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{{about|the folk tale}}
sRY
[[File:Dore ridinghood.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A depiction by [[Gustave Doré]].]]
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|title= Red Riding Hood
|description=The version found in ''The Book of Fables and Folk Stories'' by Horace E. Scudder.
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'''Little Red Riding Hood''', or '''Little Red Ridinghood''', also known as '''Little Red Cap''' or simply '''Red Riding Hood''', is a French<ref name="Jacques Berlioz 2007 p63">Jacques Berlioz, ''Il faut sauver Le petit chaperon rouge''. Les Collections de L'Histoire (2007) n°36, p63</ref> and later European [[fairy tale]] about a young girl and a [[Big Bad Wolf]]. The story has been changed considerably in its history and subject to numerous modern adaptations and readings. The story was first published by [[Charles Perrault]].<ref>Bottigheimer, Ruth. (2008). "Before ''Contes du temps passe'' (1697): Charles Perrault's ''Griselidis'', ''Souhaits'' and ''Peau''". ''The Romantic Review'', Volume 99, Number 3. pp. 175-189</ref>

This story is number 333 in the [[Aarne-Thompson classification system]] for folktales.<ref>[[D. L. Ashliman]]. "[http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/type0333.html Little Red Riding Hood and other tales of Aarne-Thompson-Uther type 333]". Retrieved 2010-01-17.</ref>

==Tale==
[[File:Little Red Riding Hood - Project Gutenberg etext 19993.jpg|thumb|upright|Little Red Riding Hood, illustrated in a 1927 story anthology]]
The story revolves around a girl called Little Red Riding Hood, after the red [[hood (headgear)|hood]]ed [[cape]]/[[cloak]] (in [[Charles Perrault|Perrault]]'s fairytale) or simple [[cap]] (in the [[Grimms' Fairy Tales|Grimms']] version called Little Red-Cap) she wears. The girl walks through the woods to deliver food to her sickly grandmother (grape juice and banana bread, or wine and cake depending on the translation). In the [[Grimms' Fairy Tales|Grimms']] version at least, she had the order from her mother to stay strictly on the path.

A mean wolf wants to eat the girl and the food in the basket. He secretly stalks her behind trees and bushes and shrubs and patches of little grass and patches of tall grass. He approaches Little Red Riding Hood and she naïvely tells him where she is going. He suggests the girl pick some flowers, which she does. In the meantime, he goes to the grandmother's house and gains entry by pretending to be the girl. He swallows the grandmother whole (in some stories, he locks her in the closet) and waits for the girl, disguised as the grandma.

When the girl arrives, she notices that her grandmother looks very strange. Little Red then says, "What a deep voice you have!" ("The better to greet you with"), "Goodness, what big eyes you have!" ("The better to see you with"), "And what big hands you have!" ("The better to hug/grab you with"), and lastly, "What a big mouth you have" ("The better to eat you with!"), at which point the wolf jumps out of bed, and swallows her up too. Then he falls asleep. In Charles Perrault's written version, the first written version at all, the story comes to an end right here, only followed by a good deal of moralizing, (see below).

A [[lumberjack]] (with the Brothers Grimm, and always in German tradition, a [[hunter]]), however, comes to the rescue and with his axe cuts open the sleeping wolf. Little Red Riding Hood and her grandmother emerge unharmed. They fill the wolf's body with heavy stones. The wolf awakens and tries to flee, but the stones cause him to collapse and die. (Sanitized versions of the story have the grandmother shut in the closet instead of eaten, and some have Little Red Riding Hood saved by the lumberjack as the wolf advances on her, rather than after she is eaten.)<ref>{{cite book|last=Spurgeon|first=Maureen|title=Red Riding Hood|year=1990|publisher=Brown Watson|location=England|isbn=0709706928}}</ref>

[[File:Arthur Rackham Little Red Riding Hood+.jpg|thumb|left|upright|"Little Red Riding Hood" illustration by [[Arthur Rackham]].<ref name = "Txxxviff">{{Harvnb|Tatar|2004|pp=xxxviii}}</ref>]]
The tale makes the clearest contrast between the safe world of the village and the dangers of the [[enchanted forest|forest]], conventional antitheses that are essentially medieval, though no written versions are as old as that. Specifically, the tale parallels how an innocent victim can be taken in and controlled by a criminal mentality, therefore, facilitating further subjection of a crime or harm against a vulnerable victim through mischievous criminal intent by removing the victim from a familiar or "safe" public location — facilitating the crime in an effort to isolate the victim by drawing her to another location "away from the public eye" where the criminal entity has complete control over the victim.

It also warns about the dangers of not obeying the mother (at least in the [[Grimms' Fairy Tales|Grimms']] version).

===Relationship to other tales===
The theme of the ravening wolf and of the creature released unharmed from its [[stomach|belly]] is also reflected in the Russian tale ''[[Peter and the Wolf]]'', and the other Grimm tale ''[[The Wolf and the Seven Young Kids]]'', but its general theme of restoration is at least as old as ''[[Book of Jonah|Jonah and the Whale]]''. The theme also appears in the story of the life of [[Margaret the Virgin|Saint Margaret]], where the saint emerges unharmed from the belly of a [[dragon]], and in the epic "The Red Path" by Jim C. Hines.

