Beauty And The Beast

1453 Words3 Pages

Beauty and the Beast is probably one of the most well known fairy tales that the Grimms’ reproduced. In it’s original form it was a long, drawn out story that was catered to adults. The Grimms’ changed the story to be more understood by children and made it short and to the point. Unlike many of the other fairy tales that they reproduced, Beauty and the Beast contains many subtle symbols in its purest form. It shows a girl and how she transfers to a woman; it also shows that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. The one major thing that separates this story from all the rest is that Beauty gets to know the Beast before marrying him.
The story starts out simply enough. There was a merchant who had three daughters and was going to the market. He asked each daughter, “what they wanted from the market.” The two older daughters were very vain and each wanted material things. Beauty, who was the sweetest of the three asked for a rose that was picked for her by her father. The man gets stuck in a storm and finds himself at a castle where he spends the night. The0re seems to be no one around but there is a wonderful dinner set upon the table. The merchant looks around the house and when he finds no one, he eats the meal. Then since he is weary from his trip he spends the night in the house, the next morning he is served breakfast but again no one shows. So he leaves the castle. On his way out he passed a garden filled with roses and he went to pick one, this is when the beast appeared. He said that the merchant was ungrateful because not only did the beast give him shelter, he gave him food. The Beast condemns the merchant to death. When the merchant explains why he was picking the rose the Beast agreed to let him go, under the condition that, he bring his daughter to serve his time. When the merchant gets home he tells this story to his three daughters and Beauty being the generous person that she is agrees to go to the castle for her father. Over time Beauty gets to know the Beast and learns to become friends with him. It is through this friendship that many of the lessons in the story are taught.
One of the important messages that were taught through the story is that true beauty comes from within. Also, if love is true it will prevail through any means. Beauty is scared of the Beast at first because ...

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...nd he is transformed.
The one thing that separates Beauty and the Beast from all the other fairy tales is that Beauty gets to know the Beast before marrying him. She lives with him for several months and gets to know him for what he is inside. He is not a prince that rescues her but she is a woman that rescues him. It is only when she professes her love for him that he is transformed. If it wasn’t for her love of the Beast from the inside he would have never been transformed and they would not have been wed. Yes, he helps her mature and become a beautiful, young women but it is her that causes the transformation.
A person can take a story and look at it from many ways. Fairy tales represent the transformation of young people. Beauty is transformed into a young woman; she passes through the stages successfully and in turn is able to love. Every story teaches a lesson and in this case more than one lesson is taught. Not only is the lesson of sexuality and maturity taught, an even more important lesson is taught. Beauty and the Beast shows that true love comes from within the inside and if it is meant to be it will prevail.

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