The Robber Bridegroom Analysis

Just as the miller’s daughter hides herself behind a cask when the bridegroom and his band enter, Mary sneaks behind a barrel, watching as Mr. Fox drags another maiden in. Notably, both Grimm and Jacobs use the verb “dragging” to describe the bridegroom’s treatment of the maiden. In keeping with the class shift from Grimm’s text, Mr. Fox uses a more extravagant weapon (a sword instead of an axe) to remove the maiden’s hand. This hand has a diamond ring, not a gold one, symbolically strengthening the link between death and marriage. Once again like the miller’s daughter, the hand lands on Mary’s lap, and she carries it with her when she escapes. Then, she sets a trap for her bridegroom at a public pre-wedding breakfast. When he urges her to

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

Unlike the early versions, this tale is told in first person from the bridegroom’s perspective, named “Mister Fox” in reference to Jacobs, only covering the events of the storytelling incident featured at the end of both early variations, this time told not by the bride but by another woman. Thus, rather than see the supposed heroine’s visit, only her story occurs. Quickly, the heroine is established as the suspicious one, described with horror imagery, like with “meat on her bones,” and uncertainty, as in “[she] smiles crooked.” When he asks for her story, she tells a tale a pregnant maiden in gruesome terms with period “blood stopped flowing” and “belly swole beyond disgusting” and describes her suitor suspiciously like the early bridegrooms, with a “sly” smile. As part of her story in lines 43-48, she sings a version of “The Fox” folk song, its original versions connoting deceit. Then, she recounts the bridegroom character’s trap to murder his intended, digging a hole under a tree to bury her in, while she watches, hidden in the tree. This plot and a later segment (lines 71-78) are lifted from two other English “Robber Bridegroom” variants, James Orchard Halliwell-Phillipps’ “The Oxford Student” and Sidney Oldall Addy’s “The Girl Who Got Up the Tree.” She explains that when the woman’s baby is born, it has a fox paw, not a human hand. After