Hansel and Gretel

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For other uses, see Hansel and Gretel (disambiguation).
Illustration by Arthur Rackham, 1909
"Hansel and Gretel" (also known as Hansel and Grettel, Hansel and Grethel, or Li
ttle Brother and Little Sister) (/'hns?l/ or /'h??ns?l/ and /'gr?t?l/; German: Hns
el und Gretel[a] ['h?nzl? ?nt 'g?e?tl?]) is a well-known fairy tale of German or
igin, recorded by the Brothers Grimm and published in 1812. Hansel and Gretel ar
e a young brother and sister kidnapped by a cannibalistic witch living deep in t
he forest in a house constructed of cake and confectionery. The two children sav
e their lives by outwitting her. The tale has been adapted to various media, mos
t notably the opera Hnsel und Gretel (1893) by Engelbert Humperdinck. Under the A
arne Thompson classification system, "Hansel and Gretel" is classified under Class
327.
Contents [hide]
1
Plot
2
History and analysis
3
Cultural significance
4
See also
5
References
5.1
Notes
5.2
Citations
5.3
Bibliography
6
External links
Plot[edit]
Hansel and Gretel are children whose father is a woodcutter. When a great famine
settles over the land, the woodcutter's abusive second wife decides to take the
children into the woods. Her plan was to abandon the kids in the woods so that
she and her husband will not starve to death. According to her it is mainly beca
use the children eat too much. The woodcutter opposes the plan but finally and r
eluctantly submits to his wife's scheme. However, while talking about their plan
, they are unaware that Hansel and Gretel have overheard them from the children'
s bedroom. After the parents have gone to bed, Hansel sneaks out of the house an
d gathers as many white pebbles as he can, then returns to his room, reassuring
Gretel that God will not forsake them.
The next two days, the family walks deep into the woods and Hansel lays a trail
of white pebbles. After their parents leave them, the children wait for the moon
to rise before following the pebbles back home. They return home safely, much t
o their stepmother's horror. Once again provisions become scarce and the stepmot
her angrily orders her husband to take the children farther into the woods and l
eave them there to die. Hansel and Gretel attempt to leave the house to gather m
ore pebbles, but find the doors locked and escape impossible.
Illustration by Theodor Hosemann
Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm heard "Hansel and Gretel" from Wilhelm's friend (and fut
ure wife) Dortchen Wild[1] and published it in Kinder - und Hausmrchen in 1812.[2
] In the Grimm tale, the woodcutter and his wife are the children's biological p
arents and share the blame for abandoning them. In later editions, some slight r
evisions were made: the wife is the children's stepmother, the woodcutter oppose
s his wife's scheme to abandon the children and religious references are made. T
he sequence where the swan helps them across the river is also an addition to la
ter editions.[3]
The fairy tale may have originated in the medieval period of the Great Famine (1
315 1321),[4] which caused desperate people to abandon young children to fend for
themselves, or even resort to cannibalism.

Folklorists Iona and Peter Opie indicate in The Classic Fairy Tales (1974) that
"Hansel and Gretel" belongs to a group of European tales especially popular in t
he Baltic regions, about children outwitting ogres into whose hands they have in
voluntarily fallen. The tale bears resemblances to the first half of Charles Per
rault's "Hop-o'-My-Thumb" (1697) and Madame d'Aulnoy's "Finette Cendron" (1721).
In both tales, the Opies note, abandoned children find their way home by follow
ing a trail. In "Clever Cinders", the Opies observe that the heroine incinerates
a giant by shoving him into an oven in a manner similar to Gretel's dispatch of
the witch and they point out that a ruse involving a twig in a Swedish tale res
embles Hansel's trick of the dry bone. Linguist and folklorist Edward Vajda has
proposed that these stories represent the remnant of a coming-of-age rite-of-pas
sage tale extant in Proto-Indo-European society.[5][6] A house made of confectio
nery is found in a 14th-century manuscript about the Land of Cockayne.[1]
The fact that the mother or stepmother dies when the children have killed the wi
tch has suggested to many commentators that the mother or stepmother and the wit
ch are metaphorically the same woman.[7] A Russian folk tale exists in which the
evil stepmother (also the wife of a poor woodcutter) asks her hated stepdaughte
r to go into the forest to borrow a light from her sister, who turns out to be B
aba Yaga, who is also a cannibalistic witch. Besides highlighting the endangerme
nt of children (as well as their own cleverness), the tales have in common a pre
occupation with food and with hurting children: the mother or stepmother wants t
o avoid hunger, while the witch lures children to eat her house of candy so that
she can then eat them.[8] Another tale of this type is the French fairy tale Th
e Lost Children.[9] The Brothers Grimm also identified the French Finette Cendro
n and Hop o' My Thumb as parallel stories.[10]
In Grimm's Fairy Tales this story is called Roland and May-Bird.[11][non-primary
source needed] The Brothers Grimm story called Hansel and Gretel tells a quite
different tale: Since their mother died and their father remarried, Hansel and h
is sister Gretel decided to run away to try their fortune in the world. As they
enter a wood their cruel step-mother (who is also an evil fairy) enchants stream
s in the forest to turn Hansel and Gretel into animals. At Gretel's warning Hans
el avoids the first and second streams (which would have turned him into a wolf
or tiger respectively), but is too thirsty to resist the third, which turns him
into a fawn. They both wander on until they find an abandoned cottage, where the
y move in and make a life for themselves. One day a king and his men are hunting
in the forest and see Hansel. They give chase to him and eventually track him d
own to the cottage. The king enters and falls in love with Gretel, they get marr
ied and Hansel moves in with them. Gretel then tells the king of what has happen
ed and he punishes the fairy step-mother, which turns Hansel back into a human.[
12]
Cultural significance[edit]
Staatsoper Wien 2015
Hansel and Gretel's trail of breadcrumbs inspired the name of the navigation ele
ment "breadcrumbs" that allows users to keep track of their locations within pro
grams or documents.[13] The opera Hnsel und Gretel by Engelbert Humperdinck is on
e of the most renowned operas, and is considered one of the most important Germa
n operas.[14]
See also[edit]
Children's literature portal
"Brother and Sister"
"Molly Whuppie"
References[edit]
Notes[edit]
Jump up ^ In German, the names are diminutives of Johannes ("John") and Margaret
e ("Margaret"), respectively

