Snow White
Retelling of the Grimms' Version by Bess Goden
This story starts just as most of the best stories do: Once upon a time.
It was snowing. The Queen loved to sit by her ebony windowsill and embroider while watching the snow fall like feathers from her pillow, just as she was doing now. She pricked herself. Blood welled up in a small dot on her finger and she quickly staunched it in the snow. It left a little red circle. And as the Queen sat there, she sighed and thought, Doesn’t that look just like a baby’s blush. Would that I had a child with cheeks as red as that dot, skin as white as this snow and hair as black as my window frame.
It wasn’t long before the queen’s heartfelt wish came true. Though it took it’s toll, as most good fortune does. She brought a beautiful daughter into the world, but it cost her her life. With her last breath she looked into the King’s loving eyes as he held their baby close to his breast and said, “My lovely little Snow White.”
And so that’s what the child came to be called. It wasn’t long before her nurse’s good care brought her through the worst of infancy and it was time for the King to consider remarrying. His daughter needed a mother, after all, and although he dreaded replacing his beloved wife, he wanted to do what was best for her. Since his heart was still numbed by grief and provided no direction for the choice, he married the prettiest of his suitors.
Unfortunate that his heart did not play some role in the matter, for his new bride turned out to be a jealous one. She quickly saw how it was between him and the princess, how he doted on her. He would say, “My sweet little Snow White, how your rosy cheeks remind me of your mother. One day your beauty may outshine even her’s.” Each time this sentiment fell on the queen’s ears, it hardened her heart a little more. Though she was careful never to be unkind to Snow White, lest the King should suspect her growing hatred of the child. But pretty soon, the queen found that even to greet the girl became a chore, as hiding your anger is a tiring business. Whenever Snow White’s eyes fell upon her, she could almost see the dead queen looking through them, mocking her. It’s as if they were saying, “You’ll never be what I was to the King, his heart feels nothing for you.” It began to turn her stomach, and she came to think that she would do anything to be rid of the girl.
Well, it wasn’t long until the bitter queen got her chance. The King often liked to hunt and Snow White would always beg her father to let her join him. He had generally refused, as she was so small, but this time the queen interceded on her behalf. “Come, my King. Snow White loves you so and is dying to see your majesty at your most glorious. Show her how well you slaughter your foe, so that she may see how she is protected.”
The King replied, “Well, I suppose that is settled then. You may thank your step-mother for this trip, my sweet Snow White. Sleep now, for we will be off early in the morning.”
The Queen smiled to herself and thought, You may indeed thank me, Snow White. But it will be the last thing you will be grateful for. As soon as the King was in bed that night, the Queen summoned the royal huntsman. “I would like a special trophy from tomorrow’s trip, hunter.” she said deviously as she pulled out a small purse of gold.
“For you, my queen, anything!” said the hunter, and gratefully pocketed the purse.
The queen smiled smugly, “It is a small quarry, but difficult to catch. You will need all your bravery and cunning, I am afraid.”
The hunter’s chest swelled as he replied, “With respect, your majesty, you need not fear. I am the best hunter in the land. No matter how challenging, your quarry will not elude me.”
The queen’s smile turned to a sneer. “Indeed I hope that she will not, for if she does it will be your heart I will ask for in substitute!”
The hunter, choked with fear, was barely able to utter his reply, “I understand, my queen.”
“Good.” She replied, “Bring me the heart of dear little Snow White.”
The hunter left with leaden steps, the reality of his new task weighing him down. What could he do? With a wife and three children to feed, they needed him. He must fulfill the Queen’s wish. Yet to murder a child? And one so sweet as Snow White. He paced the grounds all night, searching for a way out of this request, but none occurred to him. Finally the sun began to rise and he made his way resolutely to the stables to ready the horses for the journey.
Bright morning light caught in Snow White’s excited eyes making them shine like little sapphires. The King picked her up, kissed her forehead and put her on her favorite mare. “You look so beautiful this morning, my sweet Snow White. A little vision of your mother.” As he said this, the hunter’s heart sank like a stone. But the Queen’s heart hardened like one and from her window she gave the hunter such a look as to put any thoughts of rebellion out of his mind.
