Tuesday, Sep. 21, 2010

The Witch in Hansel and Gretel

For a children's fairy tale, Hansel and Gretel deals with some pretty serious themes: famine, abandonment and cannibalism. In the Brothers Grimm story, when Hansel and Gretel's family experiences a famine, the evil stepmother convinces her nice but misguided husband to abandon his children in the woods. After a series of twists and turns, the tykes come across a cottage built out of gingerbread and candies, which they greedily begin to eat until a witch opens the door and lures them inside with the promise of more sweets. Turns out this witch is the very worst kind: the type that eats people. She is eventually burned to death in an oven by Gretel. Oh, yeah, we forgot to mention there's immolation too.