Jefferson Kao

Professor Lynda Haas

Writing 39B
16 January 2016
Rhetorical Analysis First Draft
A fairy tale is a fictional children's story. They typically focus on mythical and
unrealistic things and usually always has a happy ending. Fairy tales normally consists
of abundant fictive characters, the protagonists and antagonists, who will go through a
great deal of struggle before ultimately succeeding with their intentional goal. And as
with every fairy tale, we can find the rhetorical situation and eventually analyze them.
According to the Anteater's Guide to Writing & Rhetoric, the rhetorical situation
"illustrates how every act of communication happens in a particular context and moment
in time scared between the person who is sending the text, the rhetor, and the person
receiving the test, the audience." The guide also states that it helps us because rhetoric
is "the ability in each particular case, to see the available means of persuasion."
Persuasion requires effecting some sort of adjustment in your audience through your
communication. The guide also states that "all acts of communication change the world
in some way. The challenge lies in changing the world in the way you set out change it."
As with the rhetorical situation and the intended audience, changes will happen as time
passes. Different historical and cultural context will change the rhetorical situation.
Different audience groups will change the rhetorical situation. The way we analyze a
story can change the rhetorical situation. In a fairy tale by Charles Perrault, Sleeping
Beauty, an evil fairy casts a malicious spell on a young princess, resulting her in an

eternal sleep. Only a true love's kiss will wake her up and it is up to the prince to save
the day. The following adaption of the original fairy tale created by Disney, Maleficent,
the evil fairy casts a similar spell on the young princess, causing her to sleep forever.
Maleficent, the evil fairy, says that only a true love's kill will wake the princess up. She
later shows to be the real "true love" as a "mother and daughter" type of love. Sleeping
Beauty borrows the conventions of classic fairy tales while Maleficent is more modern
and focuses on a 21st century audience. Maleficent is both the hero and the villain in the
movie and her character develops vastly throughout the film. Her true love for the young
princess, Princess Aurora, shows to be what saves her. In return, Maleficent is also
saved mentally and emotionally by Princess Aurora. The differences between the two
versions are great and the rhetorical situation changes along with changes in audience,
different historical and cultural context, and gender roles of women in the early 17 th
century and modern 21st century.
In Perrault's Sleeping Beauty, there was a king and a queen who longed for a
child. After trying many times, they finally give birth to a beautiful baby daughter. As a
celebration, the couple invited all the good fairies of the kingdom except for one, who
was presumed to be dead. However, the forgotten fairy arrives in an angry and bitter
state. In return, the fairy curses the young princess promising that on her sixteenth
birthday, she will prick her finger on a spindle and enter into an eternal sleep state. Only
a true love's kiss can save her and wake her up. Perrault's version relies heavily on
traditional fairy tale conventions, such as the female character relying on a male hero in
order to be saved. It follows the guideline by incorporating a hero and a villain
throughout the fairy tale. True love is eventually presented at the end of the story when

the prince finds the princess and saves her from her everlasting sleep. Gender
conventions are present in this version because the woman relies heavily on the male in
order to "survive" and to live. For example, after the princess pricks her finger on the
spindle, she falls into an eternal sleep. She relies heavily on a male part to save her in
order for her to survive. When the male arrives and saves the day, the prince marries
the princess and has the ultimate power. He is the one who saves the day and the one
who gets the girl, similar with other fairy tales, such as Cinderella. Cinderella's character
also needs a man to save her from her struggles, which would be her evil stepsisters
and stepmother. According to Local Histories, women in late 16th century and early 17th
century Europe had limited abilities in society. Women usually worked spinning cloth,
which is what would place the princess in a sleep-like state forever when she pricks her
finger on the spindle, while the males had bigger roles, such as providing for the family
and "leading" the household. The site also states that marriages were usually arranged
for upper class women. In the fairy tale, the princess marries the princess after he
wakes her up. In a sense, it was already presumed that the prince would come and
save the princess and that it could be expected that the "Prince Charming" would come
and rescue the helpless princess.
In Disney's Maleficent, the character deviates from the traditional idea that
women need to be saved by men. Since Disney's version targets a modern 21 st century
audience, the rhetorical situation changes. The character motif, especially the hero, the
villain, and true love changed. In the early version, the true love and the hero are
separate characters. True love also involves a man saving the female. However, all this
changes in Maleficent. Maleficent introduces the idea of feminism and the changes the

