The story starts with a wizard who pretends he is a beggar just to catch girls and bring him to his home in the forest. The wizard catches the eldest of three sisters and brings her back to his home. He leaves her alone at his home with a key and an egg and tells her she is free to go everywhere but one room. He also gives her an egg and says to keep it safe. After he leaves, she goes into the room to find a basin filled with blood, body parts and a shiny ax. When he returns, he finds out she entered the room and kills her. He does the same with the second sister and she too has the same fate. The third sister goes into the room, brings her sisters to life and does not get caught. When he comes back, she orders him to go give gold to her family …show more content…
All three fairy tales were written in different time periods. Bluebeard was written in 1697 which was an extremely stereotypic time when it comes to gender roles. In Bluebeard the wife requests prayer time before her death but truly just uses it to buy time to request help from her brother and outsmart Bluebeard. The Bloody Chamber was written in 1979, which was a more liberal time when compared to 1697 and 1914. In The Bloody Chamber, the girl is saved by her mother killing the French Marquis. All the stories involve a women outsmarting the controlling husbands even though the husbands believe that they are the ones being smart about the whole situation. All three also possess the gothic element. They all occur in a forest or a creepy castle they are unfamiliar with. The setting for these fairy tales all have a creepy aura right from the beginning. None of the girls are willingly with these men and all the girls find a chamber full of past wives. The imagery in these fairy tales is quite similar as well. The way the pool of blood is described in the chamber makes the reader literally visualize a pool of blood with dead bodies within, which is ever so gruesome. The way the weapon of their ultimate defeat is described also adds to the creepy aura. All the weapons are clean, shiny and sharp even though it is a room full of mess. This small detail is kept throughout all the fairy tales. Even though the original fairy tale was Bluebeard, all these fairy tales are similar to Adam and Eve. Even though Adam and Eve were meant to be together, they still had the element of forbidding and disobeying. All three stories include the females disobeying their husbands by going into the one place they were told not to go. Eve had the one fruit God told her not to have. The idea of someone disobeying against one rule they had against them has
Everyone grew up hearing them and reading them as we absorb lessons from some of our favorite characters. Fairy tales send a message out to children to teach them right from wrong and helps them decide what kind of person they want to grow up to be. In “Beauty and the Beast”, by Jeanne-Marie Leprince De Beaumont and “The Pig King” by Giovanni Francesco Straparola, the two stories share a similar story and similar behavior and mannerism in the girls. The girls were all calm and respectful as they helped break the chains of their loved ones’ curse. However, the two stories did differ a bit and had two different attitudes from the princes. The beast remained calm and collected while the pig king caused mess and murder as they found their soul mate and lived happily ever
witchcraft on the girls. After declaring herself a witch she accuses the names of four
Highly similar in form, they are both short works, collected as fairy tales with similar plot structure (a woman becomes engaged, visits her betrothed’s home, discovers he is a murderer by witnessing the dismembering of a maiden behind a cask/barrel, retains evidence of the crime in the form of the maiden’s severed hand with a ring, and exposes the betrothed’s crimes via public storytelling, resulting in his punishment). Neither tale requires a happily ever after beyond the bridegroom’s punishment, though Jacobs’ punishment is more brutal. Notably, Grimm’s bridegroom is more brutal himself, with graphic torture of the maiden and cannibalistic tendencies. Jacobs’ bridegroom acts alone, a serial murderer, while Grimm’s bridegroom is a member of robber band. Jacobs’ characters are more fully formed, with greater detail ascribed to his named characters. Jacobs and Grimms’ stories revolve around high and working class circumstances respectively, contrasting a lady with a miller’s daughter, a mere home with a castle, and an ax with a sword. The framing of both variations has the heroine as the central character, with her personal account of the bridegroom’s crimes matching the narrative’s version in diction and syntax. Both heroines draw power from narratives, spinning tales like the female character of the storyteller featured in many collections. They also obscure their accusations using a
One folktale that has multiple versions is the story of “Cinderella/Ashenputal”. Each story contrast the two time periods and cultures of France and Germany. The story of Cinderella was written for royalty, while Ashenputal was written for peasants. In Cinderella is a much more gentler take on the story, suggest that it was written for the upper-class. It involves The King’s Ball, a fairy godmother, and all other actions to create a harmonious conclusion. In the end Cinderella also forgives her family for her mistreatment. She also wears glass slippers instead of gold because these would be only something you could get with great wealth.
