Top-Rated Free Essay
Preview

Little Red Riding Hood

Good Essays
1075 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Little Red Riding Hood
The many tales of Little Red Riding Hood provides us with historical changes in the way women have been perceivedthroughout history. Little Red Riding Hood has transformed from naive to sophistication depending on the cultural and the moral beliefs within that time. She has evolved even before theCharles Perrault version in 1697 and the more known version by Grimm brothers in 1812 and still being reinvented to please its current audience. The development of the tale allowed us to vision the tone of a particular world view in the hands of new interpretation. Little red riding hood is a classic story told worldwide, but as many historical periods are different, the story varies based on past and contemporary cultural issues.
Before the first printed versions of Little Red Riding Hoodin the 1800’s, children literature has not yet existed. Children as we called and treat them today had not always been the same. When Little Red Riding Hood was only an oral versionyoung women were used as adults and sexually provoked to give up their virginity. Children, not being children at all, were naturally acting as adults. There are some versions of Little Red Riding where she performs a strip tease, removing her clothing one at a time. In order to survive to stay alive, the little girl was capable of buying more escape time by slowly sheading her clothes for the wolf. The meaning of childhood was not recognized as a concept of innocence or a development stage for growth, but a concept survival. “Before there could be children’s books, there had to be children- children, that is who were accepted as beings with their own particular needs and interests, not only miniature men and women.” Little Red Riding Hood started out a tale for adults which can explain the explicit language and sexual content of the early versions of this fairytale. Little Red Riding Hood was interpreted to fit the“concerns, hopes, and fears during their time and culture.” She has changed with the discourse and ideology of the culture from which she is reborn to communicate through a specific time.
In the versions of Little Red Riding Hood written byCharles Perrault, Little Red Riding Hood was characterized as being “the prettiest you can imagine,” but gullible in depth of no survival. Perrault, an upper classman in the 1600’s, felt as if young well-bred ladies needed to understand they are subject to manipulation and will be gobbled up if not careful.Acknowledging Perrault’s time of male dominance and femalesubordination, he portrays the ignorance of a young girl by allowing her to be fooled and victimized. It was not untilduring the discourse of time in 1812, did the Grimm brothers bring out a male hero to save Little Red Riding Hood’s life. InGrimm’s version of Little Red Riding Hood, Little Red learns her lesson after being rescued by the huntsman, who intended to skin the wolf. The Grimm brother’s tale provided Little Red a chance to use what she learned and gain victory over thesecond time with another wolf. Grimm’s version also differs from Perrault’s because he mentions no social stratification for Little Red Riding Hood, where Perrault set her as a lower classvillage girl.
Little Red Riding Hood has evolved tremendously in the 1900’s along with woman’s right to vote, the 19th Amendment; change for women empowerment became the upward social mobility for equality. James Thurber shared his version of Little Red Riding Hood in the 1940 called the Little Girl and the Wolf where the moral of the story is, “It is not so easy to fool little girls nowadays as it used to be.” Thurber’s versiondoesn’t allow the little girl to look naïve and fall for the trickery of the wolf; instead she shoots the wolf with an automatic twenty-five feet from the wolf, making her not only dangerous with a gun but smart enough from a distance to see what was going on. Little Red Riding Hood has been molded with correspondence of the time; maturing to satisfy an evolving, demanding audience as of the modern day woman.Each writer continually innovates her role as a more powerful model who will not be defeated by any wolf.
With the hands of great writers, Little Red Riding Hood is now the undefeated young girl that has sophisticated hervictorious ending with humor and charm. Transforming the well known classic tale while still maintaining its identity in different society setting gave Little Red Riding Hood a stamp in historical tales. Roald Dahl was one of the funniest versions, written as a brilliant rhyme with a twisted plot. Dahl wrote two short stories that incorporated Little Red Riding Hood; first oneinvolves her killing the wolf with her pistol without any trouble, and then replacing her red cloak to what was the wolf skin, to show honorable symbol for her kill. The second tale by Dahl evolves even more by adding Little Red Riding Hood as a well known wolf killer to the three little pigs. At the end of the story with the last pig standing, the pig telephones Little Red Riding Hood to rescue him from the big bad wolf. Dahl more modern Little Riding Red Riding Hood comes over after drying her hair and pulls out a pistol from her snickers and kills the wolf. The twisted part of the story is when she adds, “Ah, piglet, you must never trust Young ladies from the upper crust. For now, Miss Riding Hood, one notes, not only has twowolfskin coats, she has a pigskin traveling case.” This part of the story reflects the desires and needs of the average girl in today’s society, which include fancy coats and items of suchnature. Little Red Riding Hood is definitely grown up with the changes of time. Developing and coming into her own, Little Red Riding Hood has learned that most women nowadays have a voice in regards to anti-discrimination and gender equality.
Little Red Riding Hood’s fictional tale is now a perfect story line to alter and fit many current situations a women might be dealing with or can relate to. Her character being well known has a fan base that can bring in revenue which can add to the changes in the plot. If Little Red Riding has an audience that want to see her act

