Imagining of Literature

The long-lasting tradition of print has established certain patterns of comprehension. Although literature is still and probably for a long time will be considered high-brow art, it is also a business based on profit and sales. Ever since the Gutenberg press came into being literature started to sell itself to wider and wider circles of people until it gained status of mass product. Literature is commodity. As Pierre Bourdieu asks in The Field of Cultural Production “Who is the true producer of the value of the work – the painter or the dealer, the writer or the publisher, the playwright or the theatre manager?” ( Bourdieu, 76 ). 

The Cinderella complex [1] and Ugly Betty The Cinderella story is one of the most popular tales with strong roots in cultures all around the globe. It was adapted and re-told multiple times eventually becoming a productive and even archetypical theme especially in Western culture. The Cinderella story is almost synonymous with the quest of a person to endure injustice and to evolve in a higher society role overcoming the odds. Similar motifs were categorized and analyzed in theory by the Russian formalist Vladimir Propp [2] and his analytical approach proved to be very influential. His work scrutinizes the folk tales and develops a pattern of well organized repeatable structures and motifs.