Simple version of little red riding hood

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The true story of Little Red Riding Hood

© Tatyana Vorontsova

190 years ago, on October 18, 1812, two young scientists, the brothers Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, put the final point in the book bestseller of German-language literature. The book was called “Children's and Household Tales”, and it was from it that the world became known

“Once upon a time there was a little, sweet girl. And whoever looked at her, everyone liked her, but her grandmother loved her more than anyone and was ready to give her everything. So she once gave her a cap of red velvet, and because this cap suited her very well and she didn’t want to wear any other, they called her Little Red Riding Hood ... ”Who in childhood was not fascinated by this seemingly naive, artless text? Nevertheless, the story of Little Red Riding Hood is not so simple: it is tortuous and intricate, just as human consciousness is tortuous and intricate.

The first literary version of this old folk tale was published by Charles Perrault in 1697 in Paris - in the book "Tales of my mother Goose, or Stories and tales of bygone times with teachings", dedicated to the princess of the French royal house. In those days, the story of a girl who went to visit her grandmother and met a wolf on the road was told all over Europe - both in the homes of commoners and in the castles of the nobility. The tale was especially popular in the Tyrol and the foothills of the Alps, where it had been known at least since the 14th century. Actually, it was a lot of stories: in the north of Italy, the granddaughter brought fresh fish to her grandmother, in Switzerland - a head of young cheese, in the south of France - a pie and a pot of butter; in some cases, the wolf was the winner, in others, the girl ... Perrault took one of the options as a basis, dressed up the nameless girl in a “companion” cap of scarlet velvet and bestowed the name - Little Red Riding Hood. I must say that in France at the turn of the 17th-18th centuries, when social differences in clothing were strictly regulated, only aristocrats and middle-class women wore such headdresses. A simple village girl, who easily walked in a velvet cap of a defiant color, and even - contrary to her mother's orders - entered into a conversation with a stranger, obviously understood a lot about herself, which the harsh era of the Enlightenment did not encourage. In the finale, the wolf taught a cruel lesson to all the windy young ladies: he "attacked Little Red Riding Hood and swallowed her."

The gallant author crowned the “cute trifle” (as he called his fairy tale) with a moral:

Little children, not without reason

(And especially girls, beauties and spoiled girls),

Encountering all kinds of men on the way,

No speeches

Otherwise, the wolf might eat them...

The popularity of Perrault's book was amazing, although the 69-year-old author himself, a prominent royal official and member of the French Academy, fearing ridicule, at first did not dare to put his own name on the collection, therefore for the first time, "Tales of Mother Goose" was published signed by the 11-year-old son of the writer - D'Armancourt.

But the “canonization” of the text did not end there. From the pages of a French book, Little Red Riding Hood returned to oral stories, and a hundred years later reappeared in a literary version - in German Kassel. This time, the philologists brothers Wilhelm and Jacob Grimm acted as authors, who saw in fairy tales by no means “trifles”. Grimms perceived folk tales as a necessary link in the unification of the fragmented German principalities-electors, who spoke different dialects, into a single national state. The goal of the Grimms was to collect and voice "living folk poetry", to preserve the authenticity of folk art. They believed that the “German pramith” was contained in fairy tales, and in their book “Children's and Household Tales” they selected only those stories that were popular in the territory of German settlement. Grimm's fairy tales were considered as pantries in which a single memory of the mythological ideas and beliefs of their ancestors was preserved, and they saw their task in revealing the “authenticity”, the true nationality of the plot. Based on the idea of ​​the unity of the people, the Grimms did not distinguish between written and oral sources, as well as the belonging of authors to different social and cultural strata, believing that in any of the options there is both truth and artificiality. They presented their own version of Little Red Riding Hood, combining oral stories, the fairy tale of Charles Perrault, as well as the verse play “The Life and Death of Little Red Riding Hood”, written in 1800 by the German romantic writer Ludwig Tiek (it was Tiek who introduced the hunter who saves the girl and grandmother from the belly of a wolf).