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Typically fairy tales are short stories that feature folkloric fantasies that contain explicit moral lessons and unusually happy happy, “fairy tale” endings. Anne Sexton’s poems in Transformations, however challenges the ideology that exist within the classic tales, and adds a pinch of cynicism to them. In doing so, she reinvent these tales, replacing their unvaried traditional message with a fresh more inclusive message. Sexton’s “Red Riding Hood” is one of the many poetic retelling that she makes. In the poem she conveys deceit and defines what a person who deceives is and what they do to innocent gullible people.…

    • 648 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Carl-Heinz Mallet in "Little Red Riding Hood: Rated R" applies psychoanalytic criticism to evaluate the relationship between male and female characters. The wolf who is the only male character in the text presents with all the desires and characteristics a man has especially on sexual desire. Mallet mentions the moral of the story, "Little Red Riding Hood" means to give a message on how sexual behavior is considered to be wicked. From the detail, little red riding hood is a naive and innocent girl who doesn't afraid talking to a male stranger. Mallet reveals that the little girl is acting innocent because the mother tells her don't leave the path, but she apparently ignores her mother by talks to the wolf and walks into the forest. Little red…

    • 929 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Every so often, there comes a story so popular that it survives many decades and is common in many cultures. Growing up here in America, I was always told the story of Little Red Riding Hood. Because of the way American structure is set up, the story in this culture teaches the people told the story a lesson as well as has a happy ending. The American story of “Little Red Riding Hood” isn’t the only version of this story. As previously mentioned, there are stories that survive many decades and last through many cultures; this is one of them. However, they all have different names. There are also: Little Red Cap, Little Red Hood, The Grandmother, The True History of Little Golden Hood, Grandmother’s Nose, and Little Red Hat. These stories come from many different areas such as Germany, Poland, Italy, Austria, and France, and they have many different authors. There are two things that do stay the same throughout every retelling of this story, the characters and idea. There is always a little girl, her grandmother, her mother, and the wolf. Additionally, in every retelling, it involves the little girl having to go to her grandmother’s house to deliver something to her. However, the actions taken by the characters and their personalities change in every telling of the story. Although every version of Little Red Riding Hood has a similar idea, the characterization and moral of the story alters based upon what time period and location it was written in because of the influences of the country of origin’s stereotypes, ideals, and…

    • 280 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    The opening chapter of the book, “Peasants Tell Tales: The Meaning of Mother Goose”, provides a historical reading of the many fairy tales we were told as young innocent children. These fairy tales had everything but happy endings and sweet morals. The gruesome truth is revealed for each fairy tale including Hansel and Gretel, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty,…

    • 1566 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Fairy tales are part of every Western child 's upbringing, and have been for decades. The method of telling and the stories them selves may have changed from the purely oral tradition to that of the written word with the introduction of the printing press and more importantly the Chap Book in the eighteenth century (Montgomery, 2009 p. 13). But the basic core of the tales remain hundreds of years on to instruct and delight children to this day. These days children are surrounded by fairy tales in the form of the books read to them at home or nursery/school, television and film adaptations, cartoons and even advertisements, as well as Christmas pantomimes. Each version they see will have differences, some more subtle than others, but the basic story will be the same.…

    • 2178 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Eng 125, Week 2

    • 707 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Many short stories have been written throughout time. Many are just for entertainment, but many of them are for teaching a lesson. Little Red Riding Hood was written partly to teach a lesson. In France, a girl that loses her virginity is said to have “seen a wolf.” That is what this story is based on. Little Red Riding Hood is about a little girl that runs in to a wolf in the forest as she is on her way to her grandmother’s house. Her grandmother was ill and her mother baked some food to make her feel better, in which Little Red Riding Hood was taking to her grandmother. When she met the wolf, the wolf was thinking he did not want to attack the girl because there were workers in the area and he did not want there to be any witnesses. Therefore, the wolf gained the trust of the little girl in just a short time so he can learn where the grandmother lived. The little girl, being naïve, gave the location of her grandmother’s house to the wolf. The end result was the death of the grandmother and the little girl because the wolf ate both of them.…

    • 707 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Different versions of Little Red Riding Hood have been retold throughout written history. Each retelling was written in a culture of its own, which holds its own philosophies on each of the continuing main ideas in each version. One integral philosophy is their principles of femininity. Because so much time had past from the original work to the time of the newer retelling, the newer version had to be rewritten to tell a different tale, distinguishing the principles of femininity that the two cultures contrasted. Two versions that contrast very well are Brother Grimms Little Red Cap and Tanith Lees Wolfland. They offer different positions of femininity, one representing the innocence of the earlier 19th century, the other representing the dominance of the late 20th century.…

