The True Story of Snow White

Someday my price will come, someday we’ll meet again. And away to his castle we’ll go, to be happy forever I know.” All through each and every one of our lives, we have been exposed to fairy tales and folklore in the form of books, cartoons and movies. Haven’t we all watched famous classic Disney movies? Don’t we continue to watch them, while re-living our wondrous childhood memories, hopes we built on castles on clouds, knowing that everything has a happy ending? Nay! It’s all a lie. The Disney versions are rated PG but the original versions however should be R(21)! Let’s look at Snow White as an example. The true story of Snow White is certainly not what Disney portrays it to be but what centuries old stories have told and have been forgotten by all of us. We will first look at what is most probably the earliest written version of Snow White. Then at how the Grimm Brothers modified it. And finally, I will end with the Snow White we all know.

Let’s start at the very beginning. Windling explains in The Story of Snow White, that Snow White is ‘a chilling tale of murderous rivalry, adolescent sexual ripening, poisoned gifts, blood on snow, witchcraft, and ritual cannibalism’.

I. The oldest written version of Snow White is The Young Slave. It can be traced back to Italy in 1634, written by Giambattista Basile [Gee-am-bah-tt-ista Baa-si-le]. The story starts from Lislle the mother and how Lisa was conceived. A. Lisa is born of a rose leaf and dies by a comb because of a curse at the age of 7. Her body is kept in a room by her mother in 7 crystal caskets encased in one another. B. When Lislle dies, she begs her brother never to open that room. However, his jealous wife discovers the now grown and beautiful Lisa and pulls her out thus dislodging the comb and brings her to life. The wife then dresses her like a slave and inflicts a hundred hardships on her. C. Lisa laments to her doll about her situation and threatens to hurt herself with a knife if it did not reply. Upon recognizing his niece he sends away his jealous wife and he finds a good husband for Lisa.

II. Chinese whispering game then played its toll on this story over the years. It changed the story’s characters, settings and plots. Other stories and versions merged to bring a mish mashed adaptation of Snow White mostly thanks to the Grimm Brothers. This is because the Brothers compiled hundreds of stories from all over Europe and re-wrote them.

A. The brother’s version of Snow White as explained by Inge, starts with a barren queen wishing for a child as white as snow, as red as blood, and as black as the wood of the window–frame. B. Dwarfs were introduced in 1819 as the story got Nordic and Germanic additions rather than the traditional Italian story lines. C. Cannibalistic tendencies were added in with the Queen desiring to eat the internal organs of the young princess. D. In the early days these stories were not meant for children but rather scholars, it was when more families bought their books did the Brothers omit and change the story to suit this segment. E. Marina Warner explains that the Brothers’ newer editions conformed with Christian values of their time by giving penalties to the wicked and rewards to the just. This meant the Queen being punished to death by dancing in hot iron shoes till she fell dead.

IV. The Brother’s rendition was made into movies and plays some of which young Walt Disney watched in the 1900s. And so we come to what we already know. Walt Disney makes the first ever full-feature animation, The Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937.

A. Snow White, the servant step-daughter of the Queen is too beautiful for her stepmother and orders a huntsman to kill her. B. After escaping with the help of the huntsman, she finds herself in a cottage of Dwarfs all of whom she becomes friends with. C. The queen finds that she is still alive and makes a poisonous apple to kill her, which only a kiss of a love can cure. D. The Prince already in love with her, finds her in the coffin, kisses her and brings her to life. Stevens and McCullum describes that Snow White does not know that she will be with her Prince till the very end but her song “Someday my prince will come” shows that there is a strong destinal force between them. E. And in the end Queen then dies when a rock falls on her during her struggle with the Dwarfs.

Now that we are at the very end, we have moved in time from the very origins of Snow White to the comfortable place we are in right now. We have also looked at the different change agents over time. The next time, I am sure that you will scrutinize each and every fairy tale you know of, and wonder what the gruesome, horrid and sick past it has. Maybe the changes in story lines and plots were good for all children past, present and future. My intention was not to ruin your childhood memories, but to give you a fuller picture of what you thought you knew all about. We live in a world of constant turmoil and thankfully story tales have moulded into a time-honoured way of making childhood an experience to remember.