Jean Hyung Choi

Dr. Haas
Writing 39B
22 February 2016
RA Rough Draft 2
A literature genre that is perceived as simple, childish, and onedimensional: the authoritative dictionary Merriam-Webster defines the genre
fairy tale as following, a story (as for children) involving fantastic forces
and beings (as fairies, wizards, and goblins) called also fairy story [or] a
story in which improbable events lead to a happy ending. As seen in
likewise official descriptions, fairy tale is a genre that is often overlooked for
its typical happy endings and overly simplified and censored story plot.
Nonetheless, such stereotypical characteristics of fairy tale were nonexistent once the history of genre is tracked back to its roots. For centuries,
fairy tale genre has gone through the pens of countless authors and editors,
getting criticized and readjusted in order to fulfill the changing perspective
and taste of the audience of different regions and time periods. In that
process of development, each version of fairy tales from different
backgrounds has come to incorporate a major aspect of literary works, the
rhetorical situation. Rhetorical situation is generalized as the circumstances
under which the rhetor writes or speaks, (pwr.la.psu.edu). Accordingly, it
includes variety of elements of the setting in which a literary work has been
created, such as the audience, the authors purpose, and general societal
context. Therefore, when several versions of one fairy tale story show largely
differing elements and settings that connect to their historical context, it can

be said that the differences are originated from the rhetorical situation of
each stories.
The beloved fairy tale of all time, Little Red Riding Hood is one of the
examples that exceptionally prove such point. The origin of Little Red Riding
Hood is the work by Charles Perrault a French author from the Salon Era
during 17th century titled Le Petit Chaperon Rouge. A brief summary of
Perraults version of Little Red Riding Hood would be the following: a young
and beloved girl named Little Red Riding Hood goes on an errand to deliver
her sick grandmother some food, and carelessly gets herself and her
grandmother eaten by a wolf. Unlike the prevailing stereotypes on fairy tale
genre, Perraults version of Little Red Riding Hood contains neither a magical
creature, nor a happy ending. Such crudity and cruelty of Perraults version
of the story becomes reasonable when the historical context is brought into
the picture. In 17th century, France, the main audience for fairy tales was
aristocratic men and women, who would gather around in Salons to
exchange knowledge through sophisticated discussions. Accordingly, the
fairy tales written in that time period contained morals for young men and
women, without further considerate process of censorship that would purify
the story free of explicit elements. Thus, not surprisingly, Perraults version
contains many references to sexuality, and sexism. As time progressed to
19th century, however, the primary source of audience expanded to include
young children as well. Therefore, under the influence of the change in
audience, Brothers Grimm the German fairy tale collectors in the 1800's

during the German Romanticism movement resolved to remove the

crudity and cruelty of earlier versions of fairy tales in their publication of the
revised collection in 1857. Grimms version of Little Red Riding Hood includes
a far more cunning Big Bad character of a wolf, and a hero who rescues the
Little Red and her grandmother from the danger, along with inevitable happy
ending. In contrast to Perraults version, a short summary of Grimms version
of the story would be as follows: a young and beloved girl named Little Red
Riding Hood goes on an errand to deliver her sick grandmother some food,
and almost carelessly gets herself and her grandmother eaten by a wolf, but
a huntsman comes to save the day, and they all lived happily ever after. As
seen in such differences between Perraults version and Grimms version of
the story, the development progress of Little Red Riding Hood over time
that is specifically seen in the change of wolfs trickery and the creation of a
hero character is the result of incorporation of rhetorical situation in each
texts, according to the change in time period and societal conventions from
17th century to 19th century, along with the change in the main age group of
the audience.
As the fairy tale genre developed over time, so did the lists of generally
accepted conventions and motifs that help identify the genre. One of such
fairy tale conventions that prominently reflect the change in rhetorical
situation between the two previously mentioned versions of Little Red Riding
Hood is the fairy tale function defined by a Soviet folklorist named Vladimir
Propp, the trickery, done by an archetypal character, the villain. In both