The dialogue between the mean wolf and Little Red Riding Hood has its analogies to the Norse ''[[Þrymskviða]]'' from the ''[[Elder Edda]]''; the giant [[Þrymr]] had stolen [[Mjölner]], [[Thor]]'s hammer, and demanded [[Freyja]] as his bride for its return. Instead, the gods dressed Thor as a bride and sent him. When the giants note Thor's unladylike eyes, eating, and drinking, [[Loki]] explains them as Freyja not having slept, or eaten, or drunk, out of longing for the wedding.<ref>[[Iona and Peter Opie]], ''The Classic Fairy Tales''. p. 93-4. ISBN 0-19-211559-6</ref>

==Tale's history==
[[File:Walter Crane26.jpg|thumb|right|upright|"The better to see you with": woodcut by [[Walter Crane]]]]

===Earliest versions===
The origins of the Little Red Riding Hood story can be traced to versions from various European countries and more than likely preceding the 17th century, of which several exist, some significantly different from the currently known, Grimms-inspired version. It was told by [[France|French]] peasants in the 10th century.<ref name="Jacques Berlioz 2007 p63"/> In Italy, the Little Red Riding Hood was told by peasants in 14th century, where a number of versions exist, including ''La finta nonna'' (The False Grandmother).<ref>Jack Zipes, In Hungarian folklore, the story is known as "Piroska" (Little Red), is still told in mostly the original version described above. ''The Great Fairy Tale Tradition: From Straparola and Basile to the Brothers Grimm'', p 744, ISBN 0-393-97636-X</ref> It has also been called "The Story of Grandmother". It is also possible that this early tale has roots in very similar Oriental tales (e.g. "Grandaunt Tiger").<ref>Alan Dundes, ''little ducking''</ref>

These early variations of the tale differ from the currently known version in several ways. The antagonist is not always a wolf, but sometimes an [[ogre]] or a 'bzou' ([[werewolf]]), making these tales relevant to the werewolf-trials (similar to witch trials) of the time (e.g. the trial of [[Peter Stumpp]]).<ref>Catherine Orenstein, ''Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked: Sex, Morality and the Evolution of a Fairy Tale'', pp 92-106, ISBN 0-465-04126-4</ref> The wolf usually leaves the grandmother’s blood and meat for the girl to eat, who then unwittingly [[cannibal]]izes her own grandmother. Furthermore, the wolf was also known to ask her to remove her clothing and toss it into the fire.<ref>{{cite book|last=Zipes|first=Jack|title=The Trials and Tribulations of Little Red Riding Hood|year=1993|publisher=Routledge|location=New York|isbn=0-415-90835-3|edition=2nd|page=4}}</ref> In some versions, the wolf eats the girl after she gets into bed with him, and the story ends there.<ref name="ReferenceA">{{cite book|last=Darnton|first=Robert|title=The Great Cat Massacre and Other Episodes in French Cultural History|year=1985|publisher=Vintage Books|location=New York|isbn=0-394-72927-7}}</ref> In others, she sees through his disguise and tries to escape, complaining to her "grandmother" that she needs to defecate and would not wish to do so in the bed. The wolf reluctantly lets her go, tied to a piece of string so she does not get away. However, the girl slips the string over something else and runs off.

In these stories she escapes with no help from any male or older female figure, instead using her own cunning. Sometimes, though more rarely, the red hood is even non-existent.<ref name="ReferenceA"/>

===Charles Perrault===
The earliest known printed version<ref>Iona and Peter Opie, ''The Classic Fairy Tales''. p. 93. ISBN 0-19-211559-6</ref> was known as ''Le Petit [[Chaperon (headgear)|Chaperon]] Rouge'' and may have had its origins in 17th-century French [[folklore]]. It was included in the collection ''[[Histoires ou contes du temps passé|Tales and Stories of the Past with Morals. Tales of Mother Goose]]'' (''Histoires et contes du temps passé, avec des moralités. Contes de ma mère l'Oye''), in 1697, by [[Charles Perrault]]. As the title implies, this version<ref>Charles Perrault, "[http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/type0333.html Le Petit Chaperon Rouge]"</ref> is both more sinister and more overtly moralized than the later ones. The redness of the hood, which has been given symbolic significance in many interpretations of the tale, was a detail introduced by Perrault.<ref>Maria Tatar, p 17, ''The Annotated Classic Fairy Tales'', ISBN 0-393-05163-3</ref>

[[File:Little Red Riding Hood.jpg|thumb|left|240px|French images, like this 19th-century painting, show the much shorter red [[chaperon (headgear)|chaperon]] being worn]]
The story had as its subject an "attractive, well-bred young lady", a village girl of the country being deceived into giving a wolf she encountered the information he needed to find her grandmother's house successfully and eat the old woman while at the same time avoiding being noticed by woodcutters working in the nearby forest. Then he proceeded to lay a trap for the Red Riding Hood. Little Red Riding Hood ends up being asked to climb into the bed before being eaten by the wolf, where the story ends. The wolf emerges the victor of the encounter and there is no happy ending.

Charles Perrault explained the 'moral' at the end so that no doubt is left to his intended meaning:

:From this story one learns that children, especially young lasses, pretty, courteous and well-bred, do very wrong to listen to strangers, And it is not an unheard thing if the Wolf is thereby provided with his dinner. I say Wolf, for all wolves are not of the same sort; there is [[Rake (character)|one kind]] with an amenable disposition – neither noisy, nor hateful, nor angry, but tame, obliging and gentle, following the young maids in the streets, even into their homes. Alas! Who does not know that these gentle wolves are of all such creatures the most dangerous!

This, the presumed original, version of the tale was written for late 17th-century French court of [[King Louis XIV]]. This audience, whom the King entertained with extravagant parties and prostitutes, presumably would take from the story the intended meaning.

===Brothers Grimm===
[[File:Grimm.jpg|thumb|right|Wilhelm (left) and Jacob Grimm (right) from an 1855 painting by Elisabeth Jerichau-Baumann.]]

