Snow White and Rapunzel: a Comparison of Two Grimm’s Stories

Snow White and Rapunzel are both stories by the Grimm Brothers and are arguably some of the tamer Grimm Brother stories. Since these stories are by the same authors we can see many similarities. While Rapunzel and Snow White are commonly known as princesses only Snow White starts out as a princess while Rapunzel is born to two peasants, however, Rapunzel does end up marrying a prince.

In both stories the original mother figures in both are in general good. Snow White’s mother just wants a beautiful daughter which she gets but dies in child birth and Rapunzel’s mother had always wanted a child but craved the rapunzel in the witch’s garden so much during her pregnancy that she ended up having to sacrifice raising her daughter.

It is rare in these types of stories that the children of peasants desire or even care for their child so much but at the same time they give her up without much of a fight so maybe the parents don’t actually represent the want for a child but instead are just peasants simply because it makes more sense that a peasant would be easier to easily attain a child from.

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While the biologically mother’s are generally good or at least neutral the step or adoptive mother’s are anything but. Snow White’s step mother is consumed by the need to be the most beautiful so much so that she tries to have Snow White killed multiple times which ends up leading to her own demise.

While Rapunzel’s adoptive mother promised that she would give the child a good life, all she really did was lock Rapunzel away and when Rapunzel tried to gain somefreedom and escape the witch chopped Rapunzel’s hair off and banished her to the desert then when her prince came she tricked him causing him to jump out of the tower, blinding him.

Interestly enough despite some hardships that all fairy tales have both stories also have happy endings by marrying princes who, even though they just met, they love. This is strange because in many original fairy tales, especially ones by the Grimm Brothers, have bitter sweet, gruesome, or sad endings. Perhaps during the time these were written extreme poverty was afoot and people needed, not only a cautionary tale about stealing and strangers, but also some small bit of hope to hold onto that things can turn out happy and that the bad people of the world, in Snow White’s cause at least, will get what’s coming to them.