Once upon a time…that’s how it always begins. Familiar words that bring back a sea of memories and nostalgia from our childhood. Although what our parents weren’t aware of was that despite bringing magic into our lives, our beloved fairy tales are not what they appear to be. It really goes to show that “You can’t judge a book by its cover”.
We’ve all heard of the Brothers Grimm but I doubt many of you have been brave enough to actually read their original versions of fairy tales.
Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm produced their first collection of fairy tales in 1812, which includes eighty-six fairy tales. Due to the Rise of Romanticism in the 19th Century, there was a revival in traditional folklore which had declined after the 17th Century. As if
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Wrong- it is believed that the Grimm Brothers got their inspiration for this story from Margarete von Waldeck. Margarete was a German Countess born in 1953 who, according to Bad Wildungen city documents, was famous for her beauty and at the age of 16, her stepmother forced her to move to Brussels. Margarete met Phillip II of Spain and they fell in love. However, her father and stepmother didn’t approve of their relationship as it was “politically inconvenient”. Margarete died at the age of 21 and it was said that she had been poisoned. However, it wasn’t because of her stepmother because she died before Margarete but there are still some parallels with Margarete’s life and the story of Snow …show more content…
What could be dark about that story? There’s a pumpkin carriage, a fairy godmother and cute talking animals…so what’s the problem? Well of course, the Brothers Grimm version doesn’t include any of those. In the Disney version, Cinderella’s father has passed away and she is left in the care of her evil stepmother. However, in the original version her father is still alive and is allowing her stepmother to abuse his daughter. Now instead of Cinderella wearing glass slippers, she is wearing gold slippers, which sound slightly more comfortable! Of course , we know they don’t last long, it’s not like many of us wear our shoes all night on a night out anyways ,so they fall off as she runs away, leaving the Prince with not even her name. When the Prince orders every woman to try on the slipper, the eldest stepsister cut off parts of their feet to fit it in the shoe. Desperation at its finest. Nevertheless, the Prince does not even notice their deceit until the doves alert him about the blood on her foot. The same fiasco occurs with the other stepsister! The Prince perhaps isn’t the brightest person in this