This version of "Snow White and the Seven Dwarves" is pretty much the one i've always heard. The good queen wishes for a daughter of rare beauty. She says "How I wish that I had a daughter that had skin as white as snow, lips as red as blood, and hair as black as ebony."Not long after that, the Good Queen gives birth to a baby daughter, the girl has skin as white as snow, lips as red as blood, and hair as black as ebony. She is named 'Snow White.' Then, the Good Queen, Snow White's mother, dies during childbirth. The King gets remarried and the new Queen wishes to be the fairest in the land. Snow White as she's growing up, only gets more beautiful. The Queen is jealous and sends a Huntsman to kill her, he spares her life and takes an animal's heart instead. The Queen realizes that Snow White is still alive and tries multiple times to kill her. Finally an apple puts Snow White into deep sleep until True Love's kiss saves her. ( )

Watch out. The end to the original version is pretty gruesome. ( )

Summary: Snow White’s wicked step mother attempts to kill her so that she can be the most beautiful woman in the kingdom. The Queen has her huntsman take Snow White out into the woods to kill, he is unable to and lets her go. He tries to trick the queen into thinking he had killed Snow White by presenting her with a pigs heart. In the mean time Snow White stumbles upon this tiny cottage where the seven dwarves live. She begs and pleads to let her live with them. When the Queen finds out that Snow White is still alive she sets out to kill Snow White herself.



Personal Reaction: I grew up reading the Grimm’s fairytales and even have a copy of their stories in German. This story in particular has always been a favorite of mine. I love that the moral of the story is that jealousy will get you no where.



Classroom Extension:

1) Group the students and have them act out their favorite scenes.

2) With older students, have them write a comparison essay between the Grimm version and the Disney version ( )

Snow White is a modern fantasy that tells of a queen who wants to be the most beautiful person in the land. Snow White grew to be the most beautiful and the queen hated her and devised several plans to kill her. Snow White ran away and ended up living with the seven dwarfs. Each time the queen thought she had killed Snow White, the dwarfs helped her get well until she ate the poisonous apple. She died, but came alive again when it was dislodged from her throat.

I didn't like this story as well as the one I read when I was growing up. The illustrations were very detailed, but I felt the story was too gory. I would hesitate to read it to small children.

For an activity, read the story to the children letting them interject the repeated lines.
Discuss what is envy and pride.