Once upon a time deep in a large forest there lived a woodchopper, his wife, and their two children, Hansel and Gretel. It was a beautiful forest, full of trees, flowers and butterflies and streams. Matter of fact, the family had everything they could ever want except for one little thing.
"Food! I must have food!" screamed the woodchopper's wife, running in circles and tugging at her hair.
Though the woodchopper just wagged his finger. "Remember, food isn't everything, dear," he reminded her.
"No, but it's something."
"Listen," said the woodchopper. "We have the trees, the flowers, the butterflies, the streams.... what more could a body want?"
"Ummmm, ever hear of carbohydrates, amino acids, riboflavin?"
That one threw the woodchopper
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for a loop. After a bit more argument, he agreed to go out into the forest and try to hunt down some of these carbohydrates and amino acids. (Yes, his wife assured him, they are in season.) But every time the woodcutter went searching for food, a curious thing happened. He just couldn't pass a tree without chopping it down. He'd come home loaded with logs but no food. By now, the wife had become so frustrated with her husband, she wasn't exactly playing gin rummy with a full deck. Just listen: "Hey, kids! she shouted. "Anyone for a roast leg of log? Ummm...yummy." Young Hansel and Gretel realized it was time for them to take this problem on themselves. "We've got to go out and get food," whispered Gretel. "Mom's a little kookie." "Kookie!" shouted their mother, overhearing them. "What a good idea. I would love to have a kookie! Mmm. Chocolate chip kookie." So, taking a few precious grains of parched corn, the children set out for the forest. Hours later, Gretel began to worry. "Hey, Hansel," she said. "Once we've found the food, how do we find our way back?" "Easy, Gretel. Remember those grains of parched corn? I've been leaving them as a trail so we can find our way home. Some neat plan, huh?" Gretel shook her head and slapped her hand to her forehead. "That plan is for the birds." Yes, you guessed it. Gretel was right. It literally was for the birds. As the kids walked along, dozens of crows swooped down behind them and ate up all the corn. Hopelessly lost, the children wandered about, passing tree after tree after tree until Hansel suddenly bumped into something. Something that wasn't a tree! "Watch your step, stupid!" shouted Gretel. "You bumped right into that gingerbread house!" One, two, three. It hit them. "Gingerbread house!" they screamed in unison. Indeed it was. A three-bedroom, four-bath Victorian gingerbread house in a traditional rural setting. Oh, and the entire house was made of spicy cookies and adorned with candies in primary colors. "Mmmmhh," said Gretel, snapping off a piece of the house. "Have a little shutter." "I'm more of a shingle and door man myself!" said Hansel, diving in on his own and in a few minutes the brother-and-sister team had eaten a big hole in the little house. And then suddenly, who should appear out of thin air but a little hunched-over woman with a wart on her nose, holding a broom and wearing a big, black pointy hat. "Oh boy," said Hansel. "There's always a catch. You're a wicked witch aren't you?" "Well, yes..." "And you've got all kinds of magic powers...true?" demanded Hansel. "Well, no.' "You mean you can't breathe fire and smoke?" "No. I try but I just get nauseous." "And you can't summon up demons?" "I don't know," said the witch, scratching her head. "Let me try. He you demons! Come to mama!"And just like that right on cue appeared a blue bird. "Some demon," laughed Hansel. "You've got no powers at all." "Well," said the witch. "There is one thing I'm pretty good at. And that is turning children into aardvarks!" With that she pointed her crooked finger at Hansel and ZING!!! the little boy shrank down into an aardvark. "Got to admit," Gretel said. "At that, you're pretty good." "Problem is," said the witch, "I really don't care much for aardvarks." "Then what gives?" demanded Hansel. "Well, I care even less for children. And I've got the witch's tradition to uphold you know?" "Isn't there something you're rather do?" asked Gretel. "Oh sure," said the witch. "I'd like to know how to ride a broomstick. Vroooooom! But what's the use? I can never seem to get it off the ground." "If I show you how to ride a broomstick, will you change Hansel back again?" Gretel asked. "Yes, but you aren't even a witch. How would you know?" "Oh come on. There's a little witch in all us girls."Then with that Gretel snapped into action. "Now you take this broom, and you twirl it all around. Now you put it on the ground. And you sit right down. Now you tell that broom, Va, va, voom! Fly around the room!" So sure enough, Gretel began to fly. And the witch turned green with envy. (Well, actually she was already pretty green to begin with, but you get the idea.) She snatched the broom away and off she flew. Unfortunately, the witch had forgotten to ask Gretel how to turn off the broom, so once she started it, she had to keep going. And in a little while, the witch had zoomed so far that she was in orbit around the Earth, where she remains to this day. But the witch did keep her word, for as soon as she was gone, Hansel turned back into himself.
