Fairy Tale Bletherings (3) Beauty and the Beast

And now for my personal favourite - Beauty and the Beast. I am a sucker for this story. I just love it so much. How love can make a beast into a man… *sigh*

I probably won’t be telling anyone anything they don’t already know but I’ll go ahead anyway

Once again this is a story that has various adaptations and versions. In some Beauty has sisters, in other she is an only child. It is also a pretty boring story when it is not given a spin. All it is about is the beast asking Beauty to marry him every night at dinner and every night she says no. That is the basic gist of the story. And, I am glad to say that it doesn’t really have a major icky factor like the previous tales mentioned. The beasts ‘beastliness’ changes in illustrated copies. Sometimes he is a lion (an actual lion) sometimes he has the body of a man and a beasts head – you get the idea.  But there are no bleeding feet, eating children or cutting off of other bodily parts.

One point from what I assume is the original story that sometimes makes it into cartoons and some films are the magical gifts that the beast gives Beauty when she returns to her father for a visit. She is given a mirror that she can use to see what is happening at the Beasts castle and ring than when she twists it on her finger it returns her to the castle.

These versions also have the Beast dying of a broken heart when Beauty is late returning to him. But when she does she cries over him, her tears land on him and he turns into a handsome prince.

But still no blood, gut or gore. Yipee.

What I love the most about this story is how it is in so many other stories and tales. The Hunchback of Notre Dame, The Phantom of the Opera, Hades and Persephone…