Speaker 1: School of Humans.
Speaker 2: This episode discusses sensitive topics. Please listen with care. My
Speaker 2: name is Miranda Hawkins. Welcome to the Deep Dark Woods.
Speaker 2: Today's episode is at U seven twenty or the Juniper Tree.
Speaker 2: Like the Robber Bridegroom. You might not have heard this
Speaker 2: tale before. It hasn't been adapted by big names like
Speaker 2: Walt Disney, but a lot of folklorests agree it's the
Speaker 2: most gruesome brothers Grim story. We'll be telling the tale
Speaker 2: in its entirety, so sit back and enjoy.
Speaker 3: Long ago, at least two thousand years there was a
Speaker 3: rich man who had a beautiful and pious wife, and
Speaker 3: they loved each other dearly. However, they had no children,
Speaker 3: though they wished very much to have some, and the
Speaker 3: woman prayed for them day and night, but they didn't
Speaker 3: get any, and they didn't get any. In front of
Speaker 3: their house there was a courtyard where there stood a
Speaker 3: juniper tree. One day in winter, the woman was standing
Speaker 3: beneath it, peeling herself an apple. And while she was
Speaker 3: thus peeling the apple, she cut her finger and the
Speaker 3: blood fell into the snow. Oh, the woman said. She
Speaker 3: sighed heavily, looked at the blood before her, and was
Speaker 3: most unhappy, if only I had a child as red
Speaker 3: as blood and as white as snow. And as she
Speaker 3: said that, she became quite contented and felt sure that
Speaker 3: it was going to happen. Then she went into the house,
Speaker 3: and a month went by and the snow was gone.
Speaker 3: Then two months and everything was green. And three months
Speaker 3: and all the flowers came out of the earth. And
Speaker 3: four months and all the trees in the woods grew thicker,
Speaker 3: and the green branches were all in twined in one another,
Speaker 3: and the birds sang until the woods resounded, and the
Speaker 3: blossoms fell from the trees. Then the fifth month passed,
Speaker 3: and she stood beneath the juniper tree, which smelled so
Speaker 3: sweet that her heart jumped for joy. And she fell
Speaker 3: on her knees and was beside herself. And when the
Speaker 3: sixth month was over, the fruit was thick and large,
Speaker 3: and then she was quite still. And after the seventh
Speaker 3: month she picked up the juniper berries and ate them greedily.
Speaker 3: Then she grew sick and sorrowful. Then the eighth month passed,
Speaker 3: and she called her husband to her and cried and said,
Speaker 3: if I die, then bury me beneath the juniper tree.
Speaker 3: Then she was quite comforted and happy until the next
Speaker 3: month was over. And then she had a child as
Speaker 3: white as snow and as red as blood. And when
Speaker 3: she saw it, she was so happy that she died.
Speaker 3: Her husband buried her beneath the juniper tree and began
Speaker 3: to cry bitterly. After some time he was at more ease,
Speaker 3: and although he still cried, he could bear it. And
Speaker 3: some time later he took another wife. He had a
Speaker 3: daughter by the second wife, but the first wife's child
Speaker 3: was a little son, and he was as red as
Speaker 3: blood and as white as snow. When the woman looked
Speaker 3: at her daughter, she loved her very much. But then
Speaker 3: she looked at the little boy, and it pierced her heart,
Speaker 3: for she thought that he would always stand in her way.
Speaker 3: That she was always thinking of how she could get
Speaker 3: the entire inheritance for her daughter, and the evil one
Speaker 3: filled her mind with this, until she grew very angry
Speaker 3: with the little boy, and she pushed him from one
Speaker 3: corner to the other, and slapped him here and cuffed
Speaker 3: him there, until the poor child was always afraid, for
Speaker 3: when he came home from school there was nowhere he
Speaker 3: could find any peace. One day, the woman had gone
Speaker 3: upstairs to her room when her little daughter came up
Speaker 3: too and said, Mother, give me an apple. Yes, my child,
Speaker 3: said the woman, and gave her a beautiful apple out
Speaker 3: of the chest. The chest had a large, heavy lid
Speaker 3: with a sharp iron lock. Mother said, the little daughter
Speaker 3: is brother not to have one too. This made the
Speaker 3: woman angry, but she said, yes, when he comes home
Speaker 3: from school. When from the window she saw him coming,
Speaker 3: it was as though the evil one came over her,
Speaker 3: and she grabbed the apple and took it away from
Speaker 3: her daughter, saying, you shall not have one before your brother.
