I didn't read a full book this week (unless you'd like a review on
Beowulf, which I don't). But I did read some of the Grimm's fairy tales. I was quite proud of myself when I found that I knew some of the lesser-known stories. And wow, I really learned a lot about what Disney and society changed! I guess parents in the 20th century didn't want to read about how Rapunzel gave birth to twins after she got out of the tower, and Disney didn't take too well to Cinderella's stepsisters chopping off their toes and heels. I'd also heard that the stories were dark, much darker than how we perceive fairy tales today. Some of them are a lot darker than the rose-tinted way we see the tales now, but some of them I'd read to a five-year-old and so far all of them I'd let a nine or ten year old read.
And of these tales, I've learned a few things:
- Kings will marry peasants. They don't care about treaties or anything like that. She just needs to be beautiful.
- If you're industrious, you're beautiful. But if you're lazy, you're ugly.
- Fathers always take their new wife's side over their children's.
- You can fall in love on-sight.
I'm only about 1/4 of the way through (I never realized how many tales there were!) but I look forward to keeping reading them.