Citations[edit]
^ Jump up to: a b Opie & Opie 1974, p. 237
Jump up ^ Tatar (2002), p. 44
Jump up ^ Tatar (2002), p. 45
Jump up ^ Raedisch (2013), p. 180
Jump up ^ Vajda (2010)
Jump up ^ Vajda (2011)
Jump up ^ Lthi 1970, p. 64
Jump up ^ Tatar 2002, p. 54
Jump up ^ Delarue 1956, p. 365
Jump up ^ Tatar 2002, p. 72
Jump up ^ Brothers Grimm (1930), Grimm's Fairy Tales: Roland and May-Bird, Georg
e H. Doran Company
Jump up ^ Brothers Grimm (1930), Grimm's Fairy Tales: Hansel and Grettel, George
H. Doran Company
Jump up ^ Mark Levene (18 October 2010). An Introduction to Search Engines and W
eb Navigation (2nd ed.). Wiley. p. 221. ISBN 978-0470526842. Retrieved June 24,
2016.
Jump up ^ Upton, George Putnam (1897). The Standard Operas (Google book) (12th e
d.). Chicago: McClurg. pp. 125 129. ISBN 1-60303-367-X. Retrieved 15 October 2007.
Bibliography[edit]
Delarue, Paul (1956). The Borzoi Book of French Folk-Tales. Alfred A. Knopf, Inc
.
Lthi, Max (1970). Once Upon A Time: On the Nature of Fairy Tales. Frederick Ungar
Publishing Co.
Opie, Iona; Opie, Peter (1974). The Classic Fairy Tales. Oxford University Press
. ISBN 978-0-19-211559-1.
Raedisch, Linda (2013). The Old Magic of Christmas: Yuletide Traditions for the
Darkest Days of the Year. Llewellyn Worldwide.
Tatar, Maria (2002). The Annotated Classic Fairy Tales. BCA. ISBN 978-0-393-0516
3-6.
Vajda, Edward (26 May 2010). The Classic Russian Fairy Tale: More Than a Bedtime
Story (Speech). The World's Classics. Western Washington University.
Vajda, Edward (1 February 2011). The Russian Fairy Tale: Ancient Culture in a Mo
dern Context (Speech). Center for International Studies International Lecture Se
ries. Western Washington University.
External links[edit]
Wikisource has original text related to this article:
Hansel and Gretel
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Hansel and Gretel.
Project Gutenberg e-text
SurLaLune Fairy Tale Pages: The Annotated Hansel and Gretel
Original versions and psychological analysis of classic fairy tales, including H
ansel and Gretel
The Story of Hansel and Gretel
Collaboratively illustrated story on Project Bookses
A translation of the Grimm's Fairy Tale Hansel and Gretel
[show] v t e
The Brothers Grimm
[show] v t e
Hansel and Gretel
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GND: 4193296-1
Categories: Brothers GrimmCannibalism in fictionEuropean fairy talesLiterary duo
sChild characters in literatureFictional German peopleWitchcraft in fairy talesE
uropean folklore charactersHansel and Gretel
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