The party began the journey. As happy as Snow White was to ride out with her beloved father she quickly tired, not being used to such exercise. The King noticed and tried to slow down a bit, but when the Royal Huntsman offered to watch her while she rested, the King gratefully accepted.
The hunter’s moment had come. He lifted little Snow White from her saddle, who smiled in thanks, shook her legs and sat on a log with relief. He turned around to unsheathe his knife and hide his tears.
“It is such a beautiful day, don’t you think?” said Snow White, admiring a large red leaf.
The hunter didn’t reply. He just wiped his tears, squared his shoulders and turned around to face his duty. She looked up at him with such sweet expectancy and innocence, still waiting for his answer.
He froze in his tracks and crumbled. “Oh dear little princess,” he said through his tears, “the Queen has charged me to murder you. She grows jealous of your beauty. Please,” he sheathed his knife and dropped to his knees in front of her, “I cannot ask your forgiveness, there is none for me. But run. Run as fast as you can away from the castle, I will find another heart for the Queen’s trophy box.”
Shock is too small a word for what she felt, as the hunter handed her a small bag of food and the knife for her journey. When she was riding with her beloved father through this dense forest, it had seemed charming then. Now that she was walking through it however, the trees looked far less friendly. They threw branches in her path to trip her and tear at her hair. One seemed to look like another and she wouldn’t have been surprised to see them change places just to confuse her way, not that she knew where she was going. Just away.
Two and three days she wandered, probably in circles, she had no way to tell. Tears and dry eyes, rest and walking. She did one until she could do it no longer, then switched to the other. Luckily, her feet had more of a sense of the land they had covered and soon they led her out of the thick and into a little glen, where there was a charming cottage. Well, I suppose any cottage would have been charming to Snow White in her state and she gratefully rushed to the door. But as she knocked the door swung open, clearly no one was at home. She walked in and saw a humble meal laid out for seven. Thinking only of her grumbling stomach, she attacked the smallish chicken with gusto, then the bread, then the cheese, until there was nothing left for the inhabitants if they should return. But the light of day was dimming and Snow White had no thought for anything but rest. She spotted the softest of seven beds and fell into it, asleep without so much as a yawn.
She slept so long and so deeply, that she didn’t even awake when the sounds of seven noisy, dwarven pairs of feet started to fill the cottage.
“Would you look at that, Ralph! Bones where there should be chicken!” said one of the little men’s voices.
“Yes, and crumbs where there should be bread and cheese!” presumably Ralph replied.
“Did you sneak back in this morning and make merry without us, Richard?” said another of the voices. All of the men laughed.
Presumably Richard replied in a huffy tone, “You won’t be complaining of my weight when it’s time to lift the coal cart! Nor if you wake up tomorrow morning and find my girth perched ever so lightly on your chest!”
This brought a great roar of laughter from the dwarves and finally little Snow White stirred from her slumber.
“What is this?” cried one of the men as she sat up and yawned.
“Oh dear, I’m so sorry!” cried Snow White, tears of fear staring to well in her eyes. She got up quickly and brushed herself off, making ready to run if she needed to.
“Relax child,” said one of the men, pushing her back down on the bed. “We will not harm you. Considering of course you have no intentions to harm us,” he said and gently drew the dagger from her sash. The group chuckled.
Still a bit fearful, Snow White began to tell her story. As she talked, she could see the little men’s hearts warm to her and once she was finished, she knew she no longer needed to fear. “And so here I am,” she said, “I am sorry for eating your dinner. If it will help you to forgive me, I will be glad to tidy and cook for you in payment. Though you may have to show me, for as a princess I have never worked a day in my life. But I learn quick.” And in her eagerness she stood, tripped on the bedclothes and tumbled to her knees, “And I am sturdier than I look.” she added in apology.
The men all laughed as hard as their bellies would allow and fell in love with the little princess at once. They picked Snow White tenderly up off her knees and put her back on the bed, wiping tears of mirth from their eyes. “Child, we would be most delighted to accept your offer.” said Ralph and all of the men nodded in approval. So the years went by peacefully for Snow White, who grew very fond of her new friends.
