Social:Hooker with a heart of gold

From HandWiki
Vasantasena from the Sanskrit play Mṛcchakatika.

The hooker with a heart of gold (also the whore with a heart of gold or the tart with a heart) is a stock character involving a courtesan or prostitute with a hidden integrity and kindness. The character, traditionally female, is usually an example of irony: an allegedly immoral woman who demonstrates virtues absent in woman morally correct for the role.

Characteristics

This character is often a pivotal, but peripheral, character in literature and motion pictures, usually giving key advice or serving as a go-between. She is sometimes established in contrast to another female character who is morally correct but frigid or otherwise unyielding. Hookers with hearts of gold are sometimes reluctant prostitutes due to either desperation or coercion from a pimp. Or her prostitution may reflect an overall lust for life, as in Ilya in Never on Sunday.

The stereotype might owe something of a debt to certain traditions surrounding the Biblical figures of Mary Magdalene (who was not a prostitute) and Rahab, or to the ancient Indian theatrical tradition of Sanskrit drama where Śudraka's play Mṛcchakatika (The Little Clay Cart) featured a nagarvadhu (courtesan) with a heart of gold named Vasantasena.[1] But this stock character is pervasive enough in various myths and cultures in the form of a tragic story of the concubine who falls in love with her patron/client or, alternatively, young and often poor lover. Therefore, this might be considered not just an archetype but also fairly universal, and somewhat indicative of various societies' complex ideas about sexual decency and moral character. A variation on the theme, the dancer (stripper) with a heart of gold, is a tamer version of the character.

The fictitious courtesan Chandramukhi (character) in Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay's highly acclaimed Bengali novel Devdas has been adapted into film numerous times, most notably into Hindi in 1955 and 2002 with the character-role of "Chandramukhi" being played by actresses Vyjayanthimala and Madhuri Dixit, respectively. Chandramukhi (character) here fulfils Devdas' desire of feeling loved which was betrayed by Parvati (Paro).

In opera and musical theater, a hooker with a heart of gold is most often portrayed by a mezzo-soprano.[citation needed] (One notable exception is the heroine of Giuseppe Verdi's La traviata, Violetta Valery, portrayed by a soprano.) She is portrayed in a tragic light and often dies a tragic death. Another classic example of the "Tart with a heart" character is the character of Nancy in Charles Dickens' novel Oliver Twist and the stage musical derived from it, Oliver!.

In television history, the "tart with a heart" has become an important archetype in serial drama and soap opera, especially in United Kingdom . During the 1960s, the character of Elsie Tanner in British series Coronation Street set the mold for future characters such as Bet Lynch (also Coronation Street), Kat Slater, Stacey Slater and Dawn Swann (all three characters from the British soap opera EastEnders). Characters of this nature are often depicted as having tragic lives, but put on a front when in public to create the illusion of happiness. More often than not, these female characters are vital to their respective shows, and inevitably become some of the biggest stars in British Television.

The hooker with a heart of gold is also a prominent character in many American western movies. In The Usual Suspects, detective Dave Kujan says to Roger "Verbal" Kint: "... so don't sell me the hooker with a heart of gold."

Examples

The story of Rahab in the Bible's Book of Joshua is considered by some the earliest example of this character type.[2]

In Giuseppe Verdi's La Traviata, the courtesan Violetta Valery turns to love when she meets Alfredo and subsequently sells all of her possessions to support them (unbeknownst to Alfredo). She is later persuaded to leave him by Alfredo's father Giorgio Germont in order to keep the family's nobility from falling (as her reputation has threatened his daughter's engagement). She is also coping with tuberculosis and keeps this a secret, leaving Alfredo who later comes after her.

In Fyodor Dostoevsky's novel Crime and Punishment, protagonist Rodion Raskolnikov is persuaded to confess to murder by the prostitute Sonya Semyonovna Marmeladova, who consistently exhibits characteristics of the archetype throughout the novel.

Bertolt Brecht's play The Good Person of Szechwan features a textbook example in the form of the young Shen Te, who is rewarded by the gods at the beginning of the play upon demonstrating courtesy when nobody else does, after which she relinquishes whoredom and acquires a tobacco shop—though to ill avail.

The Marlene Dietrich role "Shanghai Lily" in the 1932 Pre-Code Shanghai Express

Two Shirley MacLaine roles—Ginny Moorhead in 1958's Some Came Running and Irma la Douce in 1963's Irma la Douce

The "hooker with a heart of gold" also appears as "Cabiria" (played by Giulietta Masina) in the 1957 film Nights of Cabiria.

