Queen (Snow White) - Brothers Grimm Version

Brothers Grimm Version

The German fairytale was collected by the Brothers Grimm in their 1812 Kinder- und Hausmärchen ("Children's and Household Tales"). In the first edition, though not the subsequent ones, the Queen is Snow White's biological mother, not stepmother.

In the Grimm version, the Queen orders her huntsman to take Snow White (or Snowdrop, as she is called in the first edition) into the forest, and bring back her lungs and liver as proof that he has killed her. The huntsman takes pity on Snow White, and instead brings the Queen the lungs and liver of a boar, which she eats, believing them to be Snow White's. The Queen eventually discovers that Snow White has survived by questioning her magic mirror. She dresses in a disguise in her later attempts to kill Snow White. First, she visits the dwarfs' house as an old peddler woman, and sells Snow White laces for a corset; but laces them too tightly, to asphyxiate her. When that fails, she returns as a different old woman and tricks Snow White into using a poisoned comb. Finally when the comb fails to kill her, she visits again as a farmer's wife and gives Snow White a poisoned apple. After Snow White and the Prince reveal her true nature, she is invited to their wedding, where she is forced to wear red-hot iron shoes and "dance until she dropped down dead."

According to Sheldon Cashdan, the evil queen in the story "embodies narcissism, and the young princess, with whom readers identify, embodies parts of the child struggling to overcome this tendency. Vanquishing the queen represents a triumph of positive forces in the self over vain impulses" and "the active involvement of heroine in the witch's demise communicates to readers that they must take an active role in overcoming their own errant tendencies."