Snow White

Story

A queen wishes for a daughter as white as snow, as red as blood and as black as the window frame. Her wish is granted and she gives birth to a daughter, Snow White. The queen dies and the king marries a woman who is jealous of Snow White’s beauty. Narrowly escaping death, Snow White finds herself banished to the woods, where she discovers a little cottage filled with seven little beds…

Why we chose it

One of the most popular and best known fairy tales. Snow White was Walt Disney’s first animated feature film.

Where it came from

Snow White is one of the traditional stories collected by the Grimm brothers and first published 1812. Brothers Jacob and Wilheim Grimm set out to collect the fairy tales that had been passed orally down the generations to make sure that they were not forgotten. Some people claim that Snow White is actually based on a real person. Possible candidates include Margaretha von Waldeck, born in 1533, a German countess whose stepmother sent her away. She died mysteriously aged 21. Or Maria Sophia von Erthal, born two centuries later, whose stepmother was reputed to hate her stepchildren. A ‘talking mirror’, a toy that could speak, now in a museum, came from the castle where she was born.

Where it went next

The most famous version of the tale is the Disney film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937). The dwarfs are given names: Bashful, Doc, Dopey, Happy, Sleepy and Sneezy. Other more recent film adaptations included Mirror Mirror (2012) and Snow White and the Huntsman (2012).

Associated stories

The Scottish folktale Lasair Gheug, the King of Ireland’s Daughter’ is similar to Snow White, but it features a talking trout instead of a talking mirror.

The Sleeper and the Spindle by Neil Gaiman and Chris Riddell is based on both Snow White and Sleeping Beauty.