FAIRY TALES

Abstract

At the end of this version of the “kind and unkind sisters” (AT 480), the narrator comments that the prince considered the diamonds and pearls that appeared every time the kind girl spoke of greater worth than any dowry. This may be seen as a rather cynical comment, but it can also be seen as symbolic of the value of kind and beautiful speech. Charles Perrault, who included this story in his Histoires ou Contes du Temps Passé with the title “The Fairies,” gives two morals at the end of the story, and the second one spells out this symbolic meaning. The first one was probably aimed at the worldly adults who, in the calculating milieu of the late seventeenthcentury French court life, would have appreciated the prince’s comments about the monetary value of the diamonds and pearls. This era was also the era of salons, hosted by upper class women, which served as intellectual gathering places where witty conversation was developed to a high art. Through this story Perrault may have been commenting on what he thought were overly outspoken women. This version can be compared with the Louisiana variant in Robert San Souci’s and Jerry Pinkney’s picture book, The Talking Eggs, as well as with other versions in The Longman Anthology of Traditional Literature, (“Kumba the Orphan Girl,” “Mother Holle,” “The Two Stepdaughters,” and the “Twelve Months,” and to some extent “La Estrellita”). The following are contemporary picture book retellings: • Huck, Charlotte. Toads and Diamonds. Illustrated by Anita Lobel. Greenwillow, 1996. • Schecter, Ellen. Diamonds and Toads: A Classic Fairy Tale. Illustrated by Ami Blackshear. Bantam Books, 1994. • Bender, Robert. Toads and Diamonds. Lodestar Books, 1995. In this adaptation of Perrault’s “Fairies” the girls meet a three-headed troll.