versions of the story, wolf tricks the innocent Little Red to tell him the
location of her grandmothers house, then arrives at the house before Little
Red, patiently waiting for his time to prey on the poor young lady. However,
in Perraults version of the story, the villain, wolf is portrayed as a very
passive character with subtle tricks to hide his identity to others except for
Little Red. Such passiveness of the wolf is seen in the story when Perrault
wrote, a wolf, who had a very great mind to eat her up, but he dared not,
because of some woodcutters working nearby in the forest. (Perrault). Such
passiveness and devious manner of the wolf derives from the Perraults
audience, the aristocratic young women, and his purpose of warning them
about the negative consequences of falling for temptation from the subtle
wolfs of the society. Catherine Orenstein, a journalist and the author of the
fairy tale genre analysis book titled Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked: Sex,
Morality, and the Evolution of a Fairy Tale, mentions in her book the old
saying of France, Elle avoit v le loup, which was used as a phrase
describing the loss of virginity in 17th century France. Interestingly, that
certain French saying directly translates to she has seen the wolf in
English. In 17th century France, aristocratic women were gaining more
independence and liberty as they participated in the intellectual gatherings
of Salon Era, and pursued compatibility between sexes, and freedom from
arranged marriages, so called marriage de raison (Windling), which was
described as an affair orchestrated by parents for social and economic
advancement by Orenstein. Such modernization movements from the

women were deemed as a threat to family life and social values, as it was
loosening the stance of the aristocratic families in the society that was
maintained through the arranged marriages between families (Orentein).
Therefore, conservative and patriarchal writers such as Charles Perrault
himself included subtle satire and implications into their works to warn the
young women of the society about the consequences of rebelling against the
accepted social roles of woman. Specifically, in Little Red Riding Hood, its
clear to see that Perraults purpose is to warn young women against
promiscuity, which was one of the factors that could interfere with
successfully completing their arranged marriages (Buchinger). Perraults
obvious use of the symbolism of wolf, and the act of the Little Red getting
into the bed with the wolf after taking off her clothes to be eaten plainly
shows the elements of sexuality and connection to promiscuity inside the
story. Due to such Perraults purpose behind the composition of the story, the
wolf in the story is deemed as a sneaky, subtle, and perhaps charming
character that easily lures Little Red into the bed, for he is the representation
of the young men of society that lured young aristocratic women to seeking
sexual freedom, losing their virginity, therefore threatening the societys
conventional structure. Conclusively, Perraults comment at the end of the
story specifically mentions his intended meanings behind the wolf character:
"I say "wolf," but there are various kinds of wolves. There are also those who
are charming, quiet, polite, unassuming, complacent, and sweet, who pursue
young women at home and in the streets (Perrault). However, the wolf

shows completely different characteristics in Grimms version of the story. In

Grimms version, wolf shows maximum effort to tempt and trick Little Red
into drifting off from her original path in order to get his chance to prey on
the grandmother and the Little Red. Such effort is seen in his line, Listen,
Little Red Cap, havent you seen the beautiful flowers growing in the forest?
Why dont you look around? I believe you havent even noticed how lovely
the birds are singing (Grimm). The wolf is no longer afraid to be seen by
the men in the woods, and appears obviously evil that it causes the Little
Red to be cautious and doubtful in treating him. Also, he seems to have no
intention of getting the Little Red out of her clothes and into the bed. Such
change in wolfs trickery and personality is the result of the changed
audience from young adults to little children, following the change of time
period from 17th century to 19th century. The main audience of Brothers
Grimms works was Protestant parents and their young children of 1800s
Germany. In his introduction to Brothers Grimms works recollection, Zipes
states the reason for Grimms edits that they have made to numerous
different fairy tales: Some thought that the stories were too crude, were not
shaped enough to appeal to children, and were weighed down by the
scholarly notes As said, for the new audience of young children, the
original version of the Little Red Riding Hood was a little too cruel, and a little
too sexual. Since the targeted audience of the story has become the young
children, the purpose of the story also changed from warning young women
about promiscuity, to warning young children about the possible harms and

