her.