    • 824 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Little Red Riding Hood

    • 605 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Angela Carter’s rendition of the Little Red Riding Hood is called The Company of Wolves. This version begins by creating the image of a dangerous, cunning, and ferocious creature – the wolf. Carter tells tales of wolves and their evil and deceiving ways. She later transitions into her version of Little Red Riding Hood and creates the sense of a vulnerable and innocent girl. However, by the end of the story, this girl shows a not-so-innocent side. Throughout The Company of Wolves, a sense of feministic ideas is portrayed as Carter expresses a view of women being dominant over men.…

    • 605 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Grimm Brothers describe Little Red Cap forcing the wolf “down the roof” with the smell of sausage, and consequentially drowning in the trough (Tatar 16). “Little Dread Riding Hood” portrays that heroic scene by designing a presumably older little red riding hood riding a wolf as though it was a horse. This domestication, or possibly dead body, of the wolf into a play toy demonstrations how little red riding hood matures, and is able to defend herself against the wolf rather than relying on someone else, the huntsman, to save…

    • 430 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Literature allows us, as readers, to relate to stories in different ways while portraying a universal theme. As far as children’s stories go, the literal text will capture a child’s imaginations while an adult may push past that point and unravel a more critical message. By cunningly adapting hidden motives into the story, it allows the reader to open the door to more possibilities. When applied to Andrew Lang’s translation of Little Red Riding Hood, we are shown the sexual insinuations, and just how dangerous it is for children to be left alone.…

    • 758 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Little Red Riding Hood

    • 1042 Words
    • 5 Pages

    The stories "Little Red Riding Hood," by Charles Perrault, and "Little Red Cap," by the Brothers Grimm, are similar and different. Moreover, both stories differ from the American version. The stories have a similar moral at the end, each with a slight twist. This story, in each of its translations, is representative of a girl 's loss of innocence, her move from childhood or adolescence into adulthood. The way women are treated within each story is different. Little Red in the French version was eaten; whereas in the German version, she is rescued by the woodsman, and this further emphasizes the cultural differences.…

    • 1042 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Ed Young Essay

    • 714 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Some may say it is the Chinese version of the famous tale of Red-Riding Hood. This book, however, is distinctively different than most children’s books. The images are vivid, realistic, and imaginative. Young uses a unique combination of pastels and watercolors to enhance and compliment the story. He incorporates key virtues such as prudence, honesty, and cooperation as well as vices; greed, disobedience, and foolishness.…

    • 714 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In the story of “Little Red Cap” they described the little girl as little girl who everyone loved. Her grandmother loved her the most of all so she decides to give her a gift. The gift was a little red velvet cap, the little girl did not want to wear anything else, so everyone calls her little red cap. In “Little Red Riding Hood” she was described as the prettiest girl that was ever seen. The little girl mother adored her so much, but her grandmother adored her even more. In this story her grandmother makes her a red hood like the ones that fine ladies wear when they go riding. The hood suited the child so well everybody was calling her Little Red Riding Hood.…

    • 694 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    In the story “ Little Red Riding Hood” the author (Charles Perrault) used Little Red Riding Hood to show the reader not to trust strangers. Charles Perrault also wanted the reader to not expose or tell their personal information. He uses these characters like they are real life people in order for children to learn the lesson. The theme of “Little Red Riding Hood” was that children must obey parents and that they must never talk to strangers. Even a very friendly stranger is capable of having bad intentions.…

    • 226 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Snow White

    • 859 Words
    • 4 Pages

    The conservative nature of this text is overwhelming. The author is not challenging children to do anything; but rather teaching them that if they are obedient then they will be happy. For example, Snow-white and Rose-red are described in various ways throughout the story: “ . . . the sweetest and best children in the world, always diligent and always cheerful . . . they always walked about hand in hand whenever they went out together . . . they drew round the fire, while the mother put on her spectacles and read aloud from a big book and the two girls listened and sat and span . . . the tender-hearted children . . .” The children are described as wonderful and obedient children who help anyone in need. They are seen as a quaint family that never argues, listens to their mother read stories around a fire, and did traditional “girl” things like spinning. The ending shows that because of their good hearts they were rewarded: “Snow-white married him, and Rose-red his brother, and they divided the great treasure the dwarf had collected in his cave between them. The old mother lived for many years peacefully with her children . . .” This “fairy tale” ending shows that if you are a good child then good things will happen to you. The text does not wish for children to challenge the things that their mother tells them to do. The text reinforces a sense of good behavior and family closeness.…

    • 859 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays