Transforming Rags to Riches? : Material Culture in Cendrillon and Pretty Woman

本文以解除神話性(de-mythicization) 的概念開啟對童話(fairy tales)的討論，認為必須加入歷史、文化、政治與物質等層面的解說才能擺脫童話中被添加的神話性並豐富童話的閱讀。接著以物質文明的角度切入女性主義經常閱讀的文本—貝侯的《灰姑娘》 (1697) 與電影《麻雀變鳳凰》(1990)，探討物質文明在兩個文本中所扮演的重要角色。 貝侯所擁護的現代主義(modernism)促使其改寫法國民間故事(folktales)，並在文中加入了大量的十七世紀法國當代物質文明，企圖重新塑造出新一代的法國文學。因此，貝侯的《灰姑娘》並非一般人所熟知的麻雀變鳳凰典型，而是一個關於恢復她貴族身分的故事。在貝侯筆下所塑造出來的灰姑娘與當時的時代背景息息相關：一個世故、聰明與積極的女性，試圖脫離她的苦難，並非大家所熟知的好心的、被動的、順從的灰姑娘形象。 電影《麻雀變鳳凰》則提供不同時代灰姑娘形象的對照。延續維多利亞時期在地化的灰姑娘形象，Vivian成為最低下的灰姑娘—流鶯。她由麻雀變鳳凰的經歷除了說明不同時代對美的詮釋與期待亦呈現出八零年代不同的灰姑娘形象：一個同時具有性感與善心的女性。 在美國，男子氣概的研究始於八零年代。因此本文以Edward的男性氣概為出發點，探討八零年代的物質文明，並以此看出對於男性的期待都建構在他的所有物，如轎車、總統套房以及馬球等等。此外，Edward身為男性灰姑娘與神仙教父的身分在本章皆有所探討。 最後必須闡明的是，物質文明並不見得能涵蓋所有的層面，尤其是在集體意識與個人偏好的部分，是無法找到一個平衡點的。本文僅能就現有的資料加以觀察與解析，以期達到較全面的觀察。To de-mythicize a fairy tale means to discover its cultural, historical and political aspects and therefore, in my thesis, it helps to distinguish Perrault’s Cendrillon (1697) from other Cinderella variants. My thesis approaches Perrault’s Cendrillon in a materialist method: with the employment of the late seventeenth-century French material culture, Cendrillon is transformed into a modernized literary fairy tale about her restoration to her original social status. This French Cinderella is quite distinct from the traditional rags-to-riches Cinderella story since Perrault champions a modernism with which he intends to change the future of the French literature. The film Pretty Woman (1990) is to serve as a contrast and to elucidate the idea that different eras make different Cinderella stories. The Cinderella in the Anglophone world is getting more and more debased and the Americanized Cinderella is the most debased ever, the street walker. Her rags-to-riches transformation manifests the social expectations toward in the eighties toward what a woman should be and possess. On the other hand, there is another side of the story in the film. On Edward’s part, I am going to approach the material culture via American masculinities in order to illustrate what a man should be and have. Besides, Edward also plays the roles of the male Cinderella and the fairy godfather in the film. The two roles Edward plays will be further developed in my thesis. The materialist approach has its own limits: it cannot include the conformist and the individualist aspects and I thus fail to incorporate it in my thesis