Illustration by Edmund Dulac
The Sleeping Beauty in the Woods is a fairy tale written by French author Charles Perrault, first published in 1697.
Origin[]
In the third book of the 14th Century anonymous chivalric romance Perceforest there was the story of Zellandine, a princess to whose christening three goddesses, not fairies, are invited. Like the eighth fairy in Perrault’s tale the goddess Themis feels disrespected because she’s not given a knife as refined as the other goddesses, so she curses the princess to die the first time she touches a piece of flax. Venus, the third goddess, changes the curse so Zellandine won’t die, only fall asleep. After the goddess’ curse becomes a reality, Venus helps Zellandine’s lover, Troylus, in order to wake her up. Also dating from the 14th Century is the Occitan narrative poem Frayere de Joy et Sor de Plaser, where it also tells the story of the cursed princess fallen in a deep sleep.
Neapolitan writer Giambattista Basile wrote two tales that could be also considered huge sources of inspiration for Perrault’s. Sun, Moon and Talia, the most well known of the two, was published in 1636 in the second volume of Il Pentamerone. The tale’s heroine, a princess called Talia, also falls asleep like Zellandine after a splinter of flax goes under her fingernail when she spins for the first time, because until then her father forbid any splinter on the palace after astrologers predicted Talia will die spinning, unlike in Perrault’s where the curse is caused by a spiteful fairy, although two fairies appear in the tale later on. The other less known, The Young Slave, was pblished in the first volume in 1634 and it includes the spiteful fairy who curses the heroine at her christening, although not because she feels disrespected, but because she twisted her ankle. But even then the rest of the tale is really different to both Sun, Moon and Talia and Perrault’s tale. Despite the possible influence of Basile on Perrault’s version, Basile’s tale included many elements that Perrault might found distasteful or outrageous for the Versailles’ audience, like the heroine being awaken not because a prince came and she magically wakes up because of that, but because a married king has sexual relationships with her while she’s still under the spell, and nine month later she gives birth to two babies, one of them who removes the splinter of flax from under her fingernail because the baby is so hungry he sucks the finger. This is also how Zellandine in Perceforest and Sor de Plaser on her poem are awaken. Instead of the prince’s mother who wants to eat the princess and her children because she’s an ogress, in Basile that role is fulfilled by the king’s wife, who wants to get revenge on Talia and her kids for her husband’s adultery.
Synopsis[]
A king and a queen are sad because they don’t have any children. After years and years they finally have a daughter and to celebrate it they give a christening which all the seven fairies that live in the kingdom are invited to be the newborn princess’ godmothers. To make sure the fairies will give the princess the best gifts imaginable the king gave each fairy a golden case with a spoon, a fork and a knife inside, all of them made of gold and set with rubies and diamonds. After the christening ceremony all the guests return to the castle and sit at the table. Suddenly an old fairy, who wasn’t invited because she spent the last fifty years locked in a tower and everyone in the kingdom believed she was dead or cursed, appears. To calm her down the king orders for a case with gold cutlery to be given to the eighth fairy like they did to the other fairies, but because they only maden seven for the seven invited fairies, they have to give her ordinary clutery. Offended the eighth fairy murmurs some threats, and the fairy who’s sitting by her side, afraid she’s planning to hurt the little princess, hides behind a curtain, so that way she would be the last to give her gift to the princess and somehow fix the damage the eighth fairy plans to inflict upon. After the first six fairies give each one their gifts to the princess, the eighth fairy curses the princess to prick her finger with a spindle and die. In the middle of the commotion cause by this the seventh fairy finally comes out from behind the curtains and tells the king and the queen that, although she’s not as powerful as the eighth fairy and can’t completely undo the curse, she’d do everything that’s on her hands to change it and make it less harmful. Instead of dying, the princess will fall asleep and will sleep for one hundred years, until a prince comes and wakes her up. That’s not enough for the king, who forbids the kingdom’s inhabitants to own spindles and distaffs, under pain of death to whoever dares to disobey.