dangers in outside world. In order to emphasize the danger of the seemingly

friendly offenders, the wolf has come to have a more cunning, and
persuasive personality compared to the naturally-appealing characteristic of
Perraults version of young-men wolf.
Another convention that reflects the changes that derive from such
changes in rhetorical situation is the Propps function, the rescue, done by an
archetypal character, the hero. As previously stated, the purpose of
Perraults version of the story was to warn the young women about possible
tragic consequences of falling into temptations of promiscuity, thus the story
ended with a simple, and resolute conclusion, saying these words, this
wicked wolf fell upon Little Red Riding Hood, and ate her all up, (Perrault).
However, the situation was different for Brothers Grimm. The audience for
Brothers Grimm was young children and their parents; hence the original
version was too crude, [was] not shaped enough to appeal to children
(Zipes). Therefore, instead of letting the story end with two peoples death,
they renovated the story plot to give it a happy ending, through the use of a
hero character, the huntsman, and his rescue of the poor Little Red. The
rhetorical situation that has influenced their decision of adding a huntsman
was the Germanys family structure in 1800s. By 19th century, the German
family structure was greatly altered into a form of a strong nuclear family
which contrasts distinctively with the Frances large, formal and aristocratic
family structure of 17th century. The familys value was accepted to be very
high with patriarchal structure, with its general form described in the

following excerpt: the family was the center of society, no matter what
economic level it lived at the father is the center and leads the wife and
children. Youth was supposed to be obedient to the elders and the father's
word was law, (Strawser). Based on such social situation, the Brothers
Grimm obtained their idea for a hero character that resembles a father of the
family, thus a huntsman. As fathers were the authoritative member of a
family who are responsible for the familys safety outside of the house, the
huntsman keeps an eye out for dangers around the female characters in the
story, and rescues them from such dangers: He had been searching for the
wolf a long time and thought that the beast had certainly eaten the
grandmother, (Grimm). Additionally, for Brothers Grimm gave the hero a
father role, they also altered Little Red to fit the role of an obedient and
bright child, thus the story ends with her learning the lesson on her own, as
seen in the line and Little Red Cap thought to herself: "Never again will
you stray from the path by yourself and go into the forest when your mother
has forbidden it." (Grimm).
Just as growing childrens personality development reflects their
background and environment, developments of literary works such as fairy
tales reflect the environment in which they have been created and refined.
The two versions of the popular tale Little Red Riding Hood by Charles
Perrault and Brothers Grimm are especially exceptional mirror to such lifelike trait of literary works. From the differences in the manifestation of
conventions villain, hero, trickery and rescue in the two versions of

Little Red Riding Hood, it is seen that analyzing rhetorical situation not only
allows the readers to understand the rhetors intended audience, but also the
purpose behind the creation of their certain literary work; in this case,
Perraults conservative moral for adult audience versus Grimms familyoriented moral for children audience. Analysis of rhetorical situation is
evidently a highly effective communication device between a rhetor and his
or her audience, which specifically speaks for the rhetors intention behind
creation.

Works Cited

Buchinger, Michael. Desexualizing Little Red Riding Hood: A Comparison of

Charles Perrault's and the Brothers Grimm's Versions of the Popular Fairy
Tale. Diss.Academia, 15 Oct. 2003.

Orenstein, Catherine. Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked: Sex, Morality and
the Evolution of a Fairy Tale. New York: Basic Books, 2002

Windling, Terri. "Les Contes Des Fes: The Literary Fairy Tales of France." Les
Contes Des Fes: The Literary Fairy Tales of France. Web Archive,
WaybackMachine, 28 Mar. 2014. Web. 16 Feb. 2016.

Zipes, Jack. "Introduction: Rediscovering the Original Tales of the Brothers

Grimm." The Original Folk and Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm. Jack Zipes,
trans. Princeton, NJ. Princeton UP: 2014, 1-26.

Merriam-Webster. Merriam-Webster. Web. 16 Feb. 2016.

Strawser, Dick. ""Mendelssohn's World"" : Being German in the Early 1800s.

Web. 16 Feb. 2016.