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Let me talks about the first Chinese fairytale I have ever read: The Snake Husband/The King of the Snakes. This is a popular Chinese fairytale with many variants (link on wikipedia). Despite the name, the focus is on the heroine of the story.
The beginning of this story may remind you of the Beauty and the Beast. A powerful snake demands a man to give a daughter to it as its wife or it will eat him for the man's offense. Only the youngest daughter agrees to be its bride to save her father. Then she discovers that her husband is very rich, kind and has an alternate (often handsome) human form, so she's very happy with her marriage. As she misses her family, she invites her sister when her husband is away.
( Then it becomes a tale of murder and revenge )
I was fascinated by the story then. Envy could kill. Appearance was deceptive. The murderer went to extra length to cover up her crime. The younger sister never gave up revenge and taking back her life. She was killed repeatedly, but got the justice and happiness she deserves. Later I read the grim dark version of Grimm fairy tale, with incest, abuse and torture, but the The Snake Husband had a place in my heart.
"Fairy tales do not give a child his first idea of bogey. What fairy tales give the child is his first clear idea of the possible defeat of bogey. The baby has known the dragon intimately ever since he had an imagination. What the fairy tale provides for him is a St. George to kill the dragon." ~ "The Red Angel," Tremendous Trifles by G. K. Chesterton
The beginning of this story may remind you of the Beauty and the Beast. A powerful snake demands a man to give a daughter to it as its wife or it will eat him for the man's offense. Only the youngest daughter agrees to be its bride to save her father. Then she discovers that her husband is very rich, kind and has an alternate (often handsome) human form, so she's very happy with her marriage. As she misses her family, she invites her sister when her husband is away.
( Then it becomes a tale of murder and revenge )
I was fascinated by the story then. Envy could kill. Appearance was deceptive. The murderer went to extra length to cover up her crime. The younger sister never gave up revenge and taking back her life. She was killed repeatedly, but got the justice and happiness she deserves. Later I read the grim dark version of Grimm fairy tale, with incest, abuse and torture, but the The Snake Husband had a place in my heart.
"Fairy tales do not give a child his first idea of bogey. What fairy tales give the child is his first clear idea of the possible defeat of bogey. The baby has known the dragon intimately ever since he had an imagination. What the fairy tale provides for him is a St. George to kill the dragon." ~ "The Red Angel," Tremendous Trifles by G. K. Chesterton
