The Robber Bridegroom Analysis

Just as the miller’s daughter hides herself behind a cask when the bridegroom and his band enter, Mary sneaks behind a barrel, watching as Mr. Fox drags another maiden in. Notably, both Grimm and Jacobs use the verb “dragging” to describe the bridegroom’s treatment of the maiden. In keeping with the class shift from Grimm’s text, Mr. Fox uses a more extravagant weapon (a sword instead of an axe) to remove the maiden’s hand. This hand has a diamond ring, not a gold one, symbolically strengthening the link between death and marriage. Once again like the miller’s daughter, the hand lands on Mary’s lap, and she carries it with her when she escapes. Then, she sets a trap for her bridegroom at a public pre-wedding breakfast. When he urges her to

recount her dreams, she employs the same tactic of disguising her eyewitness testimony as a “dream,” saying she “dreamed” the happenings repeatedly. Mr. Fox interrupts her, attempting to discount her words by saying “it is not so, nor was it so” three times and “God forbid it should be so” once. More confrontationally and openly than the miller’s daughter, Mary reverses the power dynamic between her and Mr. Fox, accusing him outright, “I saw you, Mr. Fox”; refuting his claims of innocence, “it is so and it was so”; and producing the severed hand as evidence, aggressively “point[ing] it at Mr. Fox.” Immediately, her brothers and friends “cut Mr. Fox into a thousand pieces,” a far more gruesome fate than the Grimm’s bridegroom suffers.
Thus, these early versions of “The Robber Bridegroom” share multiple characteristics.

Highly similar in form, they are both short works, collected as fairy tales with similar plot structure (a woman becomes engaged, visits her betrothed’s home, discovers he is a murderer by witnessing the dismembering of a maiden behind a cask/barrel, retains evidence of the crime in the form of the maiden’s severed hand with a ring, and exposes the betrothed’s crimes via public storytelling, resulting in his punishment). Neither tale requires a happily ever after beyond the bridegroom’s punishment, though Jacobs’ punishment is more brutal. Notably, Grimm’s bridegroom is more brutal himself, with graphic torture of the maiden and cannibalistic tendencies. Jacobs’ bridegroom acts alone, a serial murderer, while Grimm’s bridegroom is a member of robber band. Jacobs’ characters are more fully formed, with greater detail ascribed to his named characters. Jacobs and Grimms’ stories revolve around high and working class circumstances respectively, contrasting a lady with a miller’s daughter, a mere home with a castle, and an ax with a sword. The framing of both variations has the heroine as the central character, with her personal account of the bridegroom’s crimes matching the narrative’s version in diction and syntax. Both heroines draw power from narratives, spinning tales like the female character of the storyteller featured in many collections. They also obscure their accusations using a

dream motif. Supernatural signs, such as the bird in Grimm and written warnings in Jacobs, suggests the strength of the heroine’s intuition and decision to investigate her bridegroom before marriage. However, while Jacobs’ messages instruct and empower the heroine, Grimm’s attempt to deter her. Similarly, Jacob’s heroine enters into a marriage contract with Mr. Fox willingly, chooses to investigate his home, escapes by herself, and orchestrates a trap without consulting her family. She has greater agency than Grimm’s heroine, who is forced into marriage and visiting the bridegroom’s home, aided by the old woman and her father. Regardless, both early versions undoubtedly partially meet Atwood’s criteria for a feminist fairy tale, with central female heroines who win through cleverness.
“The White Road” by Neil Gaiman opens with the bridegroom asking his intended to “visit” his “home,” similar to the Grimms’ plot.

Unlike the early versions, this tale is told in first person from the bridegroom’s perspective, named “Mister Fox” in reference to Jacobs, only covering the events of the storytelling incident featured at the end of both early variations, this time told not by the bride but by another woman. Thus, rather than see the supposed heroine’s visit, only her story occurs. Quickly, the heroine is established as the suspicious one, described with horror imagery, like with “meat on her bones,” and uncertainty, as in “[she] smiles crooked.” When he asks for her story, she tells a tale a pregnant maiden in gruesome terms with period “blood stopped flowing” and “belly swole beyond disgusting” and describes her suitor suspiciously like the early bridegrooms, with a “sly” smile. As part of her story in lines 43-48, she sings a version of “The Fox” folk song, its original versions connoting deceit. Then, she recounts the bridegroom character’s trap to murder his intended, digging a hole under a tree to bury her in, while she watches, hidden in the tree. This plot and a later segment (lines 71-78) are lifted from two other English “Robber Bridegroom” variants, James Orchard Halliwell-Phillipps’ “The Oxford Student” and Sidney Oldall Addy’s “The Girl Who Got Up the Tree.” She explains that when the woman’s baby is born, it has a fox paw, not a human hand. After

her story, she references the Eastern mythology of fox spirits, like Kitsune or Huli jing, that can transform into women, but may be revealed as foxes by their tails. Then, Mister Fox’s intended tells her story, disguising her testimony as a “dream,” like the early variants. She describes him as monstrous, with yellow teeth that “could eat [a maiden’s] heart,” again conjuring the duality of heart imagery, physical and emotional. As in Jacobs’ version, he interrupts her tale with, “God forbid.” She visits his house unannounced and finds blood dripping, along with Jacobs’ inscription “Be bold, / Be bold, / But not too bold” and his third warning in lines 170-174. In the house, she finds a woman’s “half-chewed hand,” present in both early versions and implying the cannibalism of Grimms’ bridegroom. She also discovers a bloody chamber, with grisly imagery of dismembered women (“a heap of breasts” and “a pile of guts” and references to Biblical “Hell”). Like Mary, she “points” at her bridegroom, describing him “dragging” another maiden. Mister Fox hacks her apart with a sword, but the bride retrieves a severed hand as evidence and escapes once again. Then, as he speaks the same denials as Jacobs’ Mr. Fox, she accuses him openly, producing a hand from her bodice as physical evidence. However, this hand is not human, with “pads” and “claws.” Finally, the first woman sneakily exits the room, described with the same words as the folk song and a “tail.” Mister Fox’s tale is then “done,” as he is beaten to death after being framed by female fox spirits, with physical power (murdering the animal child), narrative power (framing Mister Fox), and magical power (disguising themselves as human women).