Cashdan, Sheldon. The Witch Must Die: The Hidden Meaning of Fairy Tales. New York: Basic Books, 1999.
The Grimm’s stories have strict criteria for good and evil. Good women are not the hero, they do not plan, nor do they get themselves out of bad situations; they are obtuse and wait until a Prince saves them. These qualities doom the female protagonists (and readers) to pursue the only destiny women have, and that is to be a wife and mother (Rowe, 1978). Cinderella is the heroine and the ideal good girl. She is unambiguously beautiful, kind, and compassionate. She does not complain or get angry. This is foreseen early in the Grimm’s Cinderella story:
Aspects of fairy tales are woven into many novels as a way to bring a sense of familiarity to the reader. Foster writes, “...we want strangeness in our stories, but we want familiarity, too. We want a new novel to be not quite like anything we’ve read before. At the same time, we look for it to be sufficiently like other things we’ve read so that we can use those to make sense of it,” (Foster 36). Fairy tales will be the same year from now and therefore hold the same familiarity to the reader. Evil stepparents, a magical fairy godmother, and the ultimate rescue to the castle are all component to the perfect fairy tale that is seen in many novels. J. K. Rowling’s infamous Harry Potter Series follows the journey made by the powerful, young wizard Harry Potter. While Harry Potter is not a fairy tale, it has many subtle attributes woven in throughout the novels. The first book in the series, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, while not a fairytale, has many attributes woven throughout the novel. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone introduces the reader to Harry’s home life which compares to that of a fairy tale. Harry is mistreated by his step parents and wishes for his fairy godmother to save him, clearly showing the distinct evil and good characters like many fairy tales have. However, Harry’s fairy
Even though the time periods are very different (by 200 years) the formulas for their fairy tales seems to remain constant. Character development, which is very important in fairy tales is both well done and accurately portrays the living situation for a character in the time period of when it was written. Perrault's version seems to put Cinderella's family in a higher, well-off situation of the Grimm's because she is still abided to obey the rules that her dying mother had set for her. Something that you would see a women do in the late 1600's. Her higher class and the rules of her generation has set her to not have revenge on her step-sisters and helps them marry in the end, making a happy ending to the story for everyone. This also gives off the rules of the time to the young girls who would be listening or reading this story back then. They knew their place in society and tales like Perrault's reinforced it. The Grimm's version, titled Ashenputtle, has key elements in the story line that make it very different from Perrault's Cinderella. The theme becomes very different as the end of the tale results in revenge on the step-sisters from Ashenputtle. This variation in the story line represents the setting in which the Grimm's either lived in themselves, or the living situation of the people who related this tale to the Grimm's.
The tale of Bluebeard dates back to the seventeenth century. "Bluebeard as we know him first appeared in Paris in 1695 as La Barbe Bleue, in the manuscript version of Charles Perrault’s Histories Ou Contes Du Temps Passe, a collection which has become a seminal influence on the evolution of fairy tale" (Davies 33). The villain of this tale is a man with a blue beard whom everyone fears. After inviting his neighbors to stay and celebrate at his country home in attempts to persuade one of the their daughters to marry him, he convinces the youngest of his widowed neighbor to be his bride. All goes well until the new husband goes away on business, leaving his wife in charge with only one rule, to not open the door of one room in the castle. Of course curiosity overtakes the wife and she enters the room only to find Bluebeard’s previous wives murdered within the chamber.
