Sleeping+Beauty

Sleeping Beauty
The imaginative tale of a radiant girl who pricks her finger and falls into a deep sleep is suddenly brought into the light. We reveal the truth about Sleeping Beauty. 

=Sleeping Beauty and Her Rapist =

The Story: Despite what most have been told of the handsome prince kissing the princess and awaking her from an eternal slumber, there is a much darker story that has yet to be told. In an italian tale of Sleeping Beauty, also known as Talia in this version, is raped by a nobleman. After pricking her finger, Talia's father carries her body into the woods and lays her on a velvet blanket. A nobleman hunting in the same woods spots her and is overwhelmed by her beauty and rapes her. Soon after, she becomes pregnant and has two children. When the nobleman's wife hears of this, she demands that their cook catches the two children and cook them into soup and to serve it to her husband. When the nobleman sits down and proceeds to eat the soup, the wife screams, "You are eating one of your own!" However, she was mistaken. The cook did not have the heart to kill the children and substituted their bodies with goat. In the forest, the two children were placed on Talia's chest for them to breast feed. One child suddenly began to suck on her finger and sucked the poison from the needle and she awakens. The story ends with Talia and the two children living happily ever after with her rapist.

Now I don't know about you all, but that's a decently gruesome spin on the tail.

= The Movie = In 2011, an adult version of the story was created into a film released only in Australia. Hopefully, it will eventually be released in America and be right up there with the movie remake favorites like //Alice in Wonderland// and //Red Riding Hood//. Our Sleeping Beauty in this film goes by the name of Lucy, a college student who has worked a number of odd jobs to pay her rent. Lucy answers an ad for a new job. When she arrives she learns just what she would need to do which required having sex with multiple men as she slept along with other requirements similar to prostitution.

= Walt Disney = ==== Walt Disney's version obviously needed to be polished and refined for the audience of children. The story goes that there were thirteen fairies in the kingdom. Once the King and Queen had their beautiful child, Aurora, they through a party and invited the fairies. All except for one. That one fairy arrived at the party and put a curse that on her claiming that on her fifteenth birthday, she will prick her finger and drop dead. But, as an attempt to save her, one of the other fairies casted a spell saying that instead of dying, she will fall into a deep sleep. Sure enough, on her fifteenth birthday, our Sleeping Beauty pricks her finger and falls into a deep sleep. Then, as every Disney fairytale would have it, a handsome prince comes to the rescue. After finding Aurora, he could not resist but to kiss the beautiful sleeping maiden. With one kiss, she is awakened and she and her prince live happily ever after. ====

Sleeping Beauty's earliest influence apparently comes from "Perceforest," a French romance first printed in 1528. While not a Sleeping Beauty tale, Perceforest contains many elements similar to the later Sleeping Beauty tales. Sone scholars debate the connection between the stories, but I believe there are enough similarities to warrant comparisons.
 * =The History =

The next known version of the tale came from Giambattista Basile's "Sun, Moon, and Talia" also known as Il Pentamerone, Day 5, Tale 5 from 1636. This is the tale which is thought to have influenced Perrault's Sleeping Beauty, which is the first version with the title Sleeping Beauty.

After Perrault, the Grimms wrote "Briar Rose" for their own collection of tales. This version is the tamest and does not involve any of the cannibalism, adultery or rape that is found in some of the earlier versions.The Grimm's tale is the most well-known version, in which the Disney is based off of but Perrault's title is more commonly used. The Grimm tale ends earlier than the others with Beauty awaking with the Prince's kiss. The former versions like Perrault's continued the story with the marriage and the events that followed. ||

= =