In the 19th century two separate German versions were retold to [[Jacob Grimm]] and his younger brother [[Wilhelm Grimm]], known as the [[Brothers Grimm]], the first by Jeanette Hassenpflug (1791–1860) and the second by Marie Hassenpflug (1788–1856). The brothers turned the first version to the main body of the story and the second into a sequel of it. The story as ''Rotkäppchen'' was included in the first edition of their collection ''[[Grimms' Fairy Tales|Kinder- und Hausmärchen]]'' (Children's and Household Tales (1812)).<ref>Jacob and Wilheim Grimm, "[http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/type0333.html#grimm Little Red Cap]"</ref>

The earlier parts of the tale agree so closely with Perrault's variant that it is almost certainly the source of the tale.<ref>Harry Velten, "The Influences of Charles Perrault's ''Contes de ma Mère L'oie'' on German Folklore", p 966, Jack Zipes, ed. ''The Great Fairy Tale Tradition: From Straparola and Basile to the Brothers Grimm'', ISBN 0-393-97636-X</ref> However, they modified the ending; this version had the little girl and her grandmother saved by a huntsman who was after the wolf's skin; this ending is identical to that in the tale ''[[The Wolf and the Seven Young Kids]]'', which appears to be the source.<ref>Harry Velten, "The Influences of Charles Perrault's ''Contes de ma Mère L'oie'' on German Folklore", p 967, Jack Zipes, ed. ''The Great Fairy Tale Tradition: From Straparola and Basile to the Brothers Grimm'', ISBN 0-393-97636-X</ref>

The second part featured the girl and her grandmother trapping and killing another wolf, this time anticipating his moves based on their experience with the previous one. The girl did not leave the path when the wolf spoke to her, her grandmother locked the door to keep it out, and when the wolf lurked, the grandmother had Little Red Riding Hood put a trough under the chimney and fill it with water that sausages had been cooked in; the smell lured the wolf down, and it drowned.<ref>Maria Tatar, ''The Annotated Brothers Grimm'', p 149 W. W. Norton & company, London, New York, 2004 ISBN 0-393-05848-4</ref>

The Brothers further revised the story in later editions and it reached the above mentioned final and better known version in the 1857 edition of their work.<ref>Jacob and Wilheim Grimm, "[http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/grimm026.html Little Red Cap]"</ref> It is notably tamer than the older stories which contained darker themes.

===After the Grimms===
[[File:New-33.jpg|thumb|180px| An engraving from the ''Cyclopedia of Wit and Humor''.]]

Numerous authors have rewritten or adapted this tale.

[[Andrew Lang]] included a variant called "The True History of Little Goldenhood"<ref>Andrew Lang, "[http://www.surlalunefairytales.com/ridinghood/stories/golden.html The True History of Little Goldenhood]", ''The Red Fairy Book'' (1890)</ref> in ''[[The Red Fairy Book]]'' (1890). He derived it from the works of Charles Marelles, in ''Contes of Charles Marelles''. This version explicitly states that the story had been mistold earlier. The girl is saved, but not by the huntsman; when the wolf tries to eat her, its mouth is burned by the golden hood she wears, which is enchanted.

James N. Barker wrote a variation of Little Red Riding Hood in 1827 as an approximately 1000-word story. It was later reprinted in 1858 in a book of collected stories edited by William E Burton, called the ''Cyclopedia of Wit and Humor''. The reprint also features a wood engraving of a clothed wolf on bended knee holding Little Red Riding Hood's hand.

In the 20th century, the popularity of the tale appeared to snowball, with many new versions being written and produced, especially in the wake of Freudian analysis, [[deconstruction]] and [[feminist literary criticism|feminist critical theory]]. (See [[#Modern uses and adaptations|"Modern uses and adaptations" below]].) This trend has also led to a number of academic texts being written that focus on Little Red Riding Hood, including works by [[Alan Dundes]] and [[Jack Zipes]].

==Interpretations==
Besides the overt warning about talking to strangers, there are many interpretations of the classic fairy tale, many of them sexual.<ref>Jane Yolen, ''Touch Magic'' p 25, ISBN 0-87483-591-7</ref> Some are listed below.

===Natural cycles===
[[folkloristics|Folklorists]] and [[cultural anthropology|cultural anthropologists]] such as [[P. Saintyves]] and [[Edward Burnett Tylor]] saw "Little Red Riding Hood" in terms of solar myths and other naturally-occurring cycles. Her red hood could represent the bright sun which is ultimately swallowed by the terrible night (the wolf), and the variations in which she is cut out of the wolf's belly represent by it the dawn.<ref>Maria Tatar, p 25, ''The Annotated Classic Fairy Tales'', ISBN 0-393-05163-3</ref> In this interpretation, there is a connection between the wolf of this tale and [[Sköll]], the wolf in Norse myth that will swallow [[Sól (sun)|the personified Sun]] at [[Ragnarök]], or [[Fenrir]].<ref>Alan Dundes, "Intrepreting Little Red Riding Hood Psychoanalytically", p 26-7, James M. McGlathery, ed. ''The Brothers Grimm and Folktale'', ISBN 0-252-01549-5</ref> Alternatively, the tale could be about the season of spring, or the month of May, escaping the winter.<ref>Alan Dundes, "Intrepreting Little Red Riding Hood Psychoanalytically", p 27, James M. McGlathery, ed. ''The Brothers Grimm and Folktale'', ISBN 0-252-01549-5</ref>

[[File:George Frederic Watts - Red Riding Hood - Project Gutenberg eText 17395.jpg|thumb|left|''Red Riding Hood'' by [[George Frederic Watts]]]]