A fairy tale is seemingly a moral fiction, intended mainly for children. A lesson in critical analysis, however, strips this guise and reveals the naked truth beneath; fairy tales are actually vicious, logical and sexual stories wearing a mask of deceptively easy language and an apparent moral. Two 19th Century writers, the Grimm brothers, were masters at writing these exaggerated stories, bewitching young readers with their prose while padding their stories with allusion and reference: an example of which is "Rapunzel." Grimm's "Rapunzel" is packed with religious symbolism, which lends a new insight to the meaning of this classic story.
Fairy Tales have been around for generations and generations. Our parents have told us these stories and we will eventually pass them down to ours. In this time of age the most common fairytales are Cinderella, Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, Beauty and The Beast and many more. Children idolize their favorite character and pretend to be them by mimicking everything they do in the stories. The character’s behavior is what is viewed as appropriate in society. These fairy tales show a girl and a boy fall in love and live “happily ever after”. The tales in many people’s eyes resemble a dream life that they would want to have of their own. However, have you ever really looked at what makes up a fairy tale? Many things are unrealistic but the most unflattering aspect of these tales is how women are depicted in them. Fairy tales give an unrealistic view to how women should look and behave in real life.
During the 1800’s two brothers, known as Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, began writing short stories that reflected their lives in central Europe. At this time the French under Napoleon’s rule had overrun Germany, which caused a lot of political issues. Germany’s new governmental ruler cut off the country of its local culture (National Geographic). The Grimm brothers tried to preserve the traditional oral stories of the time. They didn’t plan for their writings to become popular, or for them to be for the younger population. The Grimm brothers were motivated to change the stories up a bit as their tales captivated more people. They incorporated a softer side with a primary moral of the story for the readers (GrimmFairytales.com). It is from these original Grimm versions that modern fairytales, such as Cinderella originated from.
The Brothers Grimm and Charles Perrault are both very well-known authors of fairytales. Wilhelm and Jacob Grimm are usually the most recognized in our society, but Perrault has his own version of many of the same tales. These authors have very different methods and styles of writing, as well as differences in morals of their stories. Here I will assess some of the differences between certain tales, as well as provide some background behind the authors.
Most modern fairytales are expected to have happy endings and be appropriate for children, nonetheless, in past centuries most were gruesome. Consequently, fairytales have been modified throughout time. The stories “Beauty and the Beast” by Jeanne-Marie LePrince de Beaumont and “The Summer and Winter Garden” by Jacob and Wilherm Grimm share similarities and differences. The two stories are distinct because of the peculiar year they have been written in. LePrince de Beaumont’s story is written in London of 1783 and Grimm’s in Germany of 1812. At the time, wealthy people in London, were educated and had nannies who would read to their children; whereas, in Germany, the Grimm brothers created their own interpretation into a short story. Because many high class parents in 18th century London would not be able to spend time with their children, nannies would read “Beauty and the Beast” to them since they were intended for children and considered appropriate. In “The Summer and Winter Garden,” the Grimm’s’ story was mostly based to entertain misbehaved children and teach them the valuable lesson that everyone should be treated with kindness. The Grimm brothers’ goal in rewriting this short story is to better children’s behavior which worked quite well. Since these stories have been re-written for children, it would be safe to say the reason why parents expose the two stories to their children is because they both portray the same moral: good things happen to good people. The two interpretations of “Beauty and the Beast,” although written in separate countries, share important similarities and differences even though the authors have different interpretations and came from different cultures.
...nges that are used to adapt to the culture they are being told in. The Brother's Grimm and Giambattista Basile each wrote a fairytale that was almost the same as the other, but as previously mentioned they are different in order to adapt to their surroundings. Nevertheless, psychologically speaking, the psyche of the characters besides the father are both the same. They portray different archetypes that contrast and cause tension in the fairy tale. Each character can easily represent a certain personality trait. Regardless, fairy tales appear to people and their is more to why they are passed down time and time again in different versions. This reason falls back to the human psyche. According to Jungian theory, subconsciously we enjoy telling fairy tales because they relate so much to us and are basically showing a closer view of our subconscious on a cultural level.