A feature of the fairy tale by the Brothers Grimm is the abundance of details, sometimes seeming nonsense, sometimes everyday life, sometimes just rudeness and cruelty. The girl's grandmother does not live in another village, but in the forest itself. Little Red Riding Hood brings her a piece of cake and a bottle of wine in her apron, and her mother sternly admonishes her: “Go modestly, as you should; don’t turn aside from the road, otherwise you’ll fall and break the bottle, then grandmother won’t get anything. And when you enter her room, do not forget to say hello to her, and not only to look back and forth in all corners first. The wolf reproachfully tells the girl that she is going, “as if she is in a hurry to go to school”, offers to “have fun in the forest”, and Little Red Riding Hood, succumbing to persuasion, enters the forest thicket and begins to collect flowers. Having eaten the grandmother, the wolf not only lays down in her bed, but first puts on a dress and cap. At the same time, he leaves the door wide open. Having swallowed the girl, the wolf snores so loudly throughout the forest that the hunter passing by the hut thinks if he needs to help the old woman. Seeing the wolf, the hunter takes the scissors and rips open the sleeping belly: “As soon as he made the first incision, he sees that the little red cap is visible inside. He quickly made a second incision, and a girl jumped out of there and screamed:

— Oh, how scared I was! It was so dark in the wolf's belly!

Grandmother also got out after Little Red Riding Hood, barely alive - she could not catch her breath. ” Then the wolf is punished: his belly is stuffed with large stones. Waking up, he wants to run away, but heavy stones are pulled down, and the wolf falls dead. Each of the winners receives his reward: the hunter takes home the skin taken from the wolf, the grandmother, after eating a cake and drinking wine, gets better, and Little Red Riding Hood learns a life lesson: “From now on, I will never turn off the highway alone without my mother’s permission” . Soon the girl meets another wolf in the forest, and this meeting turns out to be fatal for him: Little Red Riding Hood and Grandmother drown the stupid villain in the trough without anyone's help.

The first publication of "Children's and Household Tales" did not arouse much enthusiasm. The Brothers Grimm's book was seen as a cross between a scientific document and children's fun, the publication was not bought up - readers demanded fabulous romantic short stories. However, after some time, either the authors successfully finalized the material, or the public got used to a strange mixture of archaic oral folk tradition and its literary fixation - the book began to diverge with a bang. Numerous translations were also not long in coming...

Since then, "Little Red Riding Hood" has become the most popular folk book fairy tale in Europe, and then in the world - always relevant and full of hidden meaning, which many tried to comprehend, sometimes crossing all sorts of boundaries in their conclusions.

So, since the fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm came out in the year of the victory over Napoleon, in 1812, and were collected at a time when the lands of the Rhine were under the French heel, some researchers saw the French “intruder” in the wolf, and the suffering German people in Little Red Riding Hood , and in the hunter - the expected disinterested liberator. And a century later, the ideologues of the Third Reich, who declared "Children's and Household Tales" by the Brothers Grimm a sacred book, wrote in all seriousness that Little Red Riding Hood embodies the German people, persecuted by the wolf of Jewry.

The Grimms themselves, deeply religious people, saw in Little Red Riding Hood a single symbol of rebirth - a descent into the darkness and transformation. A hundred years later, Christian researchers who developed this idea declared Little Red Riding Hood the personification of human passions: vanity, self-interest and hidden lust. In the wolf, these same passions are embodied clearly and definitely. Only freed from the wolf's belly, as if born again, the girl is transformed.

Neo-mythologists, supporters of the so-called “wolf-solar theory”, who also considered themselves followers of the Grimms, argued that the fairy tale reflects the change of natural phenomena: the grandmother living in the forest in a house “under three large oaks” is mother nature, Little Red Riding Hood is the sun , the wolf is winter, and the hunter is the new year. Neo-pagans (there were some) considered the wolf to be the most positive character in the fairy tale. The red color of the girl's headdress seemed to them the embodiment of danger, and the grandmother, living in a dense forest, evoked associations with Baba Yaga and the goddess of death of the ancient Germans (by the way, pies and wine were a common sacrifice for the dead and other representatives of the underworld among all Indo-Europeans). So the wolf seemed to them to be something like an ancestor hero, who was trying to free the world from death and fell victim in an unequal struggle.