The character appears in modern action films as "Chris" (played by Angie Dickinson) in the 1967 action film Point Blank, as "Rosie" (played by Maria Bello) in the 1999 re-make Payback and as "Donna Quintano" (played by Monica Bellucci) in Shoot 'Em Up (2007).

In modern comedy films, Jamie Lee Curtis's role in Trading Places has been called an example of this archetype,[3] and the 1990 film Pretty Woman (starring Julia Roberts and Richard Gere) is probably the most recognizable modern depiction of the 'hooker with a heart of gold'. The character "V", played by Melanie Griffith in the movie Milk Money could also be considered an example of this type or role.

Moulin Rouge! is another modern-day film, in which the main character is a courtesan named Satine who does end up having a heart and falling in love, but ultimately (tragically) dies of tuberculosis during one of her performances and never actually gets to be with the one she truly loves.

In the 1970 highly successful Pakistani film, Anjuman, Rani played the virtuous prostitute "Anjuman". The role was later reprised by Sara Loren, in the remake of the film in 2013.

In the 1990 film Pretty Woman Vivian Ward played by Julia Roberts is portrayed as a kind hearted prostitute.

A 2003 episode of Firefly titled "Heart of Gold" has the crew of Serenity defending a brothel called the Heart of Gold from a wealthy, misogynistic local rancher.

Acclaimed Bollywood actor Rani Mukerji plays the hooker with a golden heart in three films. In Mangal Pandey: The Rising, she plays a compassionate courtesan. In Laaga Chunari Mein Daag, she plays a lower middle class woman who turns into a high profile escort. In Saawariya, Mukerji appeared in a small but highly appreciated cameo of a street-smart prostitute called Gulab.

In the 2004 Hindi film Chameli, Kareena Kapoor plays the highly acclaimed golden-hearted prostitute named "Chameli".

The 2010 thriller miniseries The Hooker with a Heart of Gold, by independent filmmaker Brad Jones, takes the proverb literally, in giving the main character – a kind-hearted prostitute simply named "Hooker" (played by Sarah Lewis) – a heart made of gold.[4] In the 2011 Pakistani film Bol, actress and model, Iman Ali, played the acclaimed golden-heart prostitute, named, "Sabina (Meena)".

In the 2012 film Fury (originally titled The Samaritan) ex-con Foley (played by Samuel L. Jackson) falls in love with a disturbed but ultimately good hearted prostitute named Iris (played by Ruth Negga).

In the 2012 Bollywood film, Talaash's main plotline involves around a prostitute, Rosie (also played by Kareena Kapoor).

The songs "Carmen" by Lana Del Rey and "The A Team" by Ed Sheeran each describe such a character.

Madhuravani was a prostitute in Gurazada Apparao's popular Telugu play Kanyasulkam, who was portrayed to be very progressive, opinionated and independent and played a key role in the play.

In Coronation Street, the characters Elsie Tanner, Carla Connor, Bet Lynch, Raquel Watts and Leanne Battersby can be described as such stereotypes.

See also

  • List of famous prostitutes and courtesans
  • Counterstereotype
  • Said the actress to the bishop

References

  1. ↑ Pauwels, Heidi Rika Maria (2008). Indian Literature and Popular Cinema. Routledge. p. 84. ISBN 0-415-44741-0. 
  2. ↑ Jakes, T.D. (2003). God's Leading Lady. New York: Berkley Books. p. 127. "She may be the original hooker with the heart of gold" 
  3. ↑ Soars, Emily. "Trading Places". Turner Classic Movies. http://www.tcm.com/this-month/article/276705%7c0/Trading-Places.html. Retrieved 16 September 2013. 
  4. ↑ The Hooker with a Heart of Gold. "The Cinema Snob" Official Site. Retrieved 12 October 2014.
  • Short description: Wiki documenting plot conventions in creative works
TV Tropes
Error creating thumbnail: Unable to save thumbnail to destination
Screenshot as of July 16, 2020
Type of site
Wiki
Available in13 languages[1]
Owner
  • Chris Richmond[2]
  • Drew Schoentrup[2]
Websitetvtropes.org
CommercialAd-supported
RegistrationRequired for all features other than viewing
Users16.000+[3]
LaunchedApril 2004; 21 years ago (2004-04)
Current statusActive
Content license
CC BY-NC-SA[4] from July 2012
Written inPmWiki (very heavily modified with no current source code used)[5][6]

TV Tropes is a wiki website that collects and documents descriptions and examples of plot conventions and devices, which it refers to as tropes, within many creative works.[7] Since its establishment in 2004, the site has shifted focus from covering various tropes to those in general media, toys, writings, and their associated fandoms, as well as some non-media subjects such as history, geography, and politics.[8][9] The nature of the site as a provider of commentary on pop culture and fiction has attracted attention and criticism from several web personalities and blogs. Users of the site's community are called "Tropers", which primarily consist of 18-34 year olds.[10][11]