Speaker 3: She threw the apple into the chest and shut it.
Speaker 3: Then the little boy came in the door, and the
Speaker 3: evil one made her say to him kindly, my son,
Speaker 3: do you want an apple? And she looked at him fiercely.
Speaker 3: Mother said the little boy, how angry you look. Yes,
Speaker 3: give me an apple. Then it seemed to her as
Speaker 3: if she had to persuade him. Come with me, she said,
Speaker 3: opening the lid of the chest, take out an apple
Speaker 3: for yourself. And while the little boy was leaning over,
Speaker 3: the evil One prompted her and crash. She slammed down
Speaker 3: the lid and his head flew off, falling among the
Speaker 3: red apples. Then fear overcame her, and she thought, maybe
Speaker 3: I can get out of this. So she went upstairs
Speaker 3: to her room to her chest of drawers and took
Speaker 3: a white scarf out of the top drawer and set
Speaker 3: the head on the neck, again, tying the scarf around
Speaker 3: it so that nothing could be seen. Then she set
Speaker 3: him on a chair in front of the door and
Speaker 3: put the apple in his hand. After this, Marlene came
Speaker 3: into the kitchen to her mother, who was standing by
Speaker 3: the fire with a pot of hot water before her,
Speaker 3: which she was stirring around and around. Mother said, Marlene,
Speaker 3: brother is sitting at the door, and he looks totally
Speaker 3: white and has an apple in his hand. I asked
Speaker 3: him to give me the apple, but he did not
Speaker 3: answer me, and I was very frightened. Go back to him,
Speaker 3: said the mother. And if you will not answer, you
Speaker 3: then box his ears. So Arlene went to him and said, brother,
Speaker 3: give me the apple, but he was silent, so she
Speaker 3: gave him one on the ear and his head fell off.
Speaker 3: Marlene was terrified and began crying and screaming and ran
Speaker 3: to her mother and said, oh, mother, I have knocked
Speaker 3: my brother's head off. And she cried and cried and
Speaker 3: could not be comforted. Marlene said the mother, what have
Speaker 3: you done? Be quiet and don't let anyone know about it.
Speaker 3: It cannot be helped. Now we will cook him into
Speaker 3: the stew. Then the mother took the little boy and
Speaker 3: shopped him in pieces, put him into the pot, and
Speaker 3: cooked him into stew. But Marlene stood by crying and crying,
Speaker 3: and all her tears fell into the pot, and they
Speaker 3: did not need any salt. Then the father came home
Speaker 3: and sat down at the table and said where is
Speaker 3: my son? And the mother served up a large large
Speaker 3: dish of stew, and Marlene cried and could not stop.
Speaker 3: Then the father said again, where is my son? Oh,
Speaker 3: said the mother. He has gone across the country to
Speaker 3: his mother's great uncle. He will stay there for a while.
Speaker 3: What is he doing there? He did not even say
Speaker 3: good bye to me. Oh, he wanted to go, and
Speaker 3: he asked me if he could stay six weeks. He
Speaker 3: will be well taken care of there. Oh, said the man.
Speaker 3: I am unhappy.
Speaker 1: This isn't right.
Speaker 3: He should have said good bye to me. With that,
Speaker 3: he began to eat, saying Marlen, why are you crying?
Speaker 3: Your brother will certainly come back then, he said, wife,
Speaker 3: this food is delicious. Give me some more. And the
Speaker 3: more he ate, the more he wanted. And he said,
Speaker 3: give me some more. You two shall have none of
Speaker 3: it seems to me as if it were all mine.
