The story of Cinderella, I heard growing up, was Cinderella being a damsel in distress. Being constantly overworked by her stepmother/sisters. After she tries to go to an upcoming ball hosted by the prince, she’s visited by her magical fairy godmother who helps her into a magical gown, slippers, etc, but this magic only lasts until midnight. While she enjoys her time with the prince, she runs away just before midnight, leaving a glass slipper. The prince eventually finds her, and they live happily ever after.

Grimm Brother version :

Is Cinderella made by the Grimm Brothers?

Cinderella was not a tale created by the Grimm Brothers. Typical of most fairy tales, many versions of Cinderella exist across the world, varying in numerous ways due to regional and cultural differences. The Grimm Brothers heard the stories and wrote their own account, which was first published in 1812.

What is the Brothers Grimm version of Cinderella?

The Brothers Grimm version of Cinderella tells the story of a kind young girl who loses her mother and struggles with her father remarrying an unkind woman with two awful daughters who treat her poorly. When the stepsisters find out they have been invited to a ball being held for the prince to find a bride, they ask Cinderella to comb their hair and brush their shoes, but tell her she cannot go with them, so Cinderella goes to her mother’s grave and begins to cry, wishing for gold and silver to wear to the ball. A little white bird who sits in the tree at her mother’s grave provides her with a gold and silver ball gown and matching shoes and for three nights in a row, Cinderella wears beautiful clothing and shoes to the Prince’s ball, and the prince, smitten with her, tries to walk her home, only for her to run away before he can discover who she is. On the third night, the prince covers the stairs with pitch, but Cinderella still escapes, only leaving a single shoe behind. When the prince comes to the house with the slipper in search of Cinderella, each of the stepsisters tries to cut off parts of their feet to fit into the tiny gold shoe, but the prince discovers their deception and finally finds Cinderella, whom he promptly marries.

✦ Find out more : Cinderella Original Story >> Folk and Fairy Tales ,

✦ But what was the original version of Cinderella?

• The earliest recorded version of the Cinderella story comes from Egypt.  The tale of Rhodopis and Her Little Gilded Sandals depicts a Greek slave girl who eventually marries the king of Egypt. Other interpretations are told in countries across Asia, including the Philippines, Malaysia, Korea, and Vietnam.

• Chinese storytellers recorded a version sometime during the Tang dynasty (618–908). In the Chinese version, the protagonist is called Yeh-Shen, and there is no fairy godmother.  Instead, there is a magical fish that helps her and a golden shoe that leads the Prince to his eventual bride. The French author was the first person to introduce the now ubiquitous Fairy Godmother into the diegesis.  He also established the much-loved pumpkin carriage, anthropomorphic animal servants, and the little glass slippers. Perrault reported that he was told the story by some anonymous folk storytellers and added the extra details for literary effect.  Some scholars claim that he confused vair (French for ‘fur’) with verre (meaning ‘glass’), which would explain how the famous slipper came to be made of the most impractical glass!

Find out more: Cinderella Original Story >> Folk and Fairy Tales, Cinderella: A Brief History | Metropolitan Opera

The story I heard growing up: Aurora was a princess cursed from birth by a witch, that she wouldn’t live till a certain age. She falls into a deep sleep and wakes up being saved by a wandering prince; they live happily ever after.

The Sleeping Beauty: For grown-ups
The story of Sleeping Beauty was first told in a French
romance, Perceforest, in 1528, then in Italy by Giambattista Basilein 1636. Their stories are much longer than modern versions and may be two stories put together. Sleeping Beauty is discovered by a king who is already married, but doesn’t wake up until she gives birth to twins. The king’s wife plans to kill Talia and her children, but is killed herself, and everyone else lives happily ever after.

In Perrault’s account, the prince’s mother is an ogre and tries to persuade the palace cook to cook the children with a brown mustard sauce. In the end, she falls into a pit of poisonous snakes. The Grimm brothers ended the story when the princess was woken with a kiss, and most modern versions stop there, too. Basile’s heroine was called Talia. She is also called Zellandine, Briar Rose, Rosebud, or Rosamond.

