Sleep plays an important part in fairy tales. While it's not considered an activity, a lot of important, maybe even fatal things may happen while the character sleeps. It may even define the character as in the most famous of presented examples below - The Sleeping Beauty.
The main characteristic of fairy tales is transformation and sleep can be crucial for that. We'll examine a few fairy tales to see the role of sleep or what it represents.
Here are 10 fairy tales with sleep in a decisive role.
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What are your thoughts on sleep in fairy tales?
I am not very interested in her. Goldilocks is not among my favorite Top 100 Characters. And I stopped writing sequels more than 30 decades ago. I prefer adaptations with a twist at the moment. Especially fables turning into fairy tales or fables with the opposite moral of the originals.
The seventh fairy tale, The three bears, is such a telling example for the irresponsible role of sleep.
That subheading leaves us with the compassionate pondering that "She is very lucky to survive the encounter with the owners and we can only hope she learned something from her experience."
You mention elsewhere of yourself as a fairy-tale writer. Might you consider a sequel about whether or not Goldilocks obtained wisdom from her irresponsible experiences?
Ha Of course!
That's why I am here, Jo_Murphy;)
Again! I have never thought about all of this.
I wouldn't say that they are the same. They share certain elements but this is true for all stories. I can even say there are only two basic stories: Cinderella and Puss in Boots and everything is just a ariaton on one of these. Or make a step further and say that everything starts and ends with Cinderella and try to prove that Puss in Boots is just a variation where the beginning of the story is a bit later ... Anyway, Water(s) of Life is a great story on its own.
Graphic description!
My sister tells me that an interesting takeaway from her recent re-read of meditator-mindfulness physician and microbiologist Jon Kabat-Zinn's Wherever You Go There You Are is that he devoted four pages to "The Water of Life" fairy tale (pages 88-91). He describes "The Water of Life" as a "richly crafted tale" with "many turns in its unfolding." He sees the tale's point as being willing to admit not knowing and to being open to "help from unexpected places." She discovered in researching "The Waters of Life" that there are numerous sleep episodes and that American folklorist Stith Thompson suggested many similarities between "The Waters of Life" and "The Golden Bird" in his book, The Folktale (published in 1977).
Would you have found in your research that "The Waters of Life" and "The Golden Bird" are one and the same fairy tale?
I believe the illustrator just tried to emhasize the monstrosity of the ogre and his daughters.
Your first example, Hop o' my thumb, to the sleep role in its vulnerable aspect considers Hop o' my thumb and his brothers versus the Ogre's daughters and ultimately the ogre.
The Gustave Doré illustration in your wizzley Hop o' My Thumb: 10 facts to know has the girls sleeping under covers whose upper surfaces have perhaps bird bones and wings. The girl closest to her father perhaps holds a (bird?) bone in her mouth.
Is the image based on something in the fairy tale? It looks like either the girls fell asleep eating or that their father moved from the dining table with his mouth full!