Speaker 3: And he ate and ate, throwing all the bones under
Speaker 3: the table until he had finished it all. Marlen went
Speaker 3: to her chest drawers, took her best silk scarf from
Speaker 3: the bottom drawer, and carried all the bones from beneath
Speaker 3: the table and tied them up in her silk scarf,
Speaker 3: then carried them outside the door. Crying tears of blood.
Speaker 3: She laid them down beneath the juniper tree on the
Speaker 3: green grass, and after she had put them there, she
Speaker 3: suddenly felt better and did not cry anymore. The juniper
Speaker 3: tree began to move. The branches moved apart, then moved
Speaker 3: together again, just as if someone were rejoicing and clapping
Speaker 3: his hands. At the same time. A mist seemed to
Speaker 3: rise from the tree. And in the center of this
Speaker 3: mist it burned like a fire, and a beautiful bird
Speaker 3: flew out of the fire, singing magnificently, and it flew
Speaker 3: high into the air, and then it was gone. The
Speaker 3: juniper tree was just as it had been before, and
Speaker 3: the cloth with the bones was no longer there. Marlene, however,
Speaker 3: was as happy and contented as if her brother was
Speaker 3: still alive. And she he went merrily into the house,
Speaker 3: sat down at the table, and ate. The bird flew
Speaker 3: away and lit on a goldsmith's house and began to sing,
Speaker 3: My mother she killed me, My father, he ate me.
Speaker 3: My sister. Marlene gathered all my bones, tied them in
Speaker 3: a silken scarf, laid them beneath the juniper tree. Tweet, tweet,
Speaker 3: What a beautiful bird am I? The goldsmith was sitting
Speaker 3: in his workshop making a golden chain when he heard
Speaker 3: the bird sitting on his roof and singing. The song
Speaker 3: seemed very beautiful to him. He stood up, but as
Speaker 3: he crossed the threshold he lost one.
Speaker 1: Of his slippers.
Speaker 3: However, he went right up the middle of the street
Speaker 3: with only one slipper and one sock on. He had
Speaker 3: his leather apron on, and in one hand he had
Speaker 3: a golden chain and in the other his tongs. The
Speaker 3: sun was shining brightly on the street. He walked onward,
Speaker 3: then stood still and said to the bird, bird, he said,
Speaker 3: how beautifully you can sing?
Speaker 1: Sing that piece again?
Speaker 3: For me, No, said the bird. I do not sing
Speaker 3: twice for nothing. Give me the golden chain, and then
Speaker 3: I will sing it again for you. Here is the
Speaker 3: golden chain for you. Now sing that song again for me.
Speaker 3: Then the bird came and took the golden chain in
Speaker 3: his right claw, and went and sat in front of
Speaker 3: the goldsmith and sang, my mother she killed me. My
Speaker 3: father he ate me. My sister Marlene gathered all my bones,
Speaker 3: tied them in a silken scarf, laid them beneath the
Speaker 3: juniper tree.
Speaker 1: Tweet tweaked, What a beautiful bird am I?
Speaker 3: Then the bird flew away to a shoemaker and lit
Speaker 3: on his roof and sang, my mother, she killed me,
Speaker 3: My father he ate me. My sister Marlen gathered all
Speaker 3: my bones, tied them in a silken scarf, laid them
Speaker 3: beneath the juniper tree. Tweet tweet, What a beautiful bird
Speaker 3: am I? Hearing this, the shoemaker ran out of doors
Speaker 3: in his shirt sleeves and looked at up at his
Speaker 3: roof and had to hold his hand in front of
Speaker 3: his eyes to keep the sun from blinding him. Bird,
Speaker 3: He said, how beautifully you can sing? Then he called
Speaker 3: in at his door wife, come outside, there's a bird here.
Speaker 1: Look at this bird.
Speaker 3: You certainly can sing. Then he called his daughter and
Speaker 3: her children, and the journeymen, and the apprentice and the maid,
Speaker 3: and they all came out into the street and looked
Speaker 3: at the bird and saw how beautiful he was, and
Speaker 3: what fine red and green feathers he had, and how
Speaker 3: his neck was like pure gold, and how his eyes
Speaker 3: shone like stars in his head. Bird said the shoemaker,
Speaker 3: Now sing that song again for me. No, said the bird.
