A article about the famous Brothers Grimm, Fairy Tale Writers |
** Image ID #1171153 Unavailable ** We all know the Grimm Brothers. You surely know the Fairy Tales they wrote. Cinderella, Rumplestiltskin, Snow White, Little Red Riding Hood, Sleeping Beauty, Hansel and Gretel,Snow White and The Frog Prince just to name a few. Oh, how we love those happily ever after tales! Our children, grandchildren will love them as well as we have as well as the children before us. Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm grew up in the 1800's in Germany. Their father died suddenly and they became a poor family. The boys loved stories and collected stories they had heard plus wrote their own and became famous authors of fairy tales. Their characters consisted of witches, servant girls, soldiers, stepmothers, dwarfs, wolves, devils, princesses, princes, kings, queens and talking animals. Grimm's Fairy Tales pervades world culture. The collection of fairy tales has been translated into 160 languages. The stories have been done into plays, movies, operas, painting, advertising and children's books. Cinderella and Snow White have been in Disney's versions and Cinderella has her own castle in Disney Land. How cool is that? To me, I live in a fantasy world in my mind and I am Cinderella's biggest fan. Grimm's Fairy Tales weren't really geared toward children. They were entertainment back in early 1800's Germany.When you read the stories, you can actually see the castles, petrified forest and feel all the magic, evil and triumphant as the stories come to life. Children love these fairy tales as bedtime stories. The stories read like dreams come true. Little girls and big girls want to be princesses. Magic wins out against trolls, witches, goblins and demons. The prince is the hero who rescues the damsel in distress and they fall in love and live happily ever. Sigh. In the Grimm's original "Snow White", the evil stepmother is forced to dance in red hot iron shoes until she falls dead. This would be offensive to young children and that part was edited. At the time, Jacob and Wilhelm were viewed as patriotic folklorists, not entertainers of children. Germany had been overrun by the French and Napoleon and were suppressing local culture. The Brothers Grimm were trying to save the endangered oral tradition of Germany. They were serious scholars of medieval literature and were loved for the tales they spun. The Grimm Brothers were working on a German Dictionary when they died. The Dictionary was uncompleted. In their final fairy tale, they wrote about a poor boy who is out collecting wood in a wintry forest on his sled. In the snow, he finds a key by an iron box. The boy inserts the key and turns it. He lifts the lid. The story ends here. Unfinished. Maybe this was the key to the imagination. A reader can discover what wonderful, magical things await them. Writers can finish the story for themselves. Sounds like a writing prompt to me. Have to love the Brothers Grimm. One more thing. In Grimms original Cinderella, the one stepsister tried on Cinderella glass slipper. Of course, it didn't fit. The mother cut off her little toe but it still didn't fit. Birds pecked out her eyes. No wonder fairy tales were edited for little children. Grimma had the right idea and the fairy tales were great and fantasy. I was entertained by them as a little girl. They will always live forever in our hearts. |