===Ritual===
The tale has been interpreted as a puberty ritual, stemming from a prehistorical origin (sometimes an origin stemming from a previous matriarchal era).<ref>Alan Dundes, "Interpreting Little Red Riding Hood Psychoanalytically", p 27-9, James M. McGlathery, ed, ''The Brothers Grimm and Folktale'', ISBN 0-252-01549-5</ref> The girl, leaving home, enters a [[liminal]] state and by going through the acts of the tale, is transformed into an adult woman by the act of coming out of the wolf's belly.<ref>Alan Dundes, "Interpreting Little Red Riding Hood Psychoanalytically", p 27-8, James M. McGlathery, ed, ''The Brothers Grimm and Folktale'', ISBN 0-252-01549-5</ref>

===Rebirth===
[[Bruno Bettelheim]], in ''[[The Uses of Enchantment]]'', recast the Little Red Riding Hood motif in terms of classic [[Sigmund Freud|Freudian]] analysis, that shows how fairy tales educate, support, and liberate the emotions of children. The motif of the huntsman cutting open the wolf, he interpreted as a "rebirth"; the girl who foolishly listened to the wolf has been reborn as a new person.<ref>Maria Tatar, ''The Annotated Brothers Grimm'', p 148 ISBN 0-393-05848-4</ref>

===Sexual awakening===
Red Riding Hood has also been seen as a parable of sexual maturity. In this interpretation, the red cloak symbolizes the blood of menstruation,<ref>{{cite book|last=Zipes|first=Jack|title=The Trials and Tribulations of Little Red Riding Hood|year=1993|publisher=Routledge|location=New York|isbn=0-415-90835-3|edition=2nd|page=382}}</ref> braving the "dark forest" of womanhood. Or the cloak could symbolize the [[hymen]] (earlier versions of the tale generally do not state that the cloak is red). In this case, the wolf threatens the girl's virginity. The anthropomorphic wolf symbolizes a man, who could be a lover, seducer or sexual predator. This differs from the ritual explanation in that the entry into adulthood is biologically, not socially, determined.<ref>{{cite book|last=Zipes|first=Jack|title=The Trials and Tribulations of Little Red Riding Hood|year=1993|publisher=Routledge|location=New York|isbn=0-415-90835-3|edition=2nd}}</ref>

===Norse myth===
The poem ''[[Þrymskviða]]'' from the ''[[Poetic Edda]]'' mirrors some elements of Red Riding Hood. [[Loki]]'s explanations for "[[Freyja]]'s" (actually [[Thor]] disguised as Freya) strange behavior mirror the wolf's explanations for his strange appearance.

The red hood has often been given great importance in many interpretations, with a significance from the dawn to blood.<ref>Alan Dundes, "Intrepreting Little Red Riding Hood Psychoanalytically", p 32, James M. McGlathery, ed. ''The Brothers Grimm and Folktale'', ISBN 0-252-01549-5</ref>

==Modern uses and adaptations==
{{main|Adaptations of Little Red Riding Hood}}
[[File:Little Red Riding Hood WPA poster.jpg|thumb|Works Progress Administration poster by Kenneth Whitley, 1939.]]

The tale can be told in terms of Little Red Riding Hood's sexual attractiveness. The song "How Could Red Riding Hood (Have Been So Very Good)?" by A.P. Randolph in 1925 was the first song known to be banned from radio because of its sexual suggestiveness. The 1966 hit song "[[Lil' Red Riding Hood]]" by [[Sam the Sham & the Pharaohs]] takes the Wolf's point of view, implying that he wants love rather than blood. In the short [[animated cartoon]] ''[[Red Hot Riding Hood]]'' by [[Tex Avery]], the story is recast in an adult-oriented urban setting, with the suave, sharp-dressed Wolf howling after the nightclub singer Red. Avery used the same cast and themes in a subsequent series of cartoons.<ref>Catherine Orenstein, ''Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked: Sex, Morality, and the Evolution of a Fairy Tale'', p 112-3, ISBN 0-465-04125-6</ref> Allusions to the tale can be more or less overtly sexual, as when the color of a lipstick is advertised as "Riding Hood Red".<ref>Catherine Orenstein, ''Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked: Sex, Morality, and the Evolution of a Fairy Tale'', p 126, ISBN 0-465-04125-6</ref>

This sexual analysis may take the form of rape. In ''Against Our Will'', [[Susan Brownmiller]] described the fairy tale as a description of rape.<ref>Catherine Orenstein, ''Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked: Sex, Morality, and the Evolution of a Fairy Tale'', p 145, ISBN 0-465-04125-6</ref> Many revisionist retellings depict Little Red Riding Hood or the grandmother successfully defending herself against the wolf.<ref>Catherine Orenstein, ''Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked: Sex, Morality, and the Evolution of a Fairy Tale'', p 160-1, ISBN 0-465-04125-6</ref>

The story may also serve as a metaphor for a sexual awakening, as in [[Angela Carter|Angela Carter's]] story "The Company of Wolves", published in her collection ''[[The Bloody Chamber]]'' (1979). (Carter's story was adapted into a [[The Company of Wolves|film]] by [[Neil Jordan]] in 1984.) In the story, the wolf is in fact a [[werewolf]], and comes to newly-menstruating Red Riding Hood in the forest in the form of a charming hunter. He turns into a wolf and eats her grandmother, and is about to devour her as well, when she is equally seductive and ends up lying with the wolf man, her sexual awakening.<ref>Catherine Orenstein, ''Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked: Sex, Morality, and the Evolution of a Fairy Tale'', p 166-7, ISBN 0-465-04125-6</ref> Such tellings bear some similarity to the "animal bridegroom" tales, such as ''[[Beauty and the Beast]]'' or ''[[The Frog Prince (story)|The Frog Prince]]'', but where the heroines of those tales transform the hero into a prince, these tellings of ''Little Red Riding Hood'' reveal to the heroine that she has a wild nature like the hero's.<ref>Catherine Orenstein, ''Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked: Sex, Morality, and the Evolution of a Fairy Tale'', p 172-3, ISBN 0-465-04125-6</ref>

