.jpg)
We always think of the Grimm fairy tales as darker than their Disney updates, and for the most part that is true. But in reading and watching the two versions of “Snow White” together, I was surprised to find they’re not that much different.
The Evil Queen asks for Snow White’s heart as proof of her death in both stories, though at least Disney withholds the part where she proceeds to consume the organ to symbolize her triumph over her enemy. However, one could argue the Disney film is darker than its source for a different part: the fate of the Queen. At the end of the Grimm story the Queen is forced into a pair of iron shoes that have been heated to burning in the fire.
A terrible torture indeed, but as the Queen is given no further mention we could assume nothing more happens to her. In Disney, the hitherto jolly and innocent dwarves chase the Queen off a cliff to her death. Though forcing someone into a pair of burning iron shoes is morbid, flat-out execution is probably worse on the moral scale.
The major difference between the two versions that’s of ultimate interest to me, however, is Snow White’s age. In the Grimm’s “Little Snow White,” the title character is only a child. It’s a fact that disturbs me on multiple levels; first, that the Queen so hates a seven-year-old because a mirror told her the child was prettier than her, and second, that it’s not clear how much time passes until she meets her prince.
The Queen tries, fails, and then succeeds to kill Snow when she’s still just a kid. When the dwarves entomb her in a glass coffin (so everyone can keep seeing how pretty she is, of course), it’s said that many years pass while she remains unchanged.
I’m guessing this means she doesn’t decompose, but that she does keep aging. She must, because when the prince comes along he becomes so enamored with her sleeping form that he begs the dwarves to give her to him. Like Snow is a piece of art to display in his foyer or something. The idea’s even more disturbing if she’s still physically seven-years-old.
What’s interesting is that here Disney makes another change: the original Snow White isn’t saved by the prince kissing her, but by his moving her to his castle. While in transport Snow’s jostled enough that a piece of poisoned apple stuck in her throat dislodges, allowing her to awaken.
I’ve complained in the past of the lack of feminism in “Snow White,” and while that hasn’t changed I can now appreciate that at least it pushed the concept forward from its source text. Snow does a whole lot more for herself in the Disney movie than she does in her original story. A case in point: in “Little Snow White,” the dwarves only agree to let a lost and hunted child stay with them if she will do all of their cooking, cleaning, and other household chores.
In the Disney version, Snow takes it upon herself to clean the dwarves’ house before even meeting them, in hopes of ingratiating herself to her hosts so that they’ll let her stay. She might be performing traditional women’s duties but given how gross and dirty the house was, it was a good idea. And she completed the chores upon her own agency and not at the dwarves’ insistence.
I never really appreciated how much a work of art “Snow White and the Seven Dwarves” is until I read its scanty source text, which is so short it only took me 10 minutes at most. Walt Disney expanded beautifully upon the original, fleshing out its characters and expanding its themes.
When I next return to the topic I’ll cover “Pinocchio” and its little known original book.
Related Articles:
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)
Snow White’s Secret Green Streak
*(This image by JeffChristiansen is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License.)
