House And Snow White example essay topic

When most children are young, they learn the story of Snow White and the seven dwarfs. Little girls are intrigued by her beauty and innocence and of how her prince charming comes to rescue her and take her off to live happily ever after. The Brothers Grimm version of Snow White is more gruesome and bold than the Disney version. It begins with Snow White's mother pricking her finger on a needle and dropping blood on the snow.

She wished for a child as "white as snow, as red as blood, and as black as the wood in the window frame" (Bell). It has Snow White's mother dying giving birth to her and has the king remarry a beautiful woman. This woman turned out to be proud and haughty and could not bear for anyone to be fairer than she (Bell). She would look into her magic mirror and ask, "Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is fairest of us all?" and the mirror would always answer, "Queen, thou art the fairest of us all" (Bell). One day the queen asked her mirror the same question and it answered her with, "Queen, thou art the fairest in this hall but Snow White's fairer than us all" (Bell). Well the queen just couldn't take that and sent a huntsman to take Snow White into the forest and kill her, and for proof, the queen wanted her lung and liver as proof that she was dead.

Well the huntsman couldn't kill Snow White. He found her too beautiful and told her to run away and never return. She ran through the forest and all the creatures that she passed did not hurt her. She came upon a small one room house and went inside to rest (Bell). There was seven of everything. All the belongings in the house were small, but were neat and tidy and in there proper place.

The story took a Goldilocks turn when Snow White ate a little food off of each of the seven plates and drank a little from the seven cups and then laid in each of the seven beds until the last one fit her perfectly and she fell fast asleep. When the dwarfs came home from working in the mountains they found their house not as they had left it. The story went on with each dwarf asking a question about who has been doing what to their things. When they finally noticed Snow White in the last bed, they decided not to wake her and let her sleep till morning. The next morning she awoke and the dwarfs asked her how she came to find their house. She told them the story of how she found their house and they told her that she could stay if she would look after the house, cook, make the beds, wash, sew, and knit, and keep everything clean and neat.

She agreed and life went on. The dwarfs knew that the evil queen would try to harm Snow White again so they told her to not let anyone in the house. The queen, who by this time had eaten what she thought was Snow White's lung and liver, asked her mirror again who was the fairest of them all and the mirror answered this time, "Queen, thou art the fairest that I see, but over the hills, where the seven dwarfs dwell, Snow-White is still alive and well, And there is none so fair as she" (Bell). Now this response angered the queen. The hunter had betrayed her and so she set out to kill Snow White herself. She painted her face and dressed herself like an old peddler-woman, and went over to the seven dwarfs' house yelling "Lovely things for sale!" and she held up a lace bodice that Snow White deeply wanted (Bell).

And of course na " ive Snow White let the old woman inside the house where she let the old lady lace up the bodice so tightly that it took Snow White's breath away (Bell). She lay on the floor as if she was dead, the dwarfs came home and saved her and she was alive again. They warned her again not to let anyone in the house, but the evil queen devised another plan and dressed herself up as another old lady with things for sale and went to the dwarfs' house to see snow white. Snow White told the lady that she wasn't allowed to let anyone in the house and the old lady told her that she could come outside and look. So she did and the old lady sold her a beautiful comb and put it in Snow White's hair and Snow White fell down again almost dead, but thanks to the dwarfs she was again saved. Once more the dwarfs told her not to let anyone in the house because the evil queen would sure be out to kill her again.

By this time the evil queen consulted her mirror once more and got the same response as last time and vowed that "Snow White shall die, even if it costs me my own life!" (Bell). So the queen made a poisoned apple that was white with red cheeks, painted her face and disguised herself as a farmer's wife and then went over to the seven dwarfs house (Bell). Snow White told the lady that she couldn't let anyone in the house. The old lady asked her if she wanted an apple and saw that Snow White was afraid to take it.

She asked the girl if she was afraid of poison and said to Snow White, "Look, I'll cut the apple in two halves, you eat the red cheek and I'll eat the white" (Bell). So Snow White was again fooled by the evil queen. She ate the apple and died this time. The dwarfs could not save her. The dwarfs mourned her death and put her body in a glass casket and wrote her name in gold letters on top of the casket for the entire world to see. One day a king's son came into the forest and saw the coffin and asked the dwarfs if he could keep the coffin.

