For Wednesday (since classes are cancelled on Monday): Grimms’ Fairy Tales
Read the following
8 Tales: Hans in Luck, The Golden Bird,
The Fisherman and His Wife, The Twelve Dancing Princesses, Tom Thumb, Jorinda
and Jorindel, Frederick and Catherine, and King Grisly-Beard.
Answer 2 of the 4 questions
that follow:
1. I chose these 8
stories since they are less familiar than the stories Disney adapted for their
classic films (Snow White, Sleeping
Beauty, etc). Why do you think
Disney passed on these classic tales? In
what ways are they atypical of the classic fairy tales we know and love? OR, do you feel they are fundamentally the
same, and could easily become a new Disney classic?
2. As we discussed
in class today (Friday), fairy tales, though fantastic in nature, always speak
about the realities of life. One of the
most constant themes in fairy tales is the danger of first impressions. How is this theme developed in one or more of
the stories, and why does our human tendency to pick the most attractive, most
pleasing objects often lead to our ruin?
3. Two of the
stories in this selection, The Fisherman
and His Wife and Frederick and
Catherine, concern the age-old ‘battle of the sexes.’ Indeed, the Fisherman
calls his wife the “plague of my life,” and Frederick
Cera Miller
ReplyDelete2. - The Golden Bird and The Fisherman and his Wife are both great examples of people being fooled by beauty. Two of the King’s sons are distracted by the nice, fun tavern, and lose sight of what they are doing. The Third son keeps getting himself deeper in trouble when he wants the nicer cage and nicer saddle. Isabel kept wanting more and more: a nice house, a nicer house, to be King, Emperor, Pope, and finally God. The third son of the King finally stops seeing what glitters and sees the reality of the situation, everything starts falling into place. Isabel, who wants everything, ends up with the pigsty she and her husband had at the beginning; when you try for everything, you get nothing.
3.
The sentiment towards women at this time was very negative. Isabel, the Fisherman’s wife is shown to be very greedy and nagging: always wanting to send her husband off to improve her status. Catherine is the complete opposite: she is always messing up, she is clumsy, and needs her husband to control everything she does. Neither of these women are depicted nicely, and this fits the times in which these stories where told. Women were subservient to men, and wives relied on and listened to their husbands.
Great responses; as you suggest, this was an older world with older values--women had a very subservient role to their husbands. Back then, too, women were still blamed for the Fall, so they usually were the brunt of jokes and stereotypes in stories and poems. However, is there a little more than this going on in "Frederick and Catherine"? Where might we sense a little satire against these views...why is the man punished, in a way, for assuming that his wife is a fool who can only rely on his instructions?
DeleteDarryn York
ReplyDeleteHey Dr. Grasso, I won't be able to make it to class tomorrow, I am stuck in Dallas, the roads are really bad here. I have to wait until the roads clear up before I'm able to come back. I'm ready to present and I will get me essay to you ASAP.
I understand, but be careful, since you're missing a lot of class and you only have until Friday to recite your poem or you get a zero. See you in a day or two I hope!
DeleteMika Hendrix
ReplyDeleteProfessor Grasso since I was supposed to present and turn In Monday do you want me to reschedule for Wednesday or Thursday? Anyday is really fine as long as I can still get my credit since class was cancelled!!!
Yes, I'm giving everyone two more days since we lost two days this week. So come after class tomorrow or Friday, or during my office hours Wed-Friday at 1-3. Thanks!
Delete2.
ReplyDeleteThe Golden Bird really shows how the prettier thing is not always the best. The better cage triggers an alarm. The tavern causes loss of time and motive for the real search.The uglier, cheaper things are actually better. With the cage, you really only need the bird, but greed catches up with you and you don't want the ugly cage. In life, we want fancy cars, that may have bad gas mileage instead of an older model that has a few dings in it but gets better mileage. Appearance is such a motivating factor in society, today's and in the past ones. We care so much about the outer appearance and not enough about the inside. But it's how we are raised. We want a cute new dog instead of a mangy shelter dog simply because our parents did. They taught us that mindset.
4.
I really hear it in the beginnings. Like in Jorinda and Jorindel, "There once was"
and just the flow of the words. You can write a story, but unless you read it out loud it won't sound very good. I can hear a sing song type of voice reading it in my head. Just the way it is worded puts a lot into it as well. The word choices, carefully chosen by the orator over the years, and changing from one to another if they thought of a better one. I just see years and years of perfection being put into the book from the words of older, wiser storytellers and grandmothers.