From April 2008 until July 2012, TV Tropes published free content.[12] After that, the site modified its license to allow only non-commercial distribution of its content but continued to host the prior submissions under a new distribution license.[13][14]

The TV Tropes website runs on its own wiki engine software, an extremely modified version of PmWiki to the point where the PmWiki website lists that it "no longer uses PmWiki in any way; the only trace that remains is in the URL" and that "no code is in use"[15] but is not open source.[5] Before October 2010, it was possible to edit anonymously; however, registration is now mandatory for all other activities besides viewing the website.[16] It has two subwikis meant to categorize the more informal tropes (and held to less rigorous standards). Darth Wiki, named after Darth Vader from Star Wars as a play on "the dark side" of TV Tropes, is a resource for more criticism-based trope examples and sometimes highlighting "the dark side" of various works, and Sugar Wiki is about praising things and is meant to be "the sweet side" of TV Tropes (a Stormtrooper in pastel on the front page image is a pun on both subwikis). Occasionally, as a way to demonstrate the dual nature of certain works, there will be separate pages for works, such as the video game Eversion.

History

TV Tropes was founded in 2004 by a programmer under the pseudonym "Fast Eddie." He described himself as having become interested in the conventions of genre fiction while studying at MIT in the 1970s and after browsing Internet forums in the 1990s.[17] He sold the site in 2014 to Drew Schoentrup and Chris Richmond, who then launched a Kickstarter to overhaul the codebase and design.[18]

Initially focused on the TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, TV Tropes has since expanded its coverage of many forms of media, including fan fiction.[17] It renders many other subjects, including Internet works such as Wikipedia (often referred to in a tongue-in-cheek way as "The Other Wiki").[18] Articles on the site often relate to real life or point out real situations where certain tropes are applied. It has used its informal style to describe topics such as science, philosophy, politics, and history under its Useful Notes section. TV Tropes does not have notability standards for the works it covers.[17] It also can be used for recommending lesser-known media on the "Needs More Love" page.

In October 2010, in what the site refers to as "The Google Incident", Google temporarily withdrew its AdSense service from the site after determining that pages regarding adult and mature tropes were inconsistent with its terms of service. The site separated NSFG articles (Not Safe for Google) from SFG articles (Safe for Google) in order to allow discussion of these kinds of tropes.[16][19]

In a separate incident in 2012, in response to other complaints by Google, TV Tropes changed its guidelines to restrict coverage of sexist tropes and rape tropes. Feminist blog The Mary Sue criticized this decision, as it censored documentation of sexist tropes in video games and young adult fiction.[20] ThinkProgress additionally condemned Google AdSense itself for "providing a financial disincentive to discuss" such topics.[21] Pornographic tropes and works, as well as additional content deemed inappropriate for coverage, were also removed from the site following the incident.

Reception

In an interview with TV Tropes co-founder Fast Eddie, Gawker Media's blog io9 described the tone of contributions to the site as "often light and funny". Cyberpunk author Bruce Sterling once described its style as a "wry fanfic analysis".[22] Essayist Linda Börzsei described TV Tropes as a technological continuum of classical archetypal literary criticisms, capable of deconstructing recurring elements from creative works in an ironic fashion.[23] Economist Robin Hanson, inspired by a scholarly analysis of Victorian literature,[24] suggests TV Tropes offers a veritable treasure trove of information about fiction – a prime opportunity for research into its nature.[25] In Lifehacker, Nick Douglas compared TV Tropes to Wikipedia, recommending to "use [TV Tropes] when Wikipedia feels impenetrable, when you want opinions more than facts, or when you've finished a Wikipedia page and now you want the juicy parts, the hard-to-confirm bits that Wikipedia doesn't share."[26] Writing for The Believer, Chantel Tattolli commented that "It is deeply satisfying to go there and reckon with the patterns made over time, across culture, medium, and genre—and to catch them in rotation."[18]

In the book Media After Deleuze, authors David Savat and Tauel Harper say that while TV Tropes does offer a "wonderful archeology of storytelling", the site undermines creativity and experience by attempting to "classify and represent" every part of a work.[27]

