Grimm’s’ Fairy Tales Revisited, Term Paper Example

“The Fairy Tales” by Jacob and Carl Grimm were first published in 1812 as a collection of stories for children that were meant to impart moral and social messages.  These stories have undergone numerous revisions and transformations in order to make them more palatable to a young audience.  As Donald Haase points out in his article “Grimm Criticism,[1]” these fairy tales have been the subject of much criticism from modern audiences for their perceived political and racial biases.  He writes that the Grimm stories became controversial “during the last half of the twentieth century, beginning already in 1947 […] because of their implication in Nazi ideology[2].

While there are many of Grimm’s tales that could be analyzed for the purpose of this paper, I chose to read “The Seven Ravens,”[3] which tells the tale of seven brothers who were cursed by their father and turned into ravens.  It falls to their youngest sister to rescue them from this curse, a message which seems to suggest that women have a great deal more power than was perhaps socially available to them at the time.  This conflicts with Haase’s assessment that feminists, among others, found the stories had been shaped by the Grimm brothers to “suit their own nineteenth-century middle class values”[4] .  However, “The Seven Ravens” does reinforce the traditional notion of the importance of children obeying their parents; the father in the tale curses his sons because they do not return from the stream with the water for their sister’s baptism quickly enough.  Each of the seven brothers wished to fill the jug, leading to it falling into the well.  Fearing their father’s reaction, “there they stood and did not know what to do, and none of them dared to go home”[5].  Although the tale has the expected happy ending, it sends a strong and potentially terrifying message to children of the consequences of not living up to parental expectations.

Haase’s critique of the Grimm tales illustrates that the interpretation of stories can be very subjective, with audiences using the narrative to fit their message.  His explanation of modern criticisms of the Brothers Grimm also demonstrates that bias is affected by historical and social components that shift over time.  As Haase writes, “the fairy tale canon is in flux,”[6] a fact that the numerous reinterpretations and reinventions of these classic stories certainly illustrates.  Haase’s brief analysis of our modern understanding of fairy tales is aimed at a literate audience who are perhaps interested in learning more about the roots of classic stories.  I’ve drawn this conclusion because his article appeared on the website Wonders and Marvels:  A Community for Curious Minds who love History, its Odd Stories, and Good Reads, suggesting that his audience already has a certain level of knowledge about literature.  While there is no obvious bias in his article, it does make broad generalizations about the uses of fairy tales and the expectations of those who read them[7].

“The Seven Ravens” and other stories by the Brothers Grimm demonstrate that fiction can do more than just entertain, and is often used–especially when aimed at children–as cautionary tales to teach young audiences the consequences of their actions.  Hause’s article helped me to better understand the different social contexts that have affected the development of “The Fairy Tales” by pointing out how the underlying meaning of such stories change over time in reaction to historical shifts in areas such as gender, race, and class[8].

Bibliography

Grimm, Jacob & Grimm, Wilhelm. “The Seven Ravens.” National Geographic Society. Published 1999. Accessed 1 July 2011. http://www.nationalgeographic.com/grimm/seven_ravens.html

Haase, Donald. “Grimm Criticism.” Wonders and Marvels. Accessed 1 July 2011. http://www.wondersandmarvels.com/2010/03/grimm-criticism.html

[1] Haase, Donald. “Grimm Criticism.” Wonders and Marvels. Accessed 1 July 2011. http://www.wondersandmarvels.com/2010/03/grimm-criticism.html

[2] Ibid.

[3] Jacob Grimm & Wilhelm Grimm. “The Seven Ravens.” National Geographic Society. Published 1999. Accessed 1 July 2011, http://www.nationalgeographic.com/grimm/seven_ravens.html

[4] Haase, Donald. “Grimm Criticism.” Wonders and Marvels. Accessed 1 July 2011. http://wondersandmarvels.com/2010/03/grimm-criticism.html

[5] Jacob Grimm & Wilhelm Grimm. “The Seven Ravens.” National Geographic Society. Published 1999. Accessed 1 July 2011, http://www.nationalgeographic.com/grimm/seven_ravens.html

[6] Haase, Donald. “Grimm Criticism.” Wonders and Marvels. Accessed 1 July 2011. http://www.wondersandmarvels.com/2010/03/grimm-criticism.html

[7] Ibid.

[8] Ibid.