For the Queen however, peace was short lived. She was delighted when she thought that she held the heart of the little princess in her trophy box, though it was really the heart of a fawn. Finally, she thought, I can be rid of that girl’s haunting gaze and all of the King’s attentions will be where they should be, on our marriage. She happily returned to her quarters and fed the heart to her favorite dog.
But things did not go as well as she had hoped with the King, who was miserable at Snow White’s disappearance. He led search parties far and wide for her and with each empty handed return he would be too tired with grief to seek the queen’s company. It seemed to the Queen that she had lost more of him than she had before and soon became miserable herself.
Upon her marriage day, the Queen’s mother had given her two books with her dowry. She had said to her, “If there ever comes a day where you feel all happiness has left you and you can never rekindle it, turn to these books. But beware, they are only for the direst of needs.” Well mother, thought the Queen to herself after the seventh of the King’s mournful excursions, now I know that the King loves no one but his Snow White, I have no where else to turn. So I will turn your page and hope for your guidance. The books were old, with many notes and additions in the spare pages, but the Queen read them cover to cover with rapt attention. They held dark secrets. Secrets to beguile the eye and to poison the soul. Her first experiment was to enchant a mirror, so that she could see into places she could not go.
To try it, she spoke:
Mirror, mirror on the wall,
Who’s the fairest one of all?
The mirror replied:
"You are fairest of them all."
This reply pleased her and she counted her first project as a success. She tried a great many spells over time, some worked better than others, but she eventually became a powerful enchantress. Perhaps happy wasn’t the best word to describe it, but a certain satisfaction settled over her and she began to relish the King’s absences. But one day the delicate peace gave way.
The Queen asked, (as she now did every day),
Mirror, mirror on the wall,
Who’s the fairest one of all?
But instead of its usual reply, the mirror had an unpleasant shock in store for it’s master:
Queen, thou art of beauty rare,
But Snow-white living in the glen
With the seven little men
Is a thousand times more fair.
The mirror then displayed a vision of a no-longer-little Snow White with her seven friends in their cottage, laughing merrily over a humble dinner.
The Queen sat, deflated. How could the child have survived? And worse, grown to be even more beautiful than me? That huntsman must have tricked me! Fool! If she is found or returns home it will be my head the King will want, as well as his! She cannot, must not return. And so the Queen turned to her books for guidance, once again. She embroidered a plot more devious than her most detailed filagree handkerchiefs.
“To beguile the eye:” she read, “mix a chicken’s blood with yarrow and hen bane then draw with it your desired appearance in a pentacle. Step inside and recite the magic couplet.”
And so she did. She turned herself into a young country maid. Donning a basket full of fine trinkets and ribbons, she set off to where the mirror had shown Snow White’s hide away. When she arrived, the cottage door was open and she saw Snow White sweeping out the floor’s dust. “Hallo, miss.” said the Queen with false shyness in her voice, “Won’t you see some of me wares? I have fine ribbons to lace your corset. Come and let me try one on you, mistress.”
Snow White remembered that it had not been so long ago when she was that small and that hungry. So she let the child in, gave her some cool milk and stooped down so the girl could relace her dress with the ribbon.
The Queen smiled to herself thinking, This is all too easy, it is almost a shame really, and laced the ribbon so tightly that it strangled the girl.
Snow White fell gasping to the floor, her face a mask of surprise. This was exactly the way the dwarves found her when they returned home that night for dinner. They turned her over and felt her forehead. She was as cold as ice.
“She must be ill!” said Richard, who had become her particular friend and did not want to accept the worst, “Let’s change her into her night shift and put her to bed, poor thing.” He leant over her to hide a sniffle and tried to untie her laces, but they were bound too tightly. He pulled out his knife and sliced through the ribbon.
All of a sudden, Snow White gasped and sat up. She let out a huge fit of coughing and hugged Richard with all her might. “Thank you! You saved me!” said Snow White and quickly told them the story of what happened.
“Now why would a little girl want to kill you?” asked Reginald, who was known for being very clever with riddles, “There is only one person I can think of who’d want you hurt and she thinks she’s already done the job.”