The brother-and-sister team packed up and started off into the deep and confusing forest. Now since they were in a magic forest, they soon came upon a huge talking duck.
"Oh duck, tell us the way back to our cottage!"
"Springen auf meinem Rücken" replied the duck. Yes, unfortunately, this was a German talking duck. But with his duckbill he motioned the two onto his back. Off they trotted, and after a long time the duck said, "Hier! Wir sind hier" (That's German for 'we are here.')
Off hopped the kids, and there was their little old cottage and their little old pond and their sitting on a log was their father. But instead of his usual ax, he was holding a musket."Father, why aren't you chopping down trees?" asked Gretel.
"Gretel," replied her father. "I've finally realized that all that glitters is not trees! Besides, I've chopped them all down. Not it's hunting! Hunting's the only thing."
So from that day on, Hansel and Gretel had plenty of food, and their mother never went hungry again. Although she did find the stray bullets whizzing around the living room a bit disconcerting."Sometimes," she told Hansel, "I wish he'd stuck to
woodcutting."
“Hansel and Grethel”, the story for children holds the cruel reality of the world, where the poor children live in a world lacking food, manners, love, and support. They are expected to grow up in the snap of a finger, without any help whatsoever, and fend for themselves. The author uses symbolism -the use of objects , thoughts, characters, and actions, to represent different meanings or ideas than the literal meaning to convey a specific message. “Hansel and Grethel” by The Grimm Brothers displays the theme of lost childhood innocence, in a world of deprivation, using symbolism of the stepmother, the bread, and the witch.
to come to the woods, “ I must tarry home and keep watch over my little
Grendel feels like an outcast in the society he lives in causing him to have a hard time finding himself in the chaotic world. He struggles because the lack of communication between he and his mother. The lack of communication puts Grendel in a state of depression. However, Grendel comes in contact with several characters with different philosophical beliefs, which allows his to see his significance in life. Their views on life influence Grendel to see the world in a meaningful way.
Despite her limited involvement in his life, Grendel’s mother indubitably impacts her son. Because she cannot speak to Grendel in a way that he understands, Grendel becomes very lonely. He wonders, “Why can’t I have someone to talk to” (Gardner 53)? This lack of communication causes Grendel to feel very distant from his own mother. As a result of his increased solitary time, he begins to isolate himself and becomes alienated. Grendel cries, “I shake my head, muttering darkly on shaded paths, holding conversation with the only friend and comfort this world affords, my shadow” (Gardner 8). Rather than looking to his mother for advice, the outcast is forced to rely on himself, thus, making him more independent and free to do as he pleases. One time Grendel asked his mother, “Why are we here” (Gardner 11)? His mother’s blank response enabled him to formulate his own austere answer to the question, resulting in his adverse and destructive ways of
Throughout the poem, there is a sense the reader is looking at Gretel through the eyes of a psychologist, listening to her devolving her deepest secrets about how the darkness has rendered her almost helpless or defenceless. Gretel is yearning for answers to the question “Why do I not forget” as she is haunted by the death of the witch. She confronts Hansel, “No one remembers”. Even you, my brother, / as though it never happened / But I killed for you.”
While Grendel enters the world with the naiveté and positive outlook of an everyday child, he quickly learns that he will not live the life he has imagined. He learns that he can not verbally communicate with his own mother and sees the mechanical layout of life. This isolation initiates Grendel’s inevitable separation from society in general, leading him to the belief that he will never be able to be a part of something bigger than himself. His lack of communication with his mother, the only being he is close to, initiates his psychological journey to fully giving in to the belief of nihilism. This occurs when Grendel, at a young age, gets his leg caught in a tree. At this point he “ twisted around as far as [he] could , hunting wildly for her shape on the cliffs, but there was nothing, or rather, there was everything but my mother” (14). This displays Grendel’s drastic separation from his mother, and his desperation to receive her aid and care, which proves to be futile. This separa...