Speaker 3: I do not sing twice for nothing. You must give
Speaker 3: me something. Wife said the man. Go into the shop.
Speaker 3: There's a pair of red shoes on the top shelf.
Speaker 1: Bring them down.
Speaker 3: Then the wife went and.
Speaker 1: Brought the shoes there.
Speaker 3: Birds, said the man, Now sing that piece again for me.
Speaker 3: Then the bird came and took the shoe in his
Speaker 3: left claw, and flew back to the roof and sang,
Speaker 3: my mother she killed me, My father he ate me,
Speaker 3: and my sister Marlene. Gathered on my bones, tied them
Speaker 3: in a silken scarf, laid them beneath the juniper tree.
Speaker 3: Twee tweet, What a beautiful bird ever I. When he
Speaker 3: had finished his song, he flew away in his right claw,
Speaker 3: he had the chain, and in his left warm the shoes.
Speaker 1: He flew far.
Speaker 3: Away to a mill, and the mill went crickety clack,
Speaker 3: crickety clack, crickety clack. In the mill sat twenty millers
Speaker 3: apprentices cutting a stone and chiseling chip toop, chiptop, chip top,
Speaker 3: and the mill went clickety clack, clickty clack, crickety clap.
Speaker 3: Then the bird went and sat on a linden tree
Speaker 3: which stood in front of the mill, and sang, my mother,
Speaker 3: she killed me. Then one of them stopped working. My
Speaker 3: father he ate me. Then two more stopped working, and
Speaker 3: less and my sister Marlene. Then four more stopped, gathered
Speaker 3: all my bones, tied them in a silken scarf. Now
Speaker 3: only eight were chiseling, laid them beneath, now only five
Speaker 3: the juniper tree. Now only one tweet tweet, What a
Speaker 3: beautiful bird am I? Then the last one stopped also
Speaker 3: and heard the last words bird, He said, how beautiful
Speaker 3: you sing? Let me hear that too. Sing it once
Speaker 3: more for me, No, said the bird. I do not
Speaker 3: sing twice for nothing. Give me the millstone and then
Speaker 3: I will sing it again. Yes, he said, if it
Speaker 3: belonged only to me. You should have it, yes, said
Speaker 3: the other. If he sings again, he can have it.
Speaker 3: Then the bird came down, and the twenty millers took
Speaker 3: a beam and lifted the stone up.
Speaker 1: Yo. Heave ho yo, heave ho yo, heave holl.
Speaker 3: The bird stuck his neck through the hole and put
Speaker 3: stone on as if it were a collar. Then flew
Speaker 3: to the tree again and sang, my mother she killed me,
Speaker 3: My father he ate me. My sister Marlene gathered all
Speaker 3: my bones, tied them in a silken scarf, laid them
Speaker 3: beneath the juniper tree.
Speaker 1: Tweet tweet, What a beautiful.
Speaker 3: Bird am I. When he was finished singing, he spread
Speaker 3: his wings, and in his right claw he had the chain,
Speaker 3: and in his left one the shoes, and around his
Speaker 3: neck the millstone. He flew far away to his father's house.
Speaker 3: In the room, the father, the mother, and Marlene were
Speaker 3: sitting at the table. The father said, I feel so contented.
Speaker 3: I am so happy. Not, I said the mother. I
Speaker 3: feel uneasy, just as if a bad storm were coming.
Speaker 3: But Marlene just sat and cried and cried. Then the
Speaker 3: bird flew up, and as it seated itself on the roof,
Speaker 3: the father said Oh, I feel so truly happy, and
Speaker 3: the sun is shining so beautifully outside. I feel as
Speaker 3: if I were about to see some old acquaintance again. Not,
Speaker 3: I said the woman. I am so afraid that my
Speaker 3: teeth are chattering, and I feel like I have fire
Speaker 3: in my veins. And she tore open her bodice even more.