Of course the dwarfs denied but by further persistence, they agreed and let the prince have the coffin. When the prince's servants were carrying the coffin away, they tripped over a bush and the piece of the poison apple that Snow White had eaten came out of her mouth and she awoke again. The prince told her that he loved her and that she was to be his wife. The evil queen was invited to the ceremony. She once more, consulted her mirror for who was the fairest of them all and the mirror answered again, Snow White. The queen was furious but went to the ceremony to see who the new queen was.

When she saw it was Snow White she couldn't move. At the end of the story, the evil queen was made to put on red hot slippers and dance till she dropped dead (Bell). How gruesome. Disney had the same idea but however, they came out with a video that was much more suitable for young children than the Grimm's version. Both the versions are similar but there are some details that Disney chooses to leave out of their movie version. Basically the differences are the opening of the Disney movie when the evil queen asks her mirror who the fairest of them all is and the mirror answers with Snow White.

After she got the answer she didn't want she sent the huntsman to kill Snow White but to bring back her heart in a red box. Well the huntsman, of course, couldn't do it, so Snow White ran away. Another difference is that the things in the forest did try to bother her while she was running away. She made friends with animals, which the Grimm's version doesn't have her doing.

And then she found the seven dwarfs house. She goes inside and finds the place a wreck, which is different from the neat and tidy house in the book. So she and the animals clean the house and Snow White goes upstairs, another difference, to the bedroom to take a nap. Disney gives the dwarfs a main part in the movie so they gave the seven dwarfs names. Sleepy, Happy, Dopey, Doc, Sneeze, Grumpy, and Bashful. Children everywhere love to remember the names of the seven Disney dwarfs.

So Snow White innocently falls asleep across their beds. When we meet the Disney dwarfs, they are working in the mines and at 5: 00 p.m. sharp, they leave work and sing the famous song: "Hiho, hiho, to home from work we go" (Disney). The dwarfs come home to find their house clean and neat. They think that a ghost is in the house until they find Snow White.

She wakes up and begs them to let her stay if she promises to cook and clean and keep house for them while they are gone. They agree and then the tale continues. The evil queen holds the box that she thinks holds Snow White's heart in it and asks the mirror the same question again. Since the mirror never lies, it told her that Snow White was the fairest of them all and when the queen argues and says that the mirror is wrong because she holds Snow White's heart in the box, the mirror tells her that she holds the heart of a pig, yet another difference. Of course the queen is angry and decides to make a poisoned apple to kill Snow White once and for all and the only antidote is a kiss from her one true love, which the queen thinks she will have no problem with because her true love doesn't know where she is. The queen puts together a spell that turns her into an old ugly woman and sets out towards the seven dwarfs' house.

Like the book, the dwarfs tell Snow White to beware of strangers because the queen is bad and full of witchcraft (Disney). The old woman comes up to the open window while Snow White is making gooseberry pies. She tells snow white that men prefer apple pie to gooseberry and to come try her magic wishing apple. So Snow White takes a bite of the apple and falls dead on the floor. The animals know what is going on and try to stop the queen by finding the dwarfs at work and trying to get them to come home to save Snow White. They finally do and they see the old lady, who they know is the evil queen, leaving their house and they follow her up to the top of this mountain of rocks.

Since the queen was at a dead end, she tried to roll this huge rock on top of all the dwarfs and animals and ended up falling off the cliff and dying. Which was quite a different twist from the Grimm's version? Disney uses words as a transition from the scene where the queen dies and the prince comes. After this scene, we see the words: .".. so beautiful even in death, that the dwarfs could not find it in their hearts to bury her... they fashioned a coffin of glass and gold, and kept eternal vigil at her side... the prince who had searched far and wide, heard of the maiden who slept in the glass coffin" (Disney). And of course as all fairytales end, the prince sees her, kisses her, she wakes up and they ride off into the sunset on his white horse with the words: THE END as the last thing we see when watching the movie. I grew up on the Disney version of Snow White.

It seems so strange to me that these are both the same story but yet they are so different. But is either right or wrong? Well that depends on when you lived. A few centuries ago, the Grimm's version probably would have been right, but now with all the advances in technology that we have today, we are able to see the same story, just in a different light. Years from now, I hope to tell my children and grandchildren the story of Snow White.

I just wonder what twists the story will take then..