type of character Maleficent is during the film. As a character, Maleficent is both the
hero and the villain and in the end, is also the true love that the princess needs. As for
feminism, Disney's audience mainly consists of young adolescent women who values
the idea of feminism. Feminism is also a modern historical and cultural movement that
will impact the lives of many young women. Maleficent educated young women that
they don't need to necessarily rely on men in order to be successful. In an interview On
Entertainment Weekly with Angelina Jolie, the actress who portrays Maleficent, Jolie
states that playing Maleficent made her "not feel any less of a woman. I feel empowered
that I made a strong choice that in no way diminishes my femininity." Feminism is also
shown throughout the movie when Shepard Project states that "many women who have
had similar tales of hurt and betrayal, where a man the loved and trusted failed them
horribly, lied, hurt, manipulated and used them for one purpose or another." This
teaches women that men can be potentially hurtful towards them in certain aspects and
that women can be perfectly fine relying on themselves. Also, Maleficent raising
Princess Aurora on her own after the pixies fail to take good care of her shows that
women are capable of raising a child and that they don't need to rely on a male figure to
succeed in raising a child. According to Urban Daily, "Maleficent's anger isn't borne out
of jealousy, but rather anger at Aurora's father, who betrays Maleficent by violating
her in the cruelest way imaginable. What "Maleficent" does quite beautifully is show
how even the deepest hurts can be healed when we open ourselves to the friendships
with the women in our lives. The world can be a cruel place, but we can't get through it
without our girls."
Character motifs also change when Maleficent is compared to Sleeping Beauty.

For example, Maleficent is both the hero and the villain in her movie and is also the true
love. Sleeping Beauty uses traditional characters in a fairy tale, such as a separate
character for the villain, a separate character for the hero, and a separate character for
the true love. The concept of villain in Maleficent shows its audience that no matter how
hurt someone is or angry someone is, there is still some love at heart that will show. For
example, Maleficent and King Stefan grew up as friends who developed feelings for
each other. Maleficent fell in love with him and felt betrayed after he cut off her wings for
his dream in having the throne. King Stefan was promised the throne if he killed
Maleficent and was blinded by the power it came with that he disregarded Maleficent
and tried to kill her. As a result, Maleficent would curse King Stefan's baby daughter,
Princess Aurora, out of revenge and spite. Her curse is as follows: "Before the sun sets
on her sixteenth birthday, she will prick her finger on the spindle of a spinning wheel,
and fall into a sleep like death! A sleep from which she will never awaken!" Because of
this, we are lead to believe that she is the villain in the movie, but we forgot the reason
behind why she did this. Her character is revealed to also be the hero when she saves
Princess Aurora. When Maleficent was standing besides Princess Aurora next to her
bed, Maleficent apologizes to Princess Aurora and says, "I will not ask your forgiveness
because what I have done to you is unforgivable. I was so lost in hatred and revenge.
Sweet Aurora, you stole what was left of my heart. And now I have lost you forever. I
swear, no harm will come to you as long as I live. And not a day shall pass that I don't
miss your smile." Maleficent then proceeds to kiss Princess Aurora on the forehead and
breaks the spell. This comes to show that Maleficent deviates from the Perrault's
version in terms of character motifs. Lastly, the wedding function in Propp's Function is

different between the two versions. There is a wedding in Sleeping Beauty that weds the
prince and princess and in Maleficent, there is no wedding at all.
The movie Maleficent and the fairy tale Sleeping Beauty shows that with
different audiences and historical and cultural context, the rhetorical analysis can
change drastically. Disney's Maleficent is targeted at a more modern 21st century
audience while Perrault's Sleeping Beauty targets a whole different audience in the
early 17th century. With society constantly changing, the rhetorical situation will change
accordingly. The change in culture as well as feminism and women's rights will also
change the rhetoric situation.

Works Cited:

Eason, Loren. "Chapter 1/Rhetoric Is...?" The Anteater's Guide to Writing and Rhetoric.
Ed. Bradley Queen. 5th ed. Plymouth, MI: Hayden-McNeal, 2016. 2-5. Print.

Lambert, Tim. "LIFE FOR WOMEN IN THE 1600s." Women in the 17th Century. N.p.,
n.d. Web. 17 Feb. 2016.

Breznican, Anthony. "Angelina Jolie Q&A: Bringing Malevolent 'Maleficent' to Life, Doing
Some Good in the World -- and Those '50 Shades' Rumors." Angelina Jolie Q&A:
Bringing the Malevolent 'Maleficent' to Life. N.p., 23 July 2015. Web. 17 Feb. 2016.

Tuttle, Stacey. "Feminism and Gender Roles in Maleficent: The Good and the Ugly."
Shepherd Project Ministries. N.p., 06 June 2014. Web. 17 Feb. 2016.

Theodore-Vachon, ReBecca. "3 Valuable Lessons In Feminism We Learned From

"Maleficent" [OPINION]." The Urban Daily RSS. N.p., 30 May 2014. Web. 17 Feb. 2016.