Little Red Riding Hood is also one of the central characters in the 1987 [[Broadway theatre|Broadway]] [[Musical theatre|musical]] ''[[Into the Woods]]'' by [[Stephen Sondheim]] and [[James Lapine]]. In the song, "I Know Things Now" she speaks of how the wolf made her feel "excited, well, excited ''and'' scared", in a reference to the sexual undertones of their relationship. Red Riding Hood's cape is also one of the musical's four quest items that are emblematic of fairy tales.<ref>Steven Sondheim and James Lapine, "Into the Woods"</ref>

The pilot episode of NBC's ''[[Grimm (TV series)|Grimm]]'' reveals that the Red Riding Hood stories were inspired by historic attacks by [[Creatures of Grimm#Blutbad|blutbaden]], werewolf-like beings who have a deeply ingrained bloodlust and a weakness for victims wearing red.

==See also==
{{portal|Children's literature}}
{{div col|cols=2}}
*[[Big Bad Wolf]]
*[[Face value]]
*''[[Hoodwinked]]''
*[[Ladle Rat Rotten Hut]]
*[[Little Red Cap (poem)]]
*[[Freeway (1996 film)|''Freeway'' (1996 film)]]
*''[[Once Upon a Time (TV series)|Once Upon a Time]]''
{{div col end}}

==References==
{{reflist|30em}}

==External links==
{{wikisource|Little Red-Cap}}
{{commons category}}
*[http://www.endicott-studio.com/rdrm/rrPathNeedles.html Terri Windling's 'The Path of Needles or Pins: Little Red Riding Hood'] – a thorough article on the history of LRRH.

{{Brothers Grimm}}
{{Little Red Riding Hood}}
{{Charles Perrault}}

[[Category:Brothers Grimm]]
[[Category:Works by Charles Perrault]]
[[Category:Fairy tales]]
[[Category:Literature featuring anthropomorphic characters]]
[[Category:Wolves in folklore, religion and mythology]]
[[Category:Fictional German people]]
[[Category:Child characters in literature]]
[[Category:Child characters in film]]
[[Category:Characters in fairy tales]]
[[Category:Characters of European folklore]]

Revision as of 11:02, 17 January 2014

This article is about the folk tale. For other uses, see Little Red Riding Hood (disambiguation).
A depiction by Gustave Doré.
Red Riding Hood
The version found in The Book of Fables and Folk Stories by Horace E. Scudder.
Problems playing this file? See media help.

Little Red Riding Hood, or Little Red Ridinghood, also known as Little Red Cap or simply Red Riding Hood, is a French[1] and later European fairy tale about a young girl and a Big Bad Wolf. The story has been changed considerably in its history and subject to numerous modern adaptations and readings. The story was first published by Charles Perrault.[2]

This story is number 333 in the Aarne-Thompson classification system for folktales.[3]

Tale

Little Red Riding Hood, illustrated in a 1927 story anthology

The story revolves around a girl called Little Red Riding Hood, after the red hooded cape/cloak (in Perrault's fairytale) or simple cap (in the Grimms' version called Little Red-Cap) she wears. The girl walks through the woods to deliver food to her sickly grandmother (grape juice and banana bread, or wine and cake depending on the translation). In the Grimms' version at least, she had the order from her mother to stay strictly on the path.

A mean wolf wants to eat the girl and the food in the basket. He secretly stalks her behind trees and bushes and shrubs and patches of little grass and patches of tall grass. He approaches Little Red Riding Hood and she naïvely tells him where she is going. He suggests the girl pick some flowers, which she does. In the meantime, he goes to the grandmother's house and gains entry by pretending to be the girl. He swallows the grandmother whole (in some stories, he locks her in the closet) and waits for the girl, disguised as the grandma.

When the girl arrives, she notices that her grandmother looks very strange. Little Red then says, "What a deep voice you have!" ("The better to greet you with"), "Goodness, what big eyes you have!" ("The better to see you with"), "And what big hands you have!" ("The better to hug/grab you with"), and lastly, "What a big mouth you have" ("The better to eat you with!"), at which point the wolf jumps out of bed, and swallows her up too. Then he falls asleep. In Charles Perrault's written version, the first written version at all, the story comes to an end right here, only followed by a good deal of moralizing, (see below).

A lumberjack (with the Brothers Grimm, and always in German tradition, a hunter), however, comes to the rescue and with his axe cuts open the sleeping wolf. Little Red Riding Hood and her grandmother emerge unharmed. They fill the wolf's body with heavy stones. The wolf awakens and tries to flee, but the stones cause him to collapse and die. (Sanitized versions of the story have the grandmother shut in the closet instead of eaten, and some have Little Red Riding Hood saved by the lumberjack as the wolf advances on her, rather than after she is eaten.)[4]

"Little Red Riding Hood" illustration by Arthur Rackham.[5]

The tale makes the clearest contrast between the safe world of the village and the dangers of the forest, conventional antitheses that are essentially medieval, though no written versions are as old as that. Specifically, the tale parallels how an innocent victim can be taken in and controlled by a criminal mentality, therefore, facilitating further subjection of a crime or harm against a vulnerable victim through mischievous criminal intent by removing the victim from a familiar or "safe" public location — facilitating the crime in an effort to isolate the victim by drawing her to another location "away from the public eye" where the criminal entity has complete control over the victim.

It also warns about the dangers of not obeying the mother (at least in the Grimms' version).

