Reading Notes: Brother's Grimm Hunt (Part A)

This unit contains fewer but longer stories. I thought this was much easier to read because the stories had more time for development.

Hansel and Grethel

• Hansel and Grethel live in a very poor family with their good-hearted father and mean step-mother
• the stories never mention anything about the children's real mother
• consider writing a story about their real mother and why she either died or left the family
• since the family is poor they have very little food so the stepmother sends the children out into the woods in hopes that they would get lost and eaten by animals so that the adults would have enough to eat
• the first time they are led into the woods, Hansel uses white pebbles to find his way back
• the second time he uses bread crumbs to leave a trail but birds ate all of the crumbs
• why did the mother wish to light a bonfire every time she took the children to the forest to be abandoned? 
• to attract wild animals, to create comfort so that the kids would sleep, other reasons...
• they find a house made of cakes, sugar, and bread in the forest that is occupied by an evil witch
• witches have red eyes and cannot see far but smell very well
• Grethel pushes the witch into the oven and burns her alive to save Hansel
• they grab treasure from the witches house and take it home to their father 
• the step-mother is dead at this point but the story never mentions how
• only been 3-4 days since the children had left the house this second time

Hansel is trapped in the cage by the evil witch.

Allerleirauh

• a King plans to marry his daughter because she looks strikingly similar to his wife
• to delay this and hopefully prevent the marriage from happening the daughter requests to have 3 dresses and a mantle of a thousand different kinds of fur and hair sewn together
• she thought this to be an impossible task but the King had it completed
• the girl runs away with the mantle and wears it as she falls asleep in the woods
• the King's guards find her while out hunting and initially believed her to be some rare animal because of the coat
• it would be interesting to give the girl the power to change into the different animals of the mantle at will 
• Story Idea: Hansel and Grethel were left in the same forest Allerleirauh escaped to. The bonfire attracts Allerleirauh to the area that Hansel and Grethel were in. She uses the powers she has and her mantle to help them defeat the witch and goes home with them to marry their father.

Bibliography

Hansel and Grethel from the Brothers Grimm (Hunt) Unit

Allerleirauh from the Brothers Grimm (Hunt) Unit

Image Information: Hansel in a cage. Found on publicdomainpictures.