Little Red Riding Hood

The many tales of Little Red Riding Hood provides us with historical changes in the way women have been perceivedthroughout history. Little Red Riding Hood has transformed from naive to sophistication depending on the cultural and the moral beliefs within that time. She has evolved even before theCharles Perrault version in 1697 and the more known version by Grimm brothers in 1812 and still being reinvented to please its current audience. The development of the tale allowed us to vision the tone of a particular world view in the hands of new interpretation. Little red riding hood is a classic story told worldwide, but as many historical periods are different, the story varies based on past and contemporary cultural issues.
Before the first printed versions of Little Red Riding Hoodin the 1800’s, children literature has not yet existed. Children as we called and treat them today had not always been the same. When Little Red Riding Hood was only an oral versionyoung women were used as adults and sexually provoked to give up their virginity. Children, not being children at all, were naturally acting as adults. There are some versions of Little Red Riding where she performs a strip tease, removing her clothing one at a time. In order to survive to stay alive, the little girl was capable of buying more escape time by slowly sheading her clothes for the wolf. The meaning of childhood was not recognized as a concept of innocence or a development stage for growth, but a concept survival. “Before there could be children’s books, there had to be children- children, that is who were accepted as beings with their own particular needs and interests, not only miniature men and women.” Little Red Riding Hood started out a tale for adults which can explain the explicit language and sexual content of the early versions of this fairytale. Little Red Riding Hood was interpreted to fit the“concerns, hopes, and fears during their time and culture.” She has changed with the discourse and ideology of the culture from which she is reborn to communicate through a specific time.
In the versions of Little Red Riding Hood written byCharles Perrault, Little Red Riding Hood was characterized as being “the prettiest you can imagine,” but gullible in depth of no survival. Perrault, an upper classman in the 1600’s, felt as if young well-bred ladies needed to understand they are subject to manipulation and will be gobbled up if not careful.Acknowledging Perrault’s time of male dominance and femalesubordination, he portrays the ignorance of a young girl by allowing her to be fooled and victimized. It was not untilduring the discourse of time in 1812, did the Grimm brothers bring out a male hero to save Little Red Riding Hood’s life. InGrimm’s version of Little Red Riding Hood, Little Red learns her lesson after being rescued by the huntsman, who intended to skin the wolf. The Grimm brother’s tale provided Little Red a chance to use what she learned and gain victory over thesecond time with another wolf. Grimm’s version also differs from Perrault’s because he mentions no social stratification for Little Red Riding Hood, where Perrault set her as a lower classvillage girl.
Little Red Riding Hood has evolved tremendously in the 1900’s along with woman’s right to vote, the 19th Amendment; change for women empowerment became the upward social mobility for equality. James Thurber shared his version of Little Red Riding Hood in the 1940 called the Little Girl and the Wolf where the moral of the story is, “It is not so easy to fool little girls nowadays as it used to be.” Thurber’s versiondoesn’t allow the little girl to look naïve and fall for the trickery of the wolf; instead she shoots the wolf with an automatic twenty-five feet from the wolf, making her not only dangerous with a gun but smart enough from a distance to see what was going on. Little Red Riding Hood has been molded with correspondence of the time; maturing to satisfy an evolving, demanding audience as of the modern day woman.Each writer continually innovates her role as a more powerful model who will not be defeated by any wolf.
With the hands of great writers, Little Red Riding Hood is now the undefeated young girl that has sophisticated hervictorious ending with humor and charm. Transforming the well known classic tale while still maintaining its identity in different society setting gave Little Red Riding Hood a stamp in historical tales. Roald Dahl was one of the funniest versions, written as a brilliant rhyme with a twisted plot. Dahl wrote two short stories that incorporated Little Red Riding Hood; first oneinvolves her killing the wolf with her pistol without any trouble, and then replacing her red cloak to what was the wolf skin, to show honorable symbol for her kill. The second tale by Dahl evolves even more by adding Little Red Riding Hood as a well known wolf killer to the three little pigs. At the end of the story with the last pig standing, the pig telephones Little Red Riding Hood to rescue him from the big bad wolf. Dahl more modern Little Riding Red Riding Hood comes over after drying her hair and pulls out a pistol from her snickers and kills the wolf. The twisted part of the story is when she adds, “Ah, piglet, you must never trust Young ladies from the upper crust. For now, Miss Riding Hood, one notes, not only has twowolfskin coats, she has a pigskin traveling case.” This part of the story reflects the desires and needs of the average girl in today’s society, which include fancy coats and items of suchnature. Little Red Riding Hood is definitely grown up with the changes of time. Developing and coming into her own, Little Red Riding Hood has learned that most women nowadays have a voice in regards to anti-discrimination and gender equality.
Little Red Riding Hood’s fictional tale is now a perfect story line to alter and fit many current situations a women might be dealing with or can relate to. Her character being well known has a fan base that can bring in revenue which can add to the changes in the plot. If Little Red Riding has an audience that want to see her act