Initially, in the oral tradition of the fairy tale about Little Red Riding Hood, the wolf was not just an animal, but a werewolf (this is where his ability to speak in a human voice and successful attempts to disguise himself as a grandmother come from). The Grimms, like Perrault, did not advertise it, but implied it. At the end of the 20th century, interest in mysticism provoked a number of relevant interpretations of Little Red Riding Hood, among which the most famous interpretation of the British "Oscar" Neil Jordan - he turned this story into a love thriller about werewolves "In the company of wolves".

People of the 19th century saw a pure image in Little Red Riding Hood. A fan of "Children's and Household Tales" Charles Dickens in his "Christmas Stories" shared naive childhood reflections: "I felt that if I could marry Little Red Riding Hood, I would know true happiness. " And the Grimms themselves, who dreamed of returning to their national roots, generally believed that before the world was asexual, and “people produced children with just one look (as God acts only with a thought)” - only “then they needed kisses for this and, finally, hugs and carnal intercourse." “Teutonic religious neurotics” (so the brothers were dubbed by little-believing psychoanalysts of the 20th century) when preparing fairy tales for publication, they expelled from them all to any extent erotic scenes and expressions, because they believed that “old poetry” was “innocent”.

The 20th century made Little Red Riding Hood a brand and a diagnosis. So, in the 30s, supporters of Freud's student Erich Fromm declared that Little Red Riding Hood is a fully matured girl, and her headdress is a symbol of physiological maturity. The mother's warnings to stay on the road and beware of breaking the bottle are warnings against casual relationships and loss of virginity. The main characters of the tale are three generations of women. The wolf, embodying the masculine principle, is a “ruthless and treacherous animal”, and the hunter is a conventional image of Little Red Riding Hood's father (which is why he is not among the despised men). In general, the story tells about the triumph of the female half of humanity over the male and returns the reader to the world of matriarchy.

In the 1960s, the era of the sexual revolution and the rise of feminism, researchers began to talk about swallowing as rape, a symbolic description of uncontrollable sexual appetite. At the same time, the girl herself provokes the wolf to active actions: she wears a bright hat, talks to a stranger, has fun in the forest ... At the same time, the wolf turns out to be a transvestite and secretly envies the woman's ability to become pregnant. That is why he swallows his grandmother and granddaughter whole, making an attempt to put living beings in his stomach. At the end of the wolf, stones are killed - symbols of sterility, which is a mockery of the desire to play childbirth . ..

There were not so many of those who remembered that Little Red Riding Hood was a fairy tale for children. They timidly pointed to the educational aspect: an innocent child should beware of life's dangers and obey mother's orders. The initial “innocence” of the story was also indicated by the fact that the wolf did not die when the hunter cut open his stomach in order to free the girl and grandmother.

The story of the second wolf was forgotten in the 20th century, it is not mentioned in all modern editions of the Brothers Grimm's fairy tales. In essence, this is a sequel, a story about a completely different girl - more experienced, correct, who learned the lessons of the “previous series”. And Little Red Riding Hood, who has lost her innocent naivete, is not interesting to the world - even if it has comprehended everything and survived all possible revolutions ...

source: Everything for the teacher of literature

Read the fairy tale Little Red Riding Hood online

The fairy tale of Charles Perrault Little Red Riding Hood is one of the undoubted leaders of fairy tale characters all over the world. The story that happened to the girl is short, but it teaches a lot. The love for Grandmother, fearlessness, kindness of the Riding Hood is put at the ready of the evil of the wolf, who lives alone in the dark forest. The fairy tale is perfect for reading at night, many parents choose this fairy tale as the first fairy tale for their child.