Fifteen or sixteen years later the king and queen go to one of their houses of pleasure and leave the princess alone in the castle. To distract herself she goes through all the rooms until she arrives at a small chamber at the top of a tower, where she finds an old woman who, because she has never heard of the king’s ban, she was spinning. The princess, who has never seen a spindle before, asks the old woman what she’s doing and if she can do it too. The instant she touches the spindle she pricks her finger and falls down into a deep swoon. The old woman cries for help, and when people see what has happened they try every remedy they know to revive the princess, unsuccessfully. When the king finds out what happened he orders his daughter to be carried to the best chamber in the palace and laid on a luxurious bed. Even though the seventh fairy is in another realm at the time of what happened, she’s informed by a dwarf wearing seven league boots, and instantly she goes to see the princess riding her fire chariot drawn by dragons. Thinking that the princess would feel alone one hundred years later when she wakes up and there aren’t any familiar faces, the seventh fairy puts to sleep all the living beings in the palace except the king and the queen, who leave the palace. Soon after plenty of trees grow so fast around the castle that they completely cover it, leaving only in sight the highest towers and preventing anyone from venturing into the palace.
One hundred years pass. The princess’ parents die, and because they didn’t have any other kids another royal family comes to rule the kingdom. One day the prince from that family is hunting nearby the enchanted castle and asks the locals what’s behind the forest. Almost everybody agrees there’s a castle, but disagree in who lives there. Some say it is haunted by ghosts, others that sorcerers celebrate their covens there, and others that it’s inhabited by a child-eating ogre. Finally an old peasant tells the prince about the enchanted princess, and the prince decides to venture himself into the castle. The trees and bushes move aside to let him pass, and inside the castle he finds all the rooms filled with sleeping people. Finally in the most esplendid room he finds the princess, who’s so beautiful the prince falls on his knees when he sees her. In that instant the princess finally wakes up. The prince and the princess spend the next hours talking and enjoying each other’s company until they’re finally called to come downstairs, where everyone has already woken up. That same night the prince and the princess get married in the castle’s chapel and they spend the night together. The next morning the prince leaves, and his parents ask him where he spent the last night. He lies to them, telling them he spent the night at a charcoal burner’s house. The king believes him, but his mother the queen doesn’t trust her son, specially because she notices that since that day the prince goes out everyday saying he’s going to hunt and spends days from home, when he’s actually going to visit the princess. She tries to make his son tell her the truth, but he doesn’t trust her because he knows she’s an ogress, and fears she might harm the princess. That situation lasts for two years until the prince’s father dies, during which the princess gives birth to two children, first a girl called Dawn (tr. Aurore) and then a boy called Day (tr. Jour). After that the prince is crowned king, and feeling that now his family can live with him without having to fear for their safety the young king makes public his wife and children’s existence and brings them to the capital.
Soon after war breaks out and the king has to go and fight, leaving his wife and children with his mother. As soon as her son leaves the queen mother sends her daughter-in-law and grandchildren to live in a house in the forest, and just a few days later she orders a kitchen servant to kill Dawn and serve her the girl’s flesh for dinner tomorrow. Initially the servant thinks that It would be better to obey the queen, not wanting to piss her off, but when Dawn sees him she hugs him and asks for candy. Realising he won’t be able to obey the queen mother’s orders he hides the girl with his wife’s help and serves the queen lamb meat for dinner pretending it is her granddaughter’s flesh. Eight days after the queen orders the servant to kill Day, so she can eat him too, but the servant can’t bring himself to do it either and then again with his wife’s help he hides the boy and serves the queen goat kid’s meat pretending it is her grandson’s. Finally the queen orders the servant to kill her daughter-in-law to eat her too, and the young queen initially wants to be killed, because she believes her missing children are dead, but the servant reveals to her that they’re still alive, and after taking her to where the kids are hidden, he serves the queen mother hind’s flesh for dinner. The servant’s plan initially works out and the queen mother actually believes she had eaten her daughter-in-law and her grandchildren, until one day while she’s taking a walk around the yard she hears the young queen arguing with her kids because Day was behaving badly. The moment she hears them she realises the servant deceived her and orders the next morning for a tub to be filled with toads and snakes, and bring her daughter-in-law, grandchildren, the servant and his wife to be thrown at the tub. Just when they were going to be thrown none other than the queen mother’s son arrived, and seeing his wife and children with their hands tied behind their backs going to be thrown to a tub filled with snakes and toads, he asked what was happening. Enraged, the king’s mother throws herself at the tub, where she’s quickly devoured by the snakes and toads. The king quickly recovers from his mother’s death thanks to his wife and children, who are still alive thanks to the fact he arrived in time.