In the Disney film, she is called Aurora, which was the name of her daughter in Perrault’s version. In some stories, the old woman with the spinning wheel is entirely innocent, but often it is made clear that she is the wicked fairy in disguise.

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I grew up hearing a story about the evil queen who was obsessed with beauty, sending a huntsman to murder Snow White because she was envious of her beauty, but he was unable to harm the princess, so he allowed her to flee. As the evil queen tries to find her, Snow White discovers seven dwarves. When the evil queen finally locates her, she pretends to be a granny and feeds her a poisoned apple. Following that, Snow White goes into a deep sleep, but is awakened by a prince kissing her, and they go on to lead a happily ever after.

Snow White is a German fairy tale published in 1812 by the Brothers Grimm in their first collection of fairy tales. But while researching it, I discovered a Russian man by the name of Aleksandr Pushkin wrote a poem in 1833 titled “The Tale of the Dead Princess and the Seven Knights.” – The Original Snow White

1. In the Brothers Grimm story, the king marries a pretty woman who possesses a magic mirror after the queen’s passing during childbirth. When the magic mirror tells the new queen that Snow White is declared the most beautiful. She becomes envious of the 7-year-old, and she decides to kill Snow White. She asks the huntsman to bring back her lungs and liver as evidence. Snow White persuades the huntsman to spare her, nevertheless, and to never go back home. The huntsman accepts thinking she will perish in the woods.
2. However, Snow White finds a house after fleeing, where she creates a mess and then goes to sleep. When Snow White wakes up and tells the seven dwarves everything, they discover her napping. The dwarves decide to welcome Snow White on the condition that she cleans, and note that her stepmother is not easily swayed. The magic mirror says the princess is still alive, but the queen is eating what she thinks are Snow White’s liver and lungs at this time.
3. The queen then deceives Snow White three times: once with a poisoned comb, once with a bodice and a poisoned apple. The seven dwarves couldn’t determine what was wrong with Snow White after she “died” from eating the poisoned apple, so they made a glass coffin and grieved for her.
4. A prince later shows up and asks the dwarves to sell Snow White to him after he spots her in a coffin. While the dwarves refuse, the prince carries snow white away, but the coffin is so heavy that the servants misstep and the poisoned apple escapes from Snow White’s mouth. When the prince proposes to her, she wakes up confused and instantly falls in love.
5. When Snow White’s stepmother receives an invitation to a wedding, she asks the magic mirror who is the fairest of them all, and he replies that it is the young new queen. She attends the wedding to see who is more beautiful, and when the prince identifies Snow White, he has the queen dance in iron shoes that have been heated up in the fire until she passes away.

The story revolves around a hungry wolf and an innocent lamb. The ravenous wolf made excuses to eat the lamb, and despite the innocent lamb’s efforts to defend itself, it was eventually eaten by the wolf.

I thought this was an interesting fable; the moral was to show that a ‘Tyrants need no excuse.’

In ancient Greece, there was a slave named Aesop. He told fables to earn his freedom. Here are some of his examples :

The boy who cried ‘Wolf’! A boy in a village lied and ran around ‘wolf’, alerting the people to come and help, only to find him lying because he found it amusing. Eventually, the villagers get tired of believing him, but when a real wolf came, no one came to save him, believing he was lying again. The moral of this story was to be honest.

The lion’s share: A lion, a donkey, and a fox go hunting. The donkey shares the meat equally. Because of this, the lion then kills the donkey, inviting the fox to share the food. From experience, the fox gives a larger share to the lion and eats less. The moral of this story was sharing, fairness, and hierarchy.

The story: A hare made fun of the tortoise’s slow walking pace. Eventually, the tortoise had enough of the mockery, so it challenged the hare in a race. The hare, believing he would win due to the slow pace of the tortoise, ran off to the finish line, but decided he had enough time for a rest. As the Hare fell asleep, the tortoise continued to walk towards the finishing line, eventually even passing the hare and winning the race. By the time the Hare woke up, the tortoise had won the race.

The moral: It’s the slow and steady that wins!