Once upon a time in a village there was a girl of unprecedented beauty: her mother loved her without memory, and her grandmother even more.

Once a grandmother sewed a red hat for her beloved granddaughter, and the girl liked it so much that she did not want to take it off. She went everywhere in her cap, and therefore they began to call her Little Red Riding Hood.

Once a mother has baked pies and says to her daughter:

— Go and visit your grandmother, she is not well. Yes, take her pies and a pot of butter. Look only in the forest, do not stop and do not talk to anyone.

Little Red Riding Hood was an obedient girl, she immediately packed up and went to her grandmother, who lived in another village.

She is walking along a forest path and then a wolf meets her. The wolf wanted to eat it, but was afraid, because the sound of woodcutters was heard nearby. So he asks:

— Where are you going, Little Red Riding Hood?

The poor girl has forgotten that it is dangerous to stop in the forest and talk to wolves, and answers him:

— I am going to my grandmother; I bring her pies and a pot of butter.

— Does your grandmother live far away? the wolf asks.

- Very far away! - answers Little Red Riding Hood: - over there behind that mill that can be seen at the edge of the forest; and there will be the first house as you enter the village.

“You know,” the wolf says to her, “I’ll go and visit your grandmother.” - I will go this way, and you go on that one: let's see which of us will reach faster.

And the wolf rushed with all his might to run along the shortest road, and the girl wandered slowly along the longest. Along the way, she collected bouquets and sang songs.

The wolf ran first to the grandmother's house. Knocked:

- Knock, knock.

Who is there?

- It's me, your granddaughter, Little Red Riding Hood, - answered the wolf in a thin voice: - I brought you pies and a pot of butter.

Grandmother was lying in bed because she was a little unwell, and shouted from there:

— Pull the rope, the door will open by itself.

The wolf pulled the rope, the door opened. He rushed at the old woman and swallowed her at once, because he had not eaten anything for more than three days.

Then he locked the door, lay down in his grandmother's bed and began to wait for Little Red Riding Hood, who after a while reached her grandmother's house and knocked:

— Knock, knock.

Who is there?

Hearing the rough voice, Little Red Riding Hood was frightened at first, but thinking that her grandmother's voice must have been hoarse because of illness, she answered:

— It's me, your granddaughter, Little Red Riding Hood, who brought you pies and a pot of butter.

The wolf called as loud as he could:

- Pull the string, the door will open by itself.

Little Red Riding Hood pulled the string, the door opened. When the girl came in, the wolf wrapped himself tightly in a blanket so that she would not recognize him, and said:

- Put somewhere a pie and a pot of butter, and go lie down with me, rest from the road.

Little Red Riding Hood lay down next to her and asked:

— Grandmother, grandmother, why do you have such big hands?

— This, granddaughter, to hug you tighter.

— Grandmother, grandmother, why do you have such big ears?

— This, granddaughter, to hear you better.

— Grandmother, grandmother, why do you have such big eyes?

— This, granddaughter, to see you better.

— Grandmother, grandmother, why do you have such big teeth?

- And this is to eat you!

And with these words the evil wolf rushed at Little Red Riding Hood and swallowed her. It is good that at that time woodcutters worked in the forest. They heard a noise and ran into the house, where they immediately rushed to the wolf. They freed Little Red Riding Hood and Grandmother. Both were whole and unharmed.

Little Red Riding Hood is one of the most popular fairy tales and not only among the fairy tales of Charles Perrault, but also among the fairy tales of all authors all over the world.

This fairy tale is included in the list of those that are read among the first children. A simple and seemingly uncomplicated story of a girl in a red cap, in fact, is a fairy tale with a deep meaning and psychological overtones.

The fairy tale Little Red Riding Hood is a story with morals and clear conclusions:

• You can't do what your mother doesn't tell you
• Don't talk to strangers
• Don't go astray
• Don't be too trusting

However, Little Red Riding Hood is doing bad things. At the first meeting with danger, with a wolf, she forgets all the instructions of her mother and begins to talk with the beast.

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