Relationship to other tales

The theme of the ravening wolf and of the creature released unharmed from its belly is also reflected in the Russian tale Peter and the Wolf, and the other Grimm tale The Wolf and the Seven Young Kids, but its general theme of restoration is at least as old as Jonah and the Whale. The theme also appears in the story of the life of Saint Margaret, where the saint emerges unharmed from the belly of a dragon, and in the epic "The Red Path" by Jim C. Hines.

The dialogue between the mean wolf and Little Red Riding Hood has its analogies to the Norse Þrymskviða from the Elder Edda; the giant Þrymr had stolen Mjölner, Thor's hammer, and demanded Freyja as his bride for its return. Instead, the gods dressed Thor as a bride and sent him. When the giants note Thor's unladylike eyes, eating, and drinking, Loki explains them as Freyja not having slept, or eaten, or drunk, out of longing for the wedding.[6]

Tale's history

"The better to see you with": woodcut by Walter Crane

Earliest versions

The origins of the Little Red Riding Hood story can be traced to versions from various European countries and more than likely preceding the 17th century, of which several exist, some significantly different from the currently known, Grimms-inspired version. It was told by French peasants in the 10th century.[1] In Italy, the Little Red Riding Hood was told by peasants in 14th century, where a number of versions exist, including La finta nonna (The False Grandmother).[7] It has also been called "The Story of Grandmother". It is also possible that this early tale has roots in very similar Oriental tales (e.g. "Grandaunt Tiger").[8]

These early variations of the tale differ from the currently known version in several ways. The antagonist is not always a wolf, but sometimes an ogre or a 'bzou' (werewolf), making these tales relevant to the werewolf-trials (similar to witch trials) of the time (e.g. the trial of Peter Stumpp).[9] The wolf usually leaves the grandmother’s blood and meat for the girl to eat, who then unwittingly cannibalizes her own grandmother. Furthermore, the wolf was also known to ask her to remove her clothing and toss it into the fire.[10] In some versions, the wolf eats the girl after she gets into bed with him, and the story ends there.[11] In others, she sees through his disguise and tries to escape, complaining to her "grandmother" that she needs to defecate and would not wish to do so in the bed. The wolf reluctantly lets her go, tied to a piece of string so she does not get away. However, the girl slips the string over something else and runs off.

In these stories she escapes with no help from any male or older female figure, instead using her own cunning. Sometimes, though more rarely, the red hood is even non-existent.[11]

Charles Perrault

The earliest known printed version[12] was known as Le Petit Chaperon Rouge and may have had its origins in 17th-century French folklore. It was included in the collection Tales and Stories of the Past with Morals. Tales of Mother Goose (Histoires et contes du temps passé, avec des moralités. Contes de ma mère l'Oye), in 1697, by Charles Perrault. As the title implies, this version[13] is both more sinister and more overtly moralized than the later ones. The redness of the hood, which has been given symbolic significance in many interpretations of the tale, was a detail introduced by Perrault.[14]

French images, like this 19th-century painting, show the much shorter red chaperon being worn

The story had as its subject an "attractive, well-bred young lady", a village girl of the country being deceived into giving a wolf she encountered the information he needed to find her grandmother's house successfully and eat the old woman while at the same time avoiding being noticed by woodcutters working in the nearby forest. Then he proceeded to lay a trap for the Red Riding Hood. Little Red Riding Hood ends up being asked to climb into the bed before being eaten by the wolf, where the story ends. The wolf emerges the victor of the encounter and there is no happy ending.

Charles Perrault explained the 'moral' at the end so that no doubt is left to his intended meaning:

From this story one learns that children, especially young lasses, pretty, courteous and well-bred, do very wrong to listen to strangers, And it is not an unheard thing if the Wolf is thereby provided with his dinner. I say Wolf, for all wolves are not of the same sort; there is one kind with an amenable disposition – neither noisy, nor hateful, nor angry, but tame, obliging and gentle, following the young maids in the streets, even into their homes. Alas! Who does not know that these gentle wolves are of all such creatures the most dangerous!

This, the presumed original, version of the tale was written for late 17th-century French court of King Louis XIV. This audience, whom the King entertained with extravagant parties and prostitutes, presumably would take from the story the intended meaning.

Brothers Grimm

Wilhelm (left) and Jacob Grimm (right) from an 1855 painting by Elisabeth Jerichau-Baumann.

In the 19th century two separate German versions were retold to Jacob Grimm and his younger brother Wilhelm Grimm, known as the Brothers Grimm, the first by Jeanette Hassenpflug (1791–1860) and the second by Marie Hassenpflug (1788–1856). The brothers turned the first version to the main body of the story and the second into a sequel of it. The story as Rotkäppchen was included in the first edition of their collection Kinder- und Hausmärchen (Children's and Household Tales (1812)).[15]

The earlier parts of the tale agree so closely with Perrault's variant that it is almost certainly the source of the tale.[16] However, they modified the ending; this version had the little girl and her grandmother saved by a huntsman who was after the wolf's skin; this ending is identical to that in the tale The Wolf and the Seven Young Kids, which appears to be the source.[17]

The second part featured the girl and her grandmother trapping and killing another wolf, this time anticipating his moves based on their experience with the previous one. The girl did not leave the path when the wolf spoke to her, her grandmother locked the door to keep it out, and when the wolf lurked, the grandmother had Little Red Riding Hood put a trough under the chimney and fill it with water that sausages had been cooked in; the smell lured the wolf down, and it drowned.[18]

The Brothers further revised the story in later editions and it reached the above mentioned final and better known version in the 1857 edition of their work.[19] It is notably tamer than the older stories which contained darker themes.

After the Grimms

File:New-33.jpg
An engraving from the Cyclopedia of Wit and Humor.

Numerous authors have rewritten or adapted this tale.

