Its story is quite similar to the Italian and German versions, yet the language and context of the English translation has made it particularly endearing to Americans. The story itself is divorced from the gruesome twists of the standard European (Grimm) tale
While at the grave, she plants a tree, which could be interpreted as a cross. Moreover, as previously noted, that same tree becomes a source of grace for the girl -- a "source of her magical help when it is visited by a white dove, the Christian symbol for the Holy Spirit" (Waters)
It should be noted that during the era when Strindberg wrote, in historical reality: "The actual class situation prevailing in Sweden at the time the play was written was, of course, a good deal more complex than such generic terms as 'aristocratic' and 'valet' can capture. Miss Julie, for instance, belongs to the nobility and can thus claim the title 'Froken,' but it is clear that her family is not without its economic and social vulnerabilities and that the upper-class privilege they enjoy is in the process of unraveling" (Chaudhuri 317)
In this case, Julie's desired command is for Jean to condemn her to death. "Strindberg believed he had learned from…that the will is itself a form of energy, so the idea of a magnetic 'battle of the brains,'" and the strongest should win -- and the strongest was, or at least, should always be the male partner (Greenway 24)
The theme of shoes and transformation are manifested even in the physical symbolism of the play for absent or silent characters: "In Miss Julie the boots waiting to be polished and the gaping speaking tube convey the spiritual presence of Julie's father. The songbird in the cage, the bird that Julie insists is her only friend and that Jean so brutally kills, underscores almost too heavily the situation in which the aristocratic girl finds herself" (Sprinchorn 124) "Although his fear of her father, the count, and his initial servility thwarts her desire to relate on a human and physical level, "his show of cultivation renders the arbitrariness of class structure even more clear, and so encourages Julie's pursuit" (Templeton 474)
Miss Julie and the Cinderella Myth The Swedish naturalist playwright August Strindberg's play Miss Julie has been described as a kind of Cinderella story in reverse, or an inversion of typical fairytale roles (Templeton 470)
It is difficult to imagine a Cinderella without castles, coaches or ball gowns, but that is precisely why students study the variations in the story across global cultures. Students "explore how the setting of a story -- time, place, and culture -- affects the characters and plot" (Butterfield n
Each of the Cinderella variants, as has been shown, has common elements. In "Universality of the Folktale," Stith Thompson claims that these stories are good entertainment, but they can also be studied to gain insight into the people and cultures from which they sprang (Longman n
Research in the economic theory of families supports the view that stepmothers behave as wickedly as the one in Cinderella out of biological instinct. Being a wicked stepmother is a matter of survival; there are biological and Darwinian reasons for shunning Cinderella (Case, Lin and McLanahan)
" From an economic standpoint, the stepmother's behavior makes perfect sense. Economic research has shown that stepchildren have "negative utility," (Daly and Wilson)
Ensuring Cinderella's failure makes it more likely that her daughters will succeed. The daughters could have chosen to bond with their stepsister, but they have "evil and dark hearts," (Grimm and Grimm)
The Grimms' oversimplification of their characters has led to an unfortunate misunderstanding of the role of all women in their domestic spheres. Stepmothers grapple with their "position in the family, feelings of anxiety, rejection, ineffectiveness, guilt, hostility, and exhaustion," according to empirical research (Morrison and Thompson-Guppy 521)