...And They All Lived Happily Ever After

After revisiting all of my posts on my blog, I realize that I truly have learned a lot this semester.  I came into the class in the beginning of the year expecting to learn about the Grimm fairy tales, compare Disney's recreations of the tales to the originals, and analyze the meanings behind each fairy tale.  Although we did just that in class, I believe I have learned a lot more than what was expected.

Not only have we studied fairy tales from the psychoanalytic approach, but we have also studied them from the feminist and social perspectives as well.  We ripped apart a lot of the fairy tales I grew up with such as Cinderella, Little Red Cap, Rapunzel, Snow White, Hansel and Gretel, and the Frog King.  For every symbol, we found a meaning and analyzed it.  For every character, we had a way of interpreting their actions in the tale.  We looked at each tale in depth and I must say, there was not a dull day in our class while we were interpreting them.

Every Wednesday evening we watched the Disney version of the tale we were learning about that week.  The following day, we compared the original tale to the Disney movie.  All I have to say about this is, Disney movies will never be the same.  In fact, no fairy tale will ever be the same.  A lot of the meanings behind fairy tales are sexual.  For example, in the original tale Cinderella, the two step sisters cut of a portion of their foot in order to make it fit in the gold slipper.  This represents the girls getting their periods and loosing their innocence.  The slipper also represents a woman's genitals, and the foot the males.  So one can only imagine what the meaning behind the prince putting the gold slipper on Cinderella's foot is.

We also learned why Disney had changed a lot of the Grimm's fairy tales.  A lot of his movies came out in the time of the Great Depression.  In order to give men hope again, he created movies that depicted a young woman in need of rescuing, with a strong, heroic prince to save her.  Also, in the majority of the original Grimm tales, the main character does not have animals dressing him/her in the morning, or helping him/her with the chores.  Disney added all of these animals because animals had always been a large part of his life because he grew up on a farm.  However, not only does he add animals, he also gives characters names.  Each one of the Princes we encounter in the movies has a name that was not given to him until the movie had been created.  We also see characters such as the seven dwarfs in Snow White receiving names.  Most of what he did we learned, was to make money though.

This has been an interesting class.  I have thoroughly enjoyed learning about fairy tales, analyzing and interpreting their meanings.  And though what I have learned in class is not something I will be willing to share with my kids in the future, I definitely plan on sharing the fairy tales that I grew up with as well as the new ones I have encountered in this class with them. 

Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair!

http://www.cartoonstock.com/newscartoons/cartoonists/ksm/lowres/ksmn347l.jpg

I chose this cartoon because I found it to be very humorous.  How often to you hear someone comparing the ride up and down from Rapunzel's tower to bungee jumping? 

I think this cartoon relates to both the tale Rapunzel and the Movie Tangled.  The most obvious reason why it relates to the the Grimms' tale is because the man bungee jumping is a prince, not an orphan like Flynn Rider is in Tangled.  However in the tale, we don't exactly hear about anyone swinging or using the hair for anything other than as a way to get up and down from the tower.  In the movie though, Rapunzel uses her hair for a lot.  There are several scenes where she uses it to tie someone up, to get from place to place in her tower, and at one point she is swinging around a tree on it like it were a swing and it was no big deal.  If she can heal Flynn's hand with her hair as well as use it every day to lift people up to her tower, I am almost positive bungee jumping with it would not be a problem either. 

The Three Versions of "Bluebeard"

"The Robber Bridegroom" and "Fitcher's Bird," are two stories written by the Brothers Grimm.  Both stories share similarities and differences in their story lines to that of Perrault's "Bluebeard." 

In all three stories, the main character is male.  In the "Robber Bridegroom," the man is a robber who was perceived to be the right suitor for the millers daughter.  In the Fitcher's Bird, the man is a sorcerer. 
And finally in "Bluebeard," the man is a very ugly man with a blue beard.  All three men are murderers as well.

In all three stories the men lure in girls and not one of them returns.  It is not until he finds the wife that is told of specifically in the story that the women's fate begins to turn around.