Speaker 3: Marlene sat in a corner crying. She held a handkerchief
Speaker 3: before her eyes and cried until it was wet clear through.
Speaker 3: Then the bird seated itself on the juniper tree and sang,
Speaker 3: my mother, she killed me. The mother stopped her ears
Speaker 3: and shut her eyes, not wanting to see or hear.
Speaker 3: But there was a roaring in her ears like the
Speaker 3: fiercest storm, and her eyes burned and flashed like lightning.
Speaker 3: My father he ate me, Oh, mother, said the man.
Speaker 3: That is a beautiful bird. He's singing so splendidly, and
Speaker 3: the sun is shining so warmly, and it smells like
Speaker 3: pure cinnamon, my sister Marlene. Then Marlene laid her head
Speaker 3: on her knee and cried and cried. But the man said,
Speaker 3: I'm going out. I must see the bird up close.
Speaker 3: Oh don't go, said the woman. I feel as if
Speaker 3: the whole house were shaking and on fire. But the
Speaker 3: man went out and looked at the bird, gathered all
Speaker 3: my bones, tied them in a silken scarf, laid them
Speaker 3: beneath the juniper tree.
Speaker 1: Tweet tweaked, what a beautiful bird am I?
Speaker 3: With this? The bird dropped the golden chain, and it
Speaker 3: fell right around the man's neck, so exactly around it
Speaker 3: that it fit beautifully. Then the man went in and said,
Speaker 3: just look what a beautiful bird that is, and what
Speaker 3: a beautiful golden chain he has given me, and how
Speaker 3: nice it looks. But the woman was terrified. She fell
Speaker 3: down on the floor in the room, and her cap
Speaker 3: fell off her head. Then the bird sang once more,
Speaker 3: my mother, she killed me. I wish I were a
Speaker 3: thousand fathoms beneath the earth so I would not have
Speaker 3: to hear that.
Speaker 1: My father ate me.
Speaker 3: The woman fell down as if she were dead. My
Speaker 3: sister Marlin, Oh, said Marlene, I too will go out
Speaker 3: and see if the bird will give me something. Then
Speaker 3: she went out, gathered all my bones, tied them in
Speaker 3: a silken scarf. He threw the shoes down to her,
Speaker 3: laid them beneath the juniper tree. Tweet tweet, what a
Speaker 3: beautiful bird. And I then she was so contented and happy.
Speaker 1: She put on the new red shoes.
Speaker 3: And danced and leaped into the house. Oh, she said,
Speaker 3: I was so sad when I went out, and now
Speaker 3: I am so contented. That is a splendid bird. He
Speaker 3: has given me a pair of red shoes. No, said
Speaker 3: the woman, jumping to her feet, and with her hair
Speaker 3: standing up like flames of a fire. I feel as
Speaker 3: if the world were coming to an end. I too,
Speaker 3: will go out and see if it makes me feel better.
Speaker 3: And as she went out the door crash. The bird
Speaker 3: threw the millstone on her head, and it crushed her
Speaker 3: to death. The father and Marlene heard it and went out. Smoke,
Speaker 3: flames and fire were rising from the place. And when
Speaker 3: that was over, the little brother was standing there, and
Speaker 3: he took his father and Marlene by the hand, and
Speaker 3: all three were very happy, and they went into the house,
Speaker 3: sat down at the table, and.
Speaker 2: Ate more on the juniper tree. After the break the
Speaker 2: Juniper Tree is considered the darkest collected tale by the
Speaker 2: Grim Brothers. In fact, the stories listed under at U
Speaker 2: seven twenty are also titled My Mother slew Me, My
Speaker 2: Father ate to me. Folklorist Maria Tatar, who's written extensively
Speaker 2: about the Grim Tales, said that it is probably the
Speaker 2: most shocking of all fairy tales, and not just of
Speaker 2: Grim but of all tales. So what makes it so dark?