Andrew Lang included a variant called "The True History of Little Goldenhood"[20] in The Red Fairy Book (1890). He derived it from the works of Charles Marelles, in Contes of Charles Marelles. This version explicitly states that the story had been mistold earlier. The girl is saved, but not by the huntsman; when the wolf tries to eat her, its mouth is burned by the golden hood she wears, which is enchanted.

James N. Barker wrote a variation of Little Red Riding Hood in 1827 as an approximately 1000-word story. It was later reprinted in 1858 in a book of collected stories edited by William E Burton, called the Cyclopedia of Wit and Humor. The reprint also features a wood engraving of a clothed wolf on bended knee holding Little Red Riding Hood's hand.

In the 20th century, the popularity of the tale appeared to snowball, with many new versions being written and produced, especially in the wake of Freudian analysis, deconstruction and feminist critical theory. (See "Modern uses and adaptations" below.) This trend has also led to a number of academic texts being written that focus on Little Red Riding Hood, including works by Alan Dundes and Jack Zipes.

Interpretations

Besides the overt warning about talking to strangers, there are many interpretations of the classic fairy tale, many of them sexual.[21] Some are listed below.

Natural cycles

Folklorists and cultural anthropologists such as P. Saintyves and Edward Burnett Tylor saw "Little Red Riding Hood" in terms of solar myths and other naturally-occurring cycles. Her red hood could represent the bright sun which is ultimately swallowed by the terrible night (the wolf), and the variations in which she is cut out of the wolf's belly represent by it the dawn.[22] In this interpretation, there is a connection between the wolf of this tale and Sköll, the wolf in Norse myth that will swallow the personified Sun at Ragnarök, or Fenrir.[23] Alternatively, the tale could be about the season of spring, or the month of May, escaping the winter.[24]

Red Riding Hood by George Frederic Watts

Ritual

The tale has been interpreted as a puberty ritual, stemming from a prehistorical origin (sometimes an origin stemming from a previous matriarchal era).[25] The girl, leaving home, enters a liminal state and by going through the acts of the tale, is transformed into an adult woman by the act of coming out of the wolf's belly.[26]

Rebirth

Bruno Bettelheim, in The Uses of Enchantment, recast the Little Red Riding Hood motif in terms of classic Freudian analysis, that shows how fairy tales educate, support, and liberate the emotions of children. The motif of the huntsman cutting open the wolf, he interpreted as a "rebirth"; the girl who foolishly listened to the wolf has been reborn as a new person.[27]

Sexual awakening

Red Riding Hood has also been seen as a parable of sexual maturity. In this interpretation, the red cloak symbolizes the blood of menstruation,[28] braving the "dark forest" of womanhood. Or the cloak could symbolize the hymen (earlier versions of the tale generally do not state that the cloak is red). In this case, the wolf threatens the girl's virginity. The anthropomorphic wolf symbolizes a man, who could be a lover, seducer or sexual predator. This differs from the ritual explanation in that the entry into adulthood is biologically, not socially, determined.[29]

Norse myth

The poem Þrymskviða from the Poetic Edda mirrors some elements of Red Riding Hood. Loki's explanations for "Freyja's" (actually Thor disguised as Freya) strange behavior mirror the wolf's explanations for his strange appearance.

The red hood has often been given great importance in many interpretations, with a significance from the dawn to blood.[30]

Modern uses and adaptations

Main article: Adaptations of Little Red Riding Hood
Works Progress Administration poster by Kenneth Whitley, 1939.

The tale can be told in terms of Little Red Riding Hood's sexual attractiveness. The song "How Could Red Riding Hood (Have Been So Very Good)?" by A.P. Randolph in 1925 was the first song known to be banned from radio because of its sexual suggestiveness. The 1966 hit song "Lil' Red Riding Hood" by Sam the Sham & the Pharaohs takes the Wolf's point of view, implying that he wants love rather than blood. In the short animated cartoon Red Hot Riding Hood by Tex Avery, the story is recast in an adult-oriented urban setting, with the suave, sharp-dressed Wolf howling after the nightclub singer Red. Avery used the same cast and themes in a subsequent series of cartoons.[31] Allusions to the tale can be more or less overtly sexual, as when the color of a lipstick is advertised as "Riding Hood Red".[32]

This sexual analysis may take the form of rape. In Against Our Will, Susan Brownmiller described the fairy tale as a description of rape.[33] Many revisionist retellings depict Little Red Riding Hood or the grandmother successfully defending herself against the wolf.[34]

The story may also serve as a metaphor for a sexual awakening, as in Angela Carter's story "The Company of Wolves", published in her collection The Bloody Chamber (1979). (Carter's story was adapted into a film by Neil Jordan in 1984.) In the story, the wolf is in fact a werewolf, and comes to newly-menstruating Red Riding Hood in the forest in the form of a charming hunter. He turns into a wolf and eats her grandmother, and is about to devour her as well, when she is equally seductive and ends up lying with the wolf man, her sexual awakening.[35] Such tellings bear some similarity to the "animal bridegroom" tales, such as Beauty and the Beast or The Frog Prince, but where the heroines of those tales transform the hero into a prince, these tellings of Little Red Riding Hood reveal to the heroine that she has a wild nature like the hero's.[36]

Little Red Riding Hood is also one of the central characters in the 1987 Broadway musical Into the Woods by Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine. In the song, "I Know Things Now" she speaks of how the wolf made her feel "excited, well, excited and scared", in a reference to the sexual undertones of their relationship. Red Riding Hood's cape is also one of the musical's four quest items that are emblematic of fairy tales.[37]

The pilot episode of NBC's Grimm reveals that the Red Riding Hood stories were inspired by historic attacks by blutbaden, werewolf-like beings who have a deeply ingrained bloodlust and a weakness for victims wearing red.

