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Author
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Comment
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Nalo
Registered User
(12/2/02 2:50:18 pm)
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Re: Wild Swans
I believe that there are stories in which Makeda, the queen of Sheba who so fascinated King Solomon, is rumoured to have had one goat's hoof.
-nalo, tangentially
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Elizabeth
Unregistered User
(12/6/02 11:05:01 am)
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red shoes
Red is infamous for symbolising evil, like the red devil, or sex, red lip stick or dress. In Anderson's story of the red shoes where the girls feet were cut off it could mean that she was wanting to express her sexuality and this was of course wrong in Anderson's day.
Also in the far east the feet are a an erotic symbol. Interestingly, in Jewish tradition the foot is considered the worst body part.
Beth
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Miranda
Unregistered User
(1/4/03 9:03:20 am)
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Shoe symbolism and foot binding
Foot binding was outlawed by the New Chinese Rebublic in 1911. The Earliest to date Cinderella tale would be Egyptian, the story of Rhodopin. (Who's shoe color varies from silver to rose red.) The Chinese version features a gold shoe.
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Miranda
Unregistered User
(1/4/03 9:08:30 am)
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red shoes
Hi Beth,
I'm doing a series on feet and their accoutrements (don't ask ...*laughs*) for a magazine. I read the Andersen story for the first time yesterday morning as a matter of fact. Really pretty awful stuff- that. Yes, read shoes are definitely anonymous with "evil".
Duiscussing elsehwre why they took the silver shoes in the Frank Baum story and made thm ruby red for the film.
~MIranda
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Laura
elf
Registered User
(1/7/03 6:37:00 pm)
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self mutilation
Cinderella's step-sisters aren't the only fairy tale characters to mutilate their bodies in an attempt to 'fit into' a masculine concept of beauty.
Snow White also succumbs twice to near-fatal beauty ties. First with the staylaces (corset) and then a poisoned comb. That she, and the stepsisters, feel the need to adhere to such practices whatever the personal cost is a powerful comment on the value of beauty.
Also, foot-binding may be out but there's a new Chinese practice which has young women lengthening their legs (through fairly painful surgery) in order to emulate Western Heights.
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