The Fairy Tale Horror, Little Red Riding Hood
Guest Post for Defending the Wood Perilous
Another guest post by Brandon Quakkelaar
The Fairy Tale Horror, Little Red Riding Hood
Apr 14, 2023
By: Brandon Quakkelaar
Edited By: Jesse Denzin-Weber
When I decided to analyze Little Red Riding Hood, I was not expecting to find a story that bludgeoned the reader (or listener) over the head with a spiked bat. But that’s exactly what this version of the story does. It’s a full fledged horror story that has a moral for the kids, but there’s also a moral for the adults reading it.
The version of Little Red Riding Hood featured in the Junior Classics Fairy and Wonder Tales (published in 1918) was originally written down by Charles Perrault in the seventeenth century, though people point out that he’s probably not the source of the original idea. He merely preserved this version by writing it down. Some say that he may have heard it from his children’s nurse who participated in an oral tradition of storytelling. Stories of a girl meeting a wolf in the forest date back hundreds of years before Perrault.
Perrault’s story is incredibly abrupt. The beginning and middle are unsurprising to anyone who’s heard a version of the story before. There’s a beautiful girl with a red riding hood. She’s loved by her mother and her grandmother.
Once upon a time there lived in a certain village a little country girl, the prettiest creature ever seen. Her mother was very fond of her, and her grandmother doted on her still more. This good woman had made for her a little red riding-hood, which became the girl so well that everybody called her Little Red Riding-Hood.
― Little Red Riding Hood by Perrault
Her grandmother becomes sick. Her mother sends Little Red Riding Hood to bring her grandmother some things to eat. Along the way, she shares too much information with a wolf. The wolf takes a fast route to Grandma’s and, in the meantime, she takes the long way and stops frequently to smell the flowers.
Perrault picks up his spiked bat right around when the wolf gains entry to the grandmother’s house. Read the rest…
I think this early version of Little Red Riding Hood was read to me as a young child. The hunter was a relief when it was written in-- but I wonder sometimes if it lessens the impact of the story. This was an interesting read L. Jagi.
Little Red Ridinghood by Charles Perrault
Little girls, this seems to say
Never stop upon the way
Never trust a stranger friend
No-one knows where it may end
As you’re pretty, so be wise
Wolves may lurk in every guise
Now as then, ‘tis simple truth
Sweetest tongue has sharpest tooth.