Ashley Rinner
Yes, great responses; we are a visual culture, and have trouble not believing in the "lie" of art: that the beautiful thing is the 'good' thing. However, experience teaches us not to trust to our sight alone, and in each story (almost), we see hero after hero (or heroine after heroine) failing because they trust their senses instead of their mind.
Delete1. These stories are all fundamentally the same because in the end they all end up living happily ever after. The only one that did not end well was the fisherman and his wife.
ReplyDelete2. Appearances often deceive us because they look so tempting to the eye that reason goes out the window. As in the golden bird, the fox gave wise council, but the man saw the fancy things (tavern, gold saddle, gold cage) and let those things distract them from their goal.
Yes, these stories have many similarities, and most end happily. However, most of them have very unconventional heroes, few of whom are able to do anything by themselves (except for the smallest of them all, Tom Thumb). Also, why doesn't The Fisherman and His Wife end happily? Why might this be a much darker fairy tale than the rest in its theme?
DeleteAlex Fillat
ReplyDelete1- I think Disney passed on these stories because they are more complex than the Disney classics. Disney make stories more young people and I think they are not sure they will like the public or that the public will understand them.
2- As the Golden Bird show, the things that look better in the outside are not always the best for us. The tavern for example, make them lose time and not focus on their real goal. In our society, we think that the people that have more and better things is better than the others so that's why we always want more.
Good start, but try to be more specific: why are these stories more "complex"? What makes them more complex than the stories we often see in movies?
DeleteAlbanie Beck
ReplyDelete1. I think these stories are some what the same because they usually end happy. The guy gets the girl and they live happily ever after. It really doesn't matter what the plot is that is usually how it goes. The witch, villain, dragon, or mythic creature dies by the handsome prince or knight. With these stories the only that didn't end so well was the fisherman and his wife. Since it didn't end well we probably won't make it into a movie because we think our lives should be like a fairytale and end happy.
2. I think the Golden Bird story is trying to tell us that looks can be deceiving. Things don't always appear to be what they really are. Everyone wants the best thing and the newest. Every time they come out with a new iPhone people want that and their old one is so last month. Just because the new iPhone has one new accessory that makes it the best. When in reality we could do without. But people will always want more and bigger and better things that is just how our society has came to be.
Good responses...even though most of these stories end predictably, they lack many of the "ideal" features Hollywood prefers in its tales of magic. What I find most interesting is that most of the heroes are totally unremarkable, even stupid; their inability to trust Nature or a voice of wisdom often leads to their downfall, since they are unable to make good decisions by themselves. Not usually what we look for in a hero or heroine!
DeleteAmira Jacobson
ReplyDelete(2) In secret every one just wants the best thing for themselves. Take me for example, after so many years of waiting I finally got a new flute. It was beautiful solid silver and it played just as well as I thought it would. Later on though I kept looking at pictures of gold, engraved flutes with jewels on top of the head piece, wishing I could afford it. And, unfortunately, I'm still doing that now. This shows that that it is just human nature to want bigger and better things.
(3) In these stories the men are all “sweet and innocent” while the women come off as either a stupid or horrible person. Just like the story Frederick and Catherine, Catherine seem like a stupid girl telling some random sales men were all their “yellow buttons” are so she can get new cooking pots and ,literally, keeping the door safe by bringing the door with her saying that it is safe with the both of them. Every time she does “silly things” her husband scolds her and every time she thinks ‘that’s what you told me to do.’ The same kind of goes for The Fisherman and His Wife; in this story the man is portrayed as “innocent” in his situation. The wife is portrayed as a horrible, greedy person who is never satisfied and who is always wanting more. Both of these stories are very stereotypical because the women are never the ones to think rationally and are considered a “plague of my life”.
Great responses...yes, we always want the most beautiful object, since we assume that beauty, in some sense, will make us beautiful/happy. We are a very visual species, so we tend to start at the level of sight, even though we know that appearances are deceiving since they are art--something that is not "real" but ideal (remember Keats' Ode on a Grecian Urn?)
DeleteDarryn York
ReplyDelete1. I think Disney chose the stories they did because they are more likable and connect better to the average person. I think in ways, they are fundamentally the same, the Disney ones just happen to be more popular, which is another reason I think Disney chose them. I also think some of these stories can be Disney movies as well.
2. Danger is the first impression is like what draws the reader to the story because at the end you always know it will come back to bite you in the but. I believe authors use this strategy in writing to deliver the message "things may not always be as nice as they look from the outside in.:"