In the stories, "Bluebeard" and "Fitcher's Bird," both men leave the house for a period of time.  They tell their wives they can explore their houses, invite others over, and have fun, as long as they do not enter one specific room.  In both stories the wife enters this room and is caught due to blood on the object the must keep safe or not use.  In "Bluebeard" his wife is not actually killed.  She is saved by her brothers.  But in the story "Fitcher's Bird," the first wife is killed, and her sister is then married to the sorcerer.  The second sister is also killed for being curious and looking into the forbidden room.  And finally their other sister gets married to this man, however she is able to out smart him and bring her sisters back to life.   
The story of "The Robber Bridegroom," is not as similar to "Bluebeard" as "Fitcher's Bird" is.  In this story, the millers daughter is forced to marry the robber.  It is unknown however that this man is indeed a robber until she is invited to his house.  There she discovers that he is a murder with several other men.  When she escapes from his house and returns home, she explains this to her father.  She is asked at the wedding party later to tell a story, where she tells the story of the murder and presents proof.

I really like the story "The Robber Bridegroom."  It is an interesting story.  I especially like the ending when the bride-to-be tells the story of the robber Bridegroom and she pulls out the finger as proof.  I did not expect that, and i really enjoyed it.

However, the story I did not like was the "Fitcher's Wife."  I found it to be extremely odd.   I did not like the fact that two of the three sisters were killed after falling for the same man.  It was not as interesting as "The Robber Bridegroom" in my opinion. 

Cupid & Psyche vs. the Frog King

 
          The tale of “Cupid and Psyche” is similar in ways to the story of “The Frog King.”   
          First of all, the stories share the two facts that the girls are the youngest and most beautiful in the family, and they are forced to marry a beastly creature.  
          Second, both stories start with the girls showing their beautiful side, then at the climax of the story they show a bit of an ugly side through their personalities(Psyche-when she goes to kill her husband, and the young princess-when she refuses to be companions with the Frog), and then finally showing their beautiful side again.  Both stories emphasize that everyone has an ugly side and beautiful side.
          There are more differences however between the two stories.
          The princess' father in the Frog King forced her to marry and be a companion to the frog.  She was not pleased with this at all.  When the frog asked her to lift her into his bed, she became angry and threw him against the wall.  At that point he transformed into a prince, she fell in love with them and they lived happily ever after.

           In Cupid and Psyche, however, Psyche may have been forced to marry the beast, but she loved him dearly before she actually found out what he was.  She only discovered what he was because her two sisters convinced her to kill him in the middle of the night.  He turned out to be Cupid, and she later became immortal in order to be with him forever.
          Finally, in the Frog Prince, the girl only meets the frog because she looses her golden ball in the well and the frog offers to get it for her for a price.  In Cupid and Psyche the goddess Venus, Cupids mother, is angered by the fact that Psyche is more beautiful and so she sends Cupid to punish her, which is when he falls in love with her.
          There are few similarities and many differences, however both stories exercise the theme of a beauty and a beast falling in love with each other, and that, I must say, is the most important similarity.

         

Little Red

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          The Little Red Riding Hood theme cartoon depicts one of the most well known scenes in any versions of Little Red Riding Hood and the illustrator does it in a very humorous way.  When arriving at the house, in the Grimm Brothers Little Red Cap, the little girl proceeds to criticize certain aspects of her "grandmothers" face and appearance.  "Oh, Grandmother, what big ears you have! Oh, Grandmother, what big hands you have! Oh, Grandmother, what a terribly big mouth you have!"  Instead of gobbling the little girl up in the cartoon however, the wolf seems almost angered at the fact that he is being criticized for his looks and is quick to insult the girl back.  We can assume with what is being said in this cartoon, that the little girl is implying that the wolf is ugly.  Most people when reading the tale, never think about how the wolf feels about such criticism.  The cartoon not only twists it around to make you think about what she is saying exactly, but it also show what the wolf feels after the comments are made, and he obviously does not leave his thoughts on her appearance out of the conversation either.  This cartoon also, in a way, makes the little girl look like the bad guy in the sense that the wolf looks hurt by what is being said about him.
          The cartoon I chose is a social cartoon.  We see in society everyday people criticizing others looks without taking the time to get to know them.  I guess what the artist may have been trying to illustrate is that we shouldn't judge a book by its cover.  Maybe if Little Red Riding Hood wouldn't have made the comments about the wolfs appearance, he wouldn't have gobbled her up.  What would have happened if she would have said he looked absolutely beautiful?  I guess we will never know.            When I saw this cartoon, I couldn't help but laugh.  I have never pictured the wolf becoming angered by what the little girl says about his appearance.  It is definitely a different way to see the story.

