Follow your heart…

“Heidi”, the well-known story for children, was written by Johanna Spyri in 1881. This book was one of the most read around the world. It highlights innocence, human values and love of nature. There are many versions in films and TV programmes. In 1937, the book was turned into a film in which the famous actress Shirley Temple plays the role of Heidi, a little orphan girl. And the first animated cartoon of Heidi was released in 1974. It was designed by the Japanese Zuiyo Eizo and ZFD, a German company, and directed by Isao Takahata.

Heidi cartoon is a sweet girl who lives with his grandfather in the high mountains faraway from the noisy and populated cities. Although “Heidi” seems to be a harmless TV series, it portrays a simple set of values which might offer an alternative lifestyle that brings the status quo into question. She  leads a quite simple life full of important values such as love, freedom, simplicity, authenticity and happiness. This type of life contrasts with the lifestyle of the big cities, where those values are underestimated because people pursue expected standards of behavior to be socially accepted. Ostentation, luxury, vanity and appearances become the rules. Thus, in the city there seems to be another legitimate lifestyle.

Despite living almost a whole life without regulations, Heidi learns that there is a standard behaviour expected from society, when she must leave the Alps in order to take care of her friend Clara in the city. However, she feels entirely uncomfortable with the imposed social constraints that she encounters within the urban areas, where she can hardly live. As one of the main characters, Clara appears in the story as a disabled child since her early childhood. While living in a luxurious mansion, she leads an empty and oppressive social way of life, totally different from the one Heidi has.

Regarding Heidi , she is very sad and oppressed when staying at Clara’s house, but when Clara goes to the mountains for the first time, she discovers a magnificent and gorgeous scenery there, and besides, she finds out a feeling of comfort and a sense of identity and uniqueness. Both girls feel quite happy as they are in the high hills, to the extent that Clara overcomes her serious illness because she is able to do away with some rules and regulations.

“Heidi” series  shows that it would be possible to live a great life with different kinds of values, by comparison to those which are proposed by modern- day society where these moral principles would appear to be a natural choice. The question is: might it be possible for us to change the model suggested by the actual system in order to set free from social constraints? It depends on us!

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