See also

References

  1. ^ a b Jacques Berlioz, Il faut sauver Le petit chaperon rouge. Les Collections de L'Histoire (2007) n°36, p63
  2. ^ Bottigheimer, Ruth. (2008). "Before Contes du temps passe (1697): Charles Perrault's Griselidis, Souhaits and Peau". The Romantic Review, Volume 99, Number 3. pp. 175-189
  3. ^ D. L. Ashliman. "Little Red Riding Hood and other tales of Aarne-Thompson-Uther type 333". Retrieved 2010-01-17.
  4. ^ Spurgeon, Maureen (1990). Red Riding Hood. England: Brown Watson. ISBN 0709706928.
  5. ^ Tatar 2004, pp. xxxviii
  6. ^ Iona and Peter Opie, The Classic Fairy Tales. p. 93-4. ISBN 0-19-211559-6
  7. ^ Jack Zipes, In Hungarian folklore, the story is known as "Piroska" (Little Red), is still told in mostly the original version described above. The Great Fairy Tale Tradition: From Straparola and Basile to the Brothers Grimm, p 744, ISBN 0-393-97636-X
  8. ^ Alan Dundes, little ducking
  9. ^ Catherine Orenstein, Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked: Sex, Morality and the Evolution of a Fairy Tale, pp 92-106, ISBN 0-465-04126-4
  10. ^ Zipes, Jack (1993). The Trials and Tribulations of Little Red Riding Hood (2nd ed.). New York: Routledge. p. 4. ISBN 0-415-90835-3.
  11. ^ a b Darnton, Robert (1985). The Great Cat Massacre and Other Episodes in French Cultural History. New York: Vintage Books. ISBN 0-394-72927-7.
  12. ^ Iona and Peter Opie, The Classic Fairy Tales. p. 93. ISBN 0-19-211559-6
  13. ^ Charles Perrault, "Le Petit Chaperon Rouge"
  14. ^ Maria Tatar, p 17, The Annotated Classic Fairy Tales, ISBN 0-393-05163-3
  15. ^ Jacob and Wilheim Grimm, "Little Red Cap"
  16. ^ Harry Velten, "The Influences of Charles Perrault's Contes de ma Mère L'oie on German Folklore", p 966, Jack Zipes, ed. The Great Fairy Tale Tradition: From Straparola and Basile to the Brothers Grimm, ISBN 0-393-97636-X
  17. ^ Harry Velten, "The Influences of Charles Perrault's Contes de ma Mère L'oie on German Folklore", p 967, Jack Zipes, ed. The Great Fairy Tale Tradition: From Straparola and Basile to the Brothers Grimm, ISBN 0-393-97636-X
  18. ^ Maria Tatar, The Annotated Brothers Grimm, p 149 W. W. Norton & company, London, New York, 2004 ISBN 0-393-05848-4
  19. ^ Jacob and Wilheim Grimm, "Little Red Cap"
  20. ^ Andrew Lang, "The True History of Little Goldenhood", The Red Fairy Book (1890)
  21. ^ Jane Yolen, Touch Magic p 25, ISBN 0-87483-591-7
  22. ^ Maria Tatar, p 25, The Annotated Classic Fairy Tales, ISBN 0-393-05163-3
  23. ^ Alan Dundes, "Intrepreting Little Red Riding Hood Psychoanalytically", p 26-7, James M. McGlathery, ed. The Brothers Grimm and Folktale, ISBN 0-252-01549-5
  24. ^ Alan Dundes, "Intrepreting Little Red Riding Hood Psychoanalytically", p 27, James M. McGlathery, ed. The Brothers Grimm and Folktale, ISBN 0-252-01549-5
  25. ^ Alan Dundes, "Interpreting Little Red Riding Hood Psychoanalytically", p 27-9, James M. McGlathery, ed, The Brothers Grimm and Folktale, ISBN 0-252-01549-5
  26. ^ Alan Dundes, "Interpreting Little Red Riding Hood Psychoanalytically", p 27-8, James M. McGlathery, ed, The Brothers Grimm and Folktale, ISBN 0-252-01549-5
  27. ^ Maria Tatar, The Annotated Brothers Grimm, p 148 ISBN 0-393-05848-4
  28. ^ Zipes, Jack (1993). The Trials and Tribulations of Little Red Riding Hood (2nd ed.). New York: Routledge. p. 382. ISBN 0-415-90835-3.
  29. ^ Zipes, Jack (1993). The Trials and Tribulations of Little Red Riding Hood (2nd ed.). New York: Routledge. ISBN 0-415-90835-3.
  30. ^ Alan Dundes, "Intrepreting Little Red Riding Hood Psychoanalytically", p 32, James M. McGlathery, ed. The Brothers Grimm and Folktale, ISBN 0-252-01549-5
  31. ^ Catherine Orenstein, Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked: Sex, Morality, and the Evolution of a Fairy Tale, p 112-3, ISBN 0-465-04125-6
  32. ^ Catherine Orenstein, Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked: Sex, Morality, and the Evolution of a Fairy Tale, p 126, ISBN 0-465-04125-6
  33. ^ Catherine Orenstein, Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked: Sex, Morality, and the Evolution of a Fairy Tale, p 145, ISBN 0-465-04125-6
  34. ^ Catherine Orenstein, Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked: Sex, Morality, and the Evolution of a Fairy Tale, p 160-1, ISBN 0-465-04125-6
  35. ^ Catherine Orenstein, Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked: Sex, Morality, and the Evolution of a Fairy Tale, p 166-7, ISBN 0-465-04125-6
  36. ^ Catherine Orenstein, Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked: Sex, Morality, and the Evolution of a Fairy Tale, p 172-3, ISBN 0-465-04125-6
  37. ^ Steven Sondheim and James Lapine, "Into the Woods"
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