Anne Sexton's Snow White

   
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Anne Sexton's poem "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" is very different from the original fairy tale written by the Grimm Brothers.  To start the entire poem is filled with Sextons own interpretations of the Grimm's Snow White.  Sexton in the beginning describes Snow White as having "cheeks as fragile as cigarette paper/arms and legs made of Limoges/lips like Vin Du Rhône/rolling her china-blue doll eyes/open and shut."  It is almost as if Snow White is a doll in the poem.  By fusing pop culture into her poem as well, Sexton is able to make her poem more comical and relatable to today.  After the dwarfs come home and untie Snow White from the lace that she had been tied up in by her stepmother, Sexton describes Snow White as being as full of life as soda pop.  At one point in the poem she even refers to an ace bandage when describing how tight Snow Whites stepmother ties her up.  

Sexton adds interesting details to parts of her poem that were not in the original story.  For instance there is a portion in the forest where Snow White encounters twenty doorways in which twenty wolves stood in front of.  Or the part where on the seventh week Snow White comes upon the seventh mountain, which is where she finds the dwarfs house.  These obviously cannot be found in the original tale.  And Sexton, by adding the fact that Snow White travels for seven total weeks, takes away the original Snow Whites image of timelessness.  Another way Sexton adds time to her poem is in the end when she states that Snow Whites princes comes in June.

Finally, Sexton adds her own interpretation of happily ever after to her poem that implies that Snow Whites has encountered the same fate as her stepmother.  She makes it seem as if it is inevitable and all women will encounter this fate at some point in their life.

I would have to say I prefer Anne Sexton's version of Snow White.  Although I love the Grimm's version, Sexton's makes me laugh every time I read it.  Her interpretations and commentary give it a personal touch, but also make it more relatable.  Her interesting descriptions are commendable and add to the overall effect.  Overall I find it to be more interesting and I really enjoyed reading her poem.

Snow White & the Seven Dwarfs

            Snow White is a tale known by all.  It involves a beautiful princess, an evil queen, seven dwarfs, as well a prince who saves the day.  However the Grimm Brother's version of the story is much different than the well known Disney version of the story. 
            To start off, most people do not know how Snow White received her name.  Her mother's blood fell onto white snow after she pricked her finger one day.  She decided that she wanted a beautiful daughter who's skin would be white as snow, lips red as blood, and hair as black as the wood in the window frame she had been sitting in.  This is one thing Disney fails to mention and I did not learn until I read this story. 
            When Snow White finds the dwarfs house in the Disney movie, she discovers that it is filthy and with the help of animals she cleans the house.  She then falls asleep in three of their beds.  When they find her in the movie, she asks if she can stay and offers to clean the house for them.  Now in the book, that is not what happens.  She discovers the house all neat and tidy and decides to eat a small part of each of the dwarfs soup, and tests each of the dwarfs beds until she find a comfortable one to sleep in.  When they find her they agree to let her stay if she will clean the house for them. 
            Another big difference between the two is the fact that in the book, the evil queen visits Snow White 3 times total.  The first two she fails at killing her and in the third try she finally succeeds.  When the prince comes and finds her, he asks the dwarfs if he can take her back to the palace to admire her and they agree.  While they are taking her back they stumble and the apple that is lodged in her throat comes out and she 'wakes up.'  In the Disney movie the witch only has to visit her one time before successfully 'killing' Snow White.  Snow White is awaken by the princes kiss soon after.
           I believe that Disney does this because he wanted to make it more kid appropriate first of all.  Second, he focused more on the dwarfs than Snow White herself.  This makes the film more kid friendly.  He does this most likely to make money.  If kids want to see the movie, their parents will have to go with them, therefore, more money is made.  I also believe that the reason Disney cut out the two other times that the evil queen visits Snow White is because it would have been to long.  The movie would have been at least 15 or 20 minutes longer, and back when the movie was created a 90 minute movie was probably too long.