The Cinderella story as we know it now is largely a product of the silly 1950 Disney animated film: the friendly mouse, a fairy godmother who doesn't question her only guardian's decision to go to a weird party alone, There is also a heroine with incredibly small feet, so small that I always doubted her ability to stand. The Cinderella story is so enduring that it was even remade into a live-action version in March this year, starring Cate Blanchett as the evil stepmother. But frankly, the filmmakers missed a trick: If they wanted to seriously attract theater audiences with tales of gore, inexplicably useful leaves, too many lentils, and flocks of birds, they should go back to the original source of fairy tales -- Mainly the Brothers Grimm.
See, in English, Cinderella has two written parents: Charles Perrault's Cendrillon , published in 1697 in his The Tale of Mother Goose (yes, Mother Goose was a Playboy), and the Brothers Grimm's "Aschenputte l" (appearing in their compendium of fairy tales). 1812. This is a popular story in many cultures, such as China's own Ye Shen folk tale, which uses fish in place of the fairy godmother. One scholar managed to find 345 versions of the story, both written and oral. As a species, we seem to really like good girls dressing up in disguise to go to prom.
Perrault's French version is the first and closest to what we know. It features a pumpkin, a godmother, and a glass slipper, which Disney credits as inspiration for the film. But the Brothers Grimm read Perrault, added their own twists from Germanic oral tradition, and came up with a version that was just as strange, if not scarier.
Here are the best and weirdest parts of the Brothers Grimm's "Cinderella."
1. Cinderella is the exact opposite of helpless.
Aschenputtel (remember, this is the name of their version of Cinderella) is not stuffy. She takes matters into her own hands, and considering her pragmatism involves a magic tree, some magic birds, and the apparent ability to disappear, it seems like she's not actually an emotionally neglected kitchen maid but a brilliant witch .
2. She is also very good at hiding.
The Prince of the Brothers Grimm insists on accompanying his new love home to find out who she really is. (Twice, mind you, since there are actually three balls in the original story.) Aschenputtle must hide in a pigeon cage and climb a pear tree until he's gone. And she was not found. here you go.
3. The "fairy" godmother is actually just a tree growing over her late mother's grave.
The godmother is not a fairy or even a human being. In Ashenput's version, Cinderella's father asks what he can buy her for a business trip, and she asks for a simple tree branch (the stepsisters ask for gold and pearls, because they are not sentimental hippies). Then she planted it on her mother's grave and watered it with her tears . The tree grows up to give her anything she wants: these clothes are just the latest incarnation. Ashen Putel is obviously very powerful, so I can't understand why she would marry a guy who chased her into a pigeon loft.
4. My stepmother has a special obsession with lentils.
Ashenputra's stepmother threw the first lentil and two cups of lentils into the ashes and told Ashenputra that if she could pull them all out, she could attend the ball. Aschenputtel did, which I'll explain later, but I still don't know why she didn't just have the tree drop a sword instead of just chasing the lentil hater around the garden.
5. "Fitting the shoe" actually means "cutting off part of the foot."
For the Brothers Grimm, none of this wimpy "my foot doesn't fit in" stuff. To fit her into the tiny golden slippers, one of her sisters cut off her big toe and another cut off her heel. Their plan is foiled by blood everywhere (someone must have thought of it), but hey, give it a try.
6. Cinderella has some pretty awesome birds as minions.
These birds are basically Ashenputra's soldiers: they pluck all her lentils from the ashes, eat the bad ones, and put all the good ones into the pot. But they are not happy singing companions.
When her stepsisters cut off body parts to fit in their slippers, the birds sang two lively songs to the prince to tell them how his stepsisters' bride's slippers were filled with blood. Then, once they secured the witch's mistress to the throne through marriage, they found the stepsisters in the church and pecked out their eyes. (More on that later.)
7. My father is very destructive.
Ashenput's father didn't die like in the Disney movie; Instead, he's still present and annoying. When the prince showed up on his doorstep, not once but twice, with a story about a girl hidden throughout his property, he didn't call the police - he wondered if the girl might be Ashen Putel, so Get an ax and chop down anything. Pigeon cage? Smashed. Beautiful pear tree full of fruit? ignite.
Let me remind you, he did this because he thought his daughter might be in there. She should let her birds build her a boat and float away from that madhouse.
8. The prince is a predator with a mysterious trap for the princess.
I must admit that the prince of Ashenput at least has personality. True, he did chase her into the chicken coop, but he also set a trap after the third ball: He coated the steps of the palace with asphalt so that she kept her golden shoes. smart people. (Although he later didn't notice that the shoes were filled with blood until some magical bird told him.)
9. The stepsisters end up going blind.
The Grimm stepsisters are just so horrible, and they get some truly horrific comeuppance. You know what I said about them being blind? Here's what happened: They wanted the glory of Ashenputra's royal wedding so badly that they walked her down the aisle and the bird pecked out an eye. But they still wanted it so bad that they walked her back down the aisle, where the bird promptly pecked out the other eye. respect.
I really hope Disney's new version has at least one shoe filled with blood.
Image: Disney, Wikimedia, Gustave Dore/Creative Commons, Arthur Rackham/Creative Commons, Edmund Dulac/Creative Commons, Walter Crane/Creative Commons
