I can’t
very well do fairy tales in October without doing the most popular tale with a
witch. For this story, I use the 1857 final edition, but as a special bonus,
you can see how the original 1812 version compares to the 1857 version of Hansel & Gretel.
Evil is Stupid
Both the
witch and the evil step-mother (pretty much all step-mothers are evil in fairy
tales, just look back at Cinedrella) demonstrate an inability to come up with
and execute any kind of real plan. The step-mother falls back on abandoning the
children in the woods, and the witch allows herself to be trapped in her own
oven. Clearly they did not receive Ph.D.s from an institution like Dr. Evil
did.
Children are More Clever than Adults
Hansel is
able to concoct a plan to get them back out of the woods, while Gretel tricks
the witch into the oven. They also prove themselves to be level-headed and
think through their problems when the need arises. This is especially telling
of Gretel who spends most of her time in the story clutching to Hansel and
crying, but when the need and opportunity arose, she demonstrated she was just
as clever. Moreover, she showed insight regarding the weight on the duckling,
which Hansel overlooked.
There Must Be Happily Ever After
The story
goes out of its way to ensure a happy ending. The witch is burned to a crisp,
the step-mother died off-stage, the father welcomes back his loving children,
and they have all the wealth they need to ensure that they’ll never go hungry
or want for anything again. The story becomes gutted because the conflicts are
so easily resolved. This sets a pattern for many of the revised stories that
offer the happy ending in favor of something more stark. Consider the original
version of Red Riding Hood that has no woodsman. The happy ending stories were
more popular selling, which drove the changes (buncha sellouts!).
Because Magic!
The story
is very sparse when it comes to explanations and logic. Granted that magic and
the supernatural changes things some, but it’s very difficult to explain the
house of bread, cake, and sugar glass. Why is it there? What’s its purpose so
deep in the woods? It seems as if its only function is that of a plot device to
entice Hansel and Gretel with something fantastic. It’s hard to believe that
such a house would continue to exist when so many birds pecked up Hansel’s
bread crumbs.
Moreover,
why does the witch have so much wealth in her house? Where did she come by it?
Do witches really earn that much for what they do? Is this a tradeoff for
becoming godless (since the story goes out of its way to mention that is what
she is)? Why leave it sitting around her house? Did she somehow conjure it? For
what purpose?
The
explanation is left simply at: she’s a witch. Witches have such things because
they enter into dark pacts with dark powers. No further explanation is
necessary.
Spineless
While the
father is not overtly evil like the step-mother, he nonetheless is not a very
good character. At the very least he is completely spineless. He can take no
action except what is given him by his wife. He expresses regret at leaving the
children, but at no point does he ever fight for them. In fact, he must be
considered passively evil because of his complicity in abandoning his children.
He selfishly chose his own continued existence over that of his children, which
would go against the strong Christian morality the story is trying to convey by
declaring the witch Godless and having Hansel repeatedly rely on God for help.
Cannibalism . . . or Pedophilia
Eating and
devouring can easily be construed as a metaphor for sexual acts. So the warning
message about strangers extends beyond those who would do basic physical harm
(by robbing, beating, or eating) to the psychological trauma of rape. This is
especially true when it comes to regarding witches who were thought to engage
in sexual acts with the devil or demons to get their powers. So readers
(especially adults, but possibly the children as well) would take away from
this story that witches—who were always outsiders in remote locations—would
rape children.
With this
interpretation in mind, the logic behind the cake and candy house now makes
sense as a lure for wayward children. This story likely serves as the
inspiration for the modern incarnation of the warning “Don’t take candy from
strangers,” with the implicit message to adults being that abducted children
will be sexually molested.