“She must have sent a spy.” said Snow White, who was slowly beginning to realize what danger she must now be in and began to shake.
“Now girl, it will be alright.” said Ralph, “You must keep yourself safe and bring no one inside when we are gone. Remember that if the Queen knows you live, perhaps your father does as well. There is always hope, little one, though you are not so little anymore.”
Snow White smiled and stood up, shaking herself off. “You must be hungry, my friends. Come let us eat.”
The sounds of this last sentence were just caught by the Queen who watched through her mirror when she arrived back at the castle. She slammed her fist into the dresser. The mirror shook itself and went blank. “I knew it was too easy.” she said to herself, and immediately went back to her books in search of a new plan.
Two days later, the Queen was ready. She traced a new figure in chicken blood, yarrow and hen bane and said the magic couplet.
That afternoon a traveling merchant lady with a very long nose walked quickly from the castle to Snow White’s little glen. When she reached the cottage she knocked at the closed door. Snow White appeared in the window and asked what the lady was about. “I have fine combs from the far east,” replied the Queen, and pulled out one laden in pearls. “Come, let me put this in your hair and you can see how lovely it looks.”
“Thank you,” said Snow White, “But I mustn’t let anyone inside.”
“Oh no, dear? Just let me sit and rest a while here, then if you don’t mind. I’ve had a long walk. Do you have any water to spare?” asked the Queen, as if she wasn’t annoyed.
Snow White once again remembered how it felt to be thirsty and in need, brought the Queen a cup of water and passed it through the window.
The Queen made a show of drinking it gratefully. Then she wiped her brow and said, “Well you must let me thank you properly before I go, it would be rude otherwise! Take this comb, I insist. Do tip your head out the window and let me put it in your hair.”
Snow White never liked to be rude, and this woman looked so different from the girl who had been there before. She reasoned, I’ll just let her touch my hair, what harm could come from that? And she leant her head toward the Queen as she had asked. But recall that the Queen’s books held poisons, as well as disguises? The prongs of this comb were dipped in the deadliest of these. The minute it scraped Snow White’s scalp, she fainted dead away with the comb still seeping poison into her hair.
The Queen hoped that this time she had done the thing properly and ran back home to spy through her mirror. Though what she saw this time made her even angrier than before:
Back at the cottage, Richard once again ran to Snow White’s rescue and found the offending comb. He yanked it from her head and her hair tumbled down her back, shaking off the poison. It was a few minutes this time, but eventually she stirred. She sat up, rubbed her head and said, “Oh, that tricky witch! How can I have been so stupid as to let her get to me again!” She sheepishly told the dwarves what had happened and they quickly sympathized.
“It is not shameful to feel another’s pain and want to help them. You are kind, you could not turn her away. But please, girl, the next time someone comes to knock do not speak to them at all!” said Richard.
Snow White nodded, but still looked downcast.
“Remember, child,” said Ralph, “If the Queen knows of you, then perhaps your father does too. There is always hope.”
At this the Queen snapped her fingers and the mirror went blank. “Perhaps your father does too,” eh? Yes, perhaps that is the answer to this problem.
That very night, determined to have it over with, she traced a new form into the pentacle and set off with nothing but a walking staff, a cloak and a fateful apple.
The next morning, just after the dwarves had left for a day’s work, an old gnarled woman in a black cloak hobbled up to the cottage and knocked at the door with her walking staff. “Hello?” said the trembling old voice, when Snow White didn’t come to the door. The old woman smiled to herself, knowing that Snow White was hiding, and sat down on a crate next to the window. She pulled out her apple and cut it in half, stuck one side in her pocket and started to nibble on the other. “Oh dear,” she said to herself, “I didn’t catch Snow White before she went out. I do hope she doesn’t meet any of the Queen’s spies on her way back, her father would be devastated!”
Snow White was so surprised to hear this, that she peeked out the window to see who this old woman was. It was hard to tell, but she thought it looked something like her old nurse from the castle. She whispered from her hiding place, “Are you from the King?”
The old woman looked around and made a great show as if she was startled. “Oh my! Who spoke? Is someone at home? ...” Snow White did not show herself. “I am from the King, indeed. Snow White, is that you?”
