Charles Perrault
Perrault was born in 1628 and died in 1703. He was a French author who began a new literary genre called the fairy tale. He is best known for tales such as Little Red Riding Hood, Sleeping Beauty, Puss-in-Boots, Cinderella, Bluebeard and Hop o' My Thumb. Perrault's famous tales are still around today and have been made into operas, ballets, plays, musicals and films. The tales that Perrault wrote were mostly adapted from earlier folk tales. Also there has been criticism about Perrault outlining his fairy tales were a little subversive as they contain an underlying criticism of the aristocracy.
Charles Perrault
Analysis of Perrault's Sleeping Beauty
Perrault's version of "The Sleeping Beauty in the Woods" differs in many ways compared to the Grimms version and Disney version. Perrault's version can be seen to be from more of a literary nature. Also his version accentuates aspects of society.
Perrault's version is more literary in the way it pays attention to detailed descriptions. An example of this is how he describes the fairy's place sitting at the celebration from Perrault's fairy tales (Carter 1967) "and before each fairy's place was a solid golden casket containing a knife, fork and spoon of pure gold inlaid with diamonds and rubies." He also pays attention to detail in other places in the story such as how they tried to revive the princess and how the princess looked while she was asleep. These are just a few examples among many in Perrault's version. Apparently, this kind of description traditionally does not exist in folk tales because they need to be remembered in order to be passed on orally.
Another aspect of Perrault's version that is inconsistent with the idea of oral tradition is the fact that the story continues after the prince wakes the princess. In this version the prince and princess marry but the prince does not tell his parents about the princess. The prince tells his parents he goes hunting when he sneaks away and visits the princess. This goes on for two years and they also have two children in the meantime called Dawn and Day. Eventually the prince's father dies and the prince has to become the King and takes his family to meet his mother who is of ogress decendent. The King has to go to war and his mother wants to eat her grandchildren and her daughter-in-law. The ogress thinks she has eaten them but really she hasn't thanks to some handy work by her majordomo (head chef), she is infuriated when she finds out she has been tricked and wants to put her son's family into a vat full of creatures to kill them. This is about to happen when the prince comes back and saves the day, the Queen can't deal with the shame so instead she jumps into the vat of creatures and dies. This second part of the story is said to be very common in literary tales.
It is said that Perrault also broke a fairy tale convention when he addressed time, when he wrote about the princess' clothes (Carter 1967) "the prince was careful not to tell her that her dress, with its great starched ruff, would have been fashionable in his grandmother's day." This is something that obviously wasn't done when writing tales but this was all part of Perrault's own style.
Perrault also referred to society a lot in his version of Sleeping Beauty. An example at the start of the story is how he tells us (Carter 1967) "They travelled all over the world taking the waters, they made vows and pilgrimages, but all to no avail." Here he is telling the reader the extent to what the King and Queen go to in order to have a child that an average couple probably could not do, which indicates the privileges of the aristocracy at these times. Another example of this is when the good fairy casts a spell on the castle for everyone to fall asleep (Carter 1967) "governesses, ladies-in-waiting, chambermaids, gentlemen, officers, stewards, cooks, scullions, errand boys, guards, porters, pages and footmen." This suggests that Perrault was making fun of the aristocracy and how many servants and people they had working for them.
Details that differ from the Perrault and Grimm version are that in the Perrault version there is no foretelling of the birth by a frog or a fish or any type of creature as there is in the Grimm version. In the Perrault version the princess awakes when the prince only kneels down beside her, which tells us that the prince really does nothing to end the spell. Also in this version the evil fairy does not give her an age when she will be pricked nor is she there when she is pricked by the spindle, whereas in the Grimm version the evil fairy foretells it will happen at the age of fifteen. There are only eight fairies whereas in Grimm's there are thirteen fairies. In Grimm's version the evil fairy was not invited because there was not enough cutlery and crockery but in Perrault's she was not invited as no one knew she was still alive. Perrault also presents a moral at the end of his story in the form of a poem.
The differences in Perrault's version do not change the traditional plot of the story. Perrault is just more elaborate by adding mention of things in society at that time and making it more of a literary tale. Perrault's only significant difference was to add the second part of the story that is not evident in any of the other versions of Sleeping Beauty.
Strengths and Weaknesses
Strengths:
*The story is not so fairy tale like, it's not just an easy happy ending such as they just kiss and everybody lives happily ever after. There is conflict in it so it is like an actual story, not just like another ordinary fairy tale.
*I liked in this version how the bad fairy wasn't invited because they thought she was dead rather than just because they didn't like her as in Disney version, it provided more of a sense of a real story and not just a fairy tale where all the good characters are against the bad characters.
* Perrault is real, he is not just a fairy tale writer, he provides a sense of reality. For example how he wrote that the prince was thinking that the princess' clothes were old fashioned like his grandmothers, was very real and not something we normally see in fairy tales.
Weaknesses:
*I feel the way the Queen just gets pregnant all of a sudden is a bit of a weakness in the story. As I said above Perrault is real and doesn't tell his story like a normal fairy tale like the other versions and for the Queen just to get pregnant like that seemed like a weakness to me.
*In Perrault's version it wasn't clear at what age the spell was meant to happen, it was just at 15 or 16. That appeared to me that Perrault had been a bit lazy with the story line beacause in the other versions they give the age when the spell is meant to be taken out.
*Another weakness I felt existed in the story was when the Queen wants to kill her granchildren and daughter-in-law. She is so infuriated that they are still alive and is ready to kill them but when the King comes in she just jumps into the vat of evil creatures and kills herself, which I thought was a definite easy way out for Perrault to end the story.
*The ultimate weakness in Perrault's version I feel is the second part of the story. This part is not as interesting as the first half nor is it necessary at all. I feel the first half of the story provides an interesting read and the second half is just a bit dull and out there, such as how the prince's mother is an ogress.