In 1886, author Sarah Orne Jewett wrote a short story “A White Heron.” The premise of the story revolves around a young girl, Sylvia, who is uprooted from her home in the city and taken by her grandmother, Mrs. Tilley, to live out in the middle of a forested, country culture. Sylvia, a nine year old girl, is quiet and shy but goes about business of caring for the family cow where life was so different from the “crowded, manufacturing town”(p.1598) she came from. For the first time in her short life Sylvia understood what it truly felt like to be alive. It is important to understand Sylvia’s character to truly understand the significance of the tree and Sylvia climbing to the top. Personal growth and maturity is an expectation of living but getting the opportunity to experience it in the country, on a farm, is paramount to the changes Sylvia experiences.
Fairy tales have been a big part of learning and childhood for many of us. They may seem childish to us, but they are full of life lessons and intelligent turnings. Components of fairy tales may even include violence, but always with the aim to provide a moral to the story. Hansel and Gretel is in itself a very interesting story to analyze. It demonstrates the way that children should not stray too far from their benchmarks and rely on appearances. In 2013, a film adaptation was produced. This film is produced for an older public and has picked up the story to turn it into a more mature and violent version. Hansel and Gretel is a German fairy tale written by the Grimm Brothers which has undergone several changes over the years and across the cultures which it touched, but for the purposes of this essay, I will stick to the original story. In the development of this essay, I will analyze the components of this tale by the Brothers Grimm based on the factors listed in the course syllabus (violence, interpersonal relationships, the function of magic and the ending), and I will then do a summary and comparison between the story and the film which was released in theaters recently.
So, you thought you knew Goldilocks, huh? Well, did you know Hansel from “Hansel and Gretel” is Goldilocks brother? That’s right. Goldilocks is really Gretel. Here’s what happened; After Hansel and Gretel killed the witch who had kidnapped them for months and forced them to eat food nonstop, they decided to run away, but they didn’t want anyone to connect them to the murder they had to commit here. They decided to eat the witch’s candy house to the ground no evidence was left. In a week’s time they had eaten every part of the house and decided to go their separate ways to console their grief and sorrow on their own.
someone smile. When the food did come, on the times she was awake for its delivery, she would
...ing used to them not living with me for college, I've realized that the cabin reassures the family bond, we have so greatly between each other, and gives the family hope that we can always have a place where the family, as one, is welcomed. Although we live in different cities, this place gives me the belief that my family will always be there. When the whole family is up at the cabin, it seems as if nothing has changed, as if the pine trees have not grown apart, or any taller. Th pine trees drop their children (pinecones) right next to the parent, never being able to leave. This symbolizes the feeling I get about my family while being up in the mountains at our cabin.
Starvation was a near daily routine for Hansel and Gretel’s family again. The step-mother instructed the father that once more they could not afford to keep the children. She suggested that they take them further out into the woods a second time and they will be sure that the siblings cannot find a way back home. Although the father disagreed with the step-mother he knew that “whoever starts something must go on with it, and since he had given in the first time, he also had to yield a second time.” (page 713) The children were awake still and overheard the conversation. Hansel had decided he would re-create the plan he had last time, but his idea was quickly brought to a stop when his step-mother had locked the doors to the house. She was suspicious of what plans the children might have that would deviate her own plan in motion. A worried Gretel was reassured by her brother. Hansel told her “the dear Lord is bound to help us.” (page
Unlike Paul Bunyan and Babe, his blue ox, Dad sleeps just down the hall, in the other bedroom. On weekends he and his friends trot down the road with their saws and axes, while the ladies stay inside, stirring lemonade. Their boots land so heavy, a solid slab of road can't last and it gives to gravel. As Dad pushes through the thicket branches break back from his wooden shoulders. Then he stops. This afternoon trees fall and fall under him and his crew. The walls of the house shake around the ladies and children. The cupboards rattle and long, dainty needles quiver in their sewing boxes.
“I don’t understand, I swear I saw a cabin in the woods, this makes no sense” Sam replies very confused.
Let’s get one thing straight here; I was not an ugly old witch. My name was Bertha. Also it really hurt my feeling and increased my insecurities when it said I was an ugly old witch. I thought I was a beautiful, middle aged woman. And I was not a, “witch”; I was simply a woman who enjoyed making and trying out new things. And who started the idea of cannibalism? I didn’t want to eat those children. So for the first time ever, I will tell you the true story of Hansel and Gretel.