Snow White stood up and said, “How can I be sure this is no trick?”
The old woman took a bite of her apple and thought for a moment before replying, “I don’t suppose you can be sure. Then again, how can I be sure you are really Snow White? I have an important message from the King, if you really are her. You fit her description right enough. But they say that Snow White was as sweet and trusting as any child ever could be. You don’t seem that way to me.”
A message from the King, she thought.There’s a chance that I could see my father!
The old woman took another bite of her apple and appeared to think again. “Well, I have another piece of this apple here.” she said after a while. “If you take a bite of it, we can kill two birds with one stone. I will have proved who I am by not poisoning you and you can prove you are Snow White by trusting me enough to try it. But really you don’t loose anything, I have just started to eat it and I am fine.”
Snow White hesitated a moment, but in the end she longed to hear from her father and decided to chance the apple. She timidly accepted the offered slice from the old woman’s pocket and took a bite. It caught in her throat. She choked and coughed then fell to the floor, thrashing.
The old woman watched from the window and thought she had finally done it. She stayed to watch the final throes just to make sure, then stole off as quietly as she came.
When the dwarves returned that night, they could find nothing wrong with her. She appeared to be sleeping, even though no breath swelled her breast. They changed her and put her to bed, but the next morning she still lie in breathless slumber. They cried and realized that the Queen must have won. But she was so beautiful lying there, that they hadn’t the heart to give up hope entirely. They had thought her dead before, and she had returned to them. They would keep her in a glass coffin until they could find a cure. So they did, and placed the coffin atop an icy mountain to keep the rose in her cheeks.
A few months later, a prince happened by the casket and begged one of the dwarves keeping vigil to tell him the story behind this beauty. It was Richard’s watch that day, and he gladly told the prince a tale that he would never forget. The prince immediately fell in love with the sleeping girl and vowed to bring her back to his castle and hire the best physicians to find her a remedy.
Richard excitedly ran to the cottage and brought his brothers to help him carry Snow White back to the prince’s castle. They gently loaded the sleeping princess onto a cart and set off, but the road was bumpy. It wasn’t too long before the wheel hit a rock and jarred the casket so forcefully that the top swung open. Snow White bounced up then fell back on her bed. And as she landed, a great chunk of the apple flew from her throat. She sat up and coughed. Then she saw who was there. In relief, she scrambled to hug her beloved friends and tried to hold back her tears as she told them her story.
The prince listened with rapt interest and when Snow White had finished her tale, he introduced himself. “My lady, I invite you to my home to recover, though you look as lively and beautiful as if nothing had happened at all,” he said with a twinkle in his eye. “There we can make contact with your father. Not to worry, all is well now, my fair princess.”
And indeed it turned out to be so. It wasn’t long before Snow White fell as madly in love with the prince as he already was with her and they decided to marry. They sent word to her father and he came at once, ecstatic to see his daughter again. But when he heard how she had gotten lost, he cried. “She must truly be a witch to be so cold-hearted! I can’t believe she could do this to you, my sweet child. She will not escape us unpunished, this time. Although, from the sounds of it, the only way to stop her would be to boil her feet.”
When the couple were married, they sent the Queen an invitation. Thinking Snow White dead, the Queen went unsuspectingly. But when she arrived, she was horrified to be introduced to a very-much-alive-and-well Snow White. Then the King emerged from behind her and the Queen froze, knowing she was undone.
“My Queen,” he said, “I know of the treachery you have underwent. Both I and my daughter have shown you nothing but kindness, and you repay us with such cruelty? It was three times you tried to murder my beloved daughter, so it is three times I will ask you to dance for us. But with these shoes.” The King motioned to a page who brought a pair of iron shoes, so hot that he carried them with blacksmith’s tongs. I needn’t tell you that she didn’t even last through one dance with shoes like that, and none of the watchers were sorry to see her faint dead away.
All was finally well in the kingdom and Snow White was happy with her prince. At least for a time, but you see each ending is a new beginning and it wasn’t long before Snow White had a child of her own. But that is another story for a different day.