The true story of Snowhite!

Which is the true story of Snowhite?

All of us know the Disney’s adaptation of this film, but… It really was like this?

The Grimm brothers version, tells the story in a violent way. In it, the queen tried to kill Snowhite three times, instead of only one.

In the first one, the queen tried to hang her with a tie, however, the dwarfs arrived on time and took the tie away. Within minutes, Snowhite regained her awareness.

The second time, the queen sold her a poisoned comb. The queen put it on Snowhite’ hair, and she fainted. Once again the dwarfs took out the poisoned comb from her hair. Snowhite had only a small injury, so she was saved.

The apple arrived in the third attempt. From here, the story is similar to the Disney’ one. The dwarfs thought Snowhite died, and they build a glass ferret to observe her until the prince arrived. When it happened, the prince fell completely in love with her, and he asked for permission to take her to his castle, and the dwarfs accepted. Thanks to the movement during the castle’s road, the piece of apple went out from her mouth, and Snowhite woke up. The prince wanted to marry with her, and she accepted; so the wedding’s setout started.

Meanwhile, the queen asked the magic mirror who was the most beautiful girl in the kingdom. The mirror answered, that the most beautiful woman was the future queen, but without revealing  that the girl was Snowhite. When the queen listened to it, she got very angry, but she didn’t know who could be that woman.

Shortly after, the queen received a royal wedding’s invitation. In the ceremony, Snowhite recognize her, and she told the story to her husband. When the prince listened to it, he ordered to punish her. A pair of iron shoes was created for her. They were heated red hot, and the queen was ordered to danced with them until she died.

 

As we saw in class, Disney’ stories are adapted those versions to children. However, the Grimm’s versions are very violent. This is a good resource to work in class with the students. In this way, we are working the literature, and children learn the different versions of a tale they already know. Moreover, we can link the different stories with the alternative endings the student’s propose.

On the other hand, we can tell the Grimm’ versions to the students of the third cycle of primary, and they could promote and develop the communicative skills comparing the story they just learned with the one they already know. =)