See also

Relevant fields of critique

References

  1. ↑ "Language Indices - TV Tropes". TV Tropes. https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LanguageIndices. 
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 "Ownership FAQ". https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/faq.php. 
  3. ↑ Tropes, TV. "Page Counts". TV Tropes Inc.. https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/page_type_counts.php. 
  4. ↑ "Administrivia: Welcome to TV Tropes". TV Tropes. https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Administrivia/WelcomeToTVTropes.  "Your Rights (Legal Stuff)"
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 "What Pm Wiki theme does this site use?". https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=13273333140A33622800&page=1. 
  6. ↑ "PmWiki Users". https://www.pmwiki.org/wiki/PmWiki/PmWikiUsers. 
  7. ↑ Cagle, Kurt (April 1, 2009). "From Mary Sue to Magnificent Bastards: TV Tropes and Spontaneous Linked Data". Semantic Universe. https://semanticweb.com/from-mary-sue-to-magnificent-bastards-tv-tropes-and-spontaneous-linked-data_b11936. 
  8. ↑ "The Current - TVTropes.org: Harnessing the might of the people to analyze fiction". Thecurrentonline.com. https://www.thecurrentonline.com/2.14135/tvtropes-org-harnessing-the-might-of-the-people-to-analyze-fiction-1.1957948. 
  9. ↑ Pincus-Roth, Zachary (February 28, 2010). "TV Tropes identifies where you've seen it all before". Los Angeles Times. https://articles.latimes.com/2010/feb/28/entertainment/la-ca-tropes28-2010feb28. 
  10. ↑ "tvtropes.org". https://www.similarweb.com/website/tvtropes.org/. 
  11. ↑ "Troper Demographics". https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TroperDemographics. 
  12. ↑ "TV Tropes Home Page". TVTropes.org. https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HomePage. 
  13. ↑ "TV Tropes Home Page". TVTropes.org. https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HomePage. 
  14. ↑ "TV Tropes Relicensed its Content - Without Permit". Soylent News. May 15, 2014. https://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=14/05/15/1938243. 
  15. ↑ "PmWiki Users". https://www.pmwiki.org/wiki/PmWiki/PmWikiUsers. 
  16. ↑ 16.0 16.1 "The Google Incident / Archive". TV Tropes. https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Archive/TheGoogleIncident. 
  17. ↑ 17.0 17.1 17.2 Newitz, Annalee (February 24, 2010). "Behind The Wiki: Meet TV Tropes Cofounder Fast Eddie". io9. https://io9.com/5479423/behind-the-wiki-meet-tv-tropes-cofounder-fast-eddie. 
  18. ↑ 18.0 18.1 18.2 Tattoli, Chantel (March 11, 2021). "TVtropes.org's Treasure and Trash". https://believermag.com/logger/tv-trope-orgs-treasure-and-trash/. 
  19. ↑ "Google Groups". https://productforums.google.com/forum/?hl=en#!category-topic/adsense/i-dont-yet-have-an-account-getting-approved/T7-CeRf60B0. 
  20. ↑ Romano, Aja (June 26, 2012). "TV Tropes Deletes Every Rape Trope; Geek Feminism Wiki steps in". themarysue.com. https://www.themarysue.com/tv-tropes-rape-articles/. 
  21. ↑ Rosenberg, Alyssa (June 26, 2012). "TV Tropes Bows to Google's Ad Servers, Deletes Discussions of Sexual Assault in Culture". ThinkProgress. https://archive.thinkprogress.org/tv-tropes-bows-to-googles-ad-servers-deletes-discussions-of-sexual-assault-in-culture-9683495c786/. 
  22. ↑ Sterling, Bruce (January 21, 2009). "TV Tropes, the all-devouring pop-culture wiki". WIRED. https://www.wired.com/2009/01/tv-tropes-the-a. Retrieved March 11, 2017. 
  23. ↑ Börzsei, Linda (April 2012). Literary Criticism in New Media. https://www.academia.edu/4570620. Retrieved September 3, 2015. 
  24. ↑ Kruger, Daniel (2006). "Hierarchy in the Library: Egalitarian Dynamics in Victorian Novels". Journal of Evolutionary Psychology. https://www.epjournal.net/wp-content/uploads/ep06715738.pdf. Retrieved November 1, 2013. 
  25. ↑ Hanson, Robin (May 9, 2009). "Tropes Are Treasures". Overcoming Bias. https://www.overcomingbias.com/2009/05/tropes-are-treasures.html. 
  26. ↑ Douglas, Nick (February 12, 2018). "Use the TV Tropes Site the Same Way You Would Wikipedia". Lifehacker. https://lifehacker.com/use-the-tv-tropes-site-the-same-way-you-would-wikipedia-1822930619. 
  27. ↑ Savat, David; Harper, Tauel (July 28, 2016). Media After Deleuze. Bloomsbury Publishing. p. 149. ISBN 978-1472531506. 






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