Mirror, Mirror on the Wall: Who is the Real Snow White? The Historical Debate Behind the Deadly Origins of Disney's First Fairy Tale
The evil queen commands the huntsman, “Kill her and as proof that she is dead bring her lungs and liver back to me.” The huntsman doesn’t kill her. Instead, he sets out into the forest and slaughters a wild boar. He brings the liver and lungs of the boar back to the evil queen and his ruse works. Greedily, the evil queen devours the entrails that the huntsman brings to her in a frenzy of cannibalistic ecstasy. In a few years, a magic mirror tells the queen that she has been deceived by the huntsman, and she sets out once again to kill the young maiden. This time she believes she has accomplished her goal after pretending to be a farmer’s wife and convincing the maiden to eat a poisoned apple. But the queen has been fooled yet again. The girl did not die. The poisoned apple has only caused her to lapse into a sort of coma after becoming lodged in her throat. Her seven companions, all suffering fr...