Speaker 2: We know in other fairy tales the stepmother is a
Speaker 2: bad guy, but there's usually a reason for it. Stepmothers
Speaker 2: are looking out for themselves so they don't starve to
Speaker 2: death like a handle and Gretel, or they're looking out
Speaker 2: for their own biological children to secure an inheritance. However,
Speaker 2: folkloreist doctor Lynn McNeil says the stepmother's actions and the
Speaker 2: juniper tree are beyond redemption.
Speaker 4: We could say, man, she's looking out for herself and
Speaker 4: her daughter. That makes sense, But the way to make
Speaker 4: us not think that at all is to have her
Speaker 4: set the body up, put the head back on the shoulders,
Speaker 4: and ask the other child to slap them across the face.
Speaker 4: That suddenly it's like, nope, no more, no, we cannot
Speaker 4: make any excuses for her. She is just evil because
Speaker 4: there's a there's almost a level of unsettling enjoyment in that,
Speaker 4: you know, there's almost a she's we get no description
Speaker 4: that she finds her work distasteful. She sets this child's
Speaker 4: body up in a chair, right, she is like, all right,
Speaker 4: I know what to do, and then she cooks and
Speaker 4: eats him and makes someone else think that they're.
Speaker 2: To be Doctor McNeil says, the stepmother takes her evilness
Speaker 2: a step further by involving her own daughter. She's not
Speaker 2: only messing with her step son, but also her own
Speaker 2: flesh and blood.
Speaker 4: She sits his body on a chair, puts his head
Speaker 4: back on his neck, ties the scarf around it so
Speaker 4: you can't see what's happened, and then asks his sister
Speaker 4: to come in and interact with him, and makes her
Speaker 4: think that she knocked his head off when she slaps
Speaker 4: him on the cheek. I mean, this is like the
Speaker 4: worst kind of horrific gaslighting ever. Like this young girl
Speaker 4: is being made to believe she murdered her brother so
Speaker 4: that she will be complicit in hiding the crime from
Speaker 4: her father. It is so horrifying. The whole thing, just
Speaker 4: the deviousness, the complexity of it. The whole thing is
Speaker 4: absolutely horrible.
Speaker 2: I've had visceral reactions to the cannibalism and some of
Speaker 2: these stories, but in the Juniper Tree. There was a
Speaker 2: different element that I couldn't quite put my finger on.
Speaker 2: Doctor McNeil helped me understand what that element is.
Speaker 4: We see a lot of monsters eating people in fairy tales,
Speaker 4: the wolf swallowing, Little Red riding Hood and Grandma Hole,
Speaker 4: the giant in Jack and the beanstalk. Who's gonna eat Jack?
Speaker 4: Somehow wolves and giants sort of get a pass. We
Speaker 4: understand that they eat people because they're monsters, right. Giants, wolves,
Speaker 4: they are predators, They are you know, supernatural evil things
Speaker 4: that eat people. This is someone's dad eating them. So
Speaker 4: we are on a whole different level of cannibalism that
Speaker 4: really leans into the taboo nature of it. And so
Speaker 4: the cannibalism becomes insidious on this level that I think
Speaker 4: is really unsettling in a way that it's not when
Speaker 4: a monster's doing it. And I think that's what I think,
Speaker 4: that's what gives this tale its staying power, but it's
Speaker 4: also what has led it to be lesser known.
Speaker 2: Even though it's, as doctor McNeil says, lesser known. There
Speaker 2: are several hundred versions of the Juniper Tree, and most
Speaker 2: of the other versions were recorded and published with any
Speaker 2: century of the Grims. The first recorded version was titled
Speaker 2: The Almond Tree. It was collected by Philip Otto Runge
Speaker 2: and was published in a journal in eighteen oh eight.
Speaker 2: Runge was a German Romantic painter, draftsman, and art theorist.
Speaker 2: He's known for his expressive portraits and symbolic landscapes. He's
Speaker 2: also known for his groundbreaking color theory. He introduced the
Speaker 2: color sphere during the last year of his life in
Speaker 2: eighteen ten. It was one of the first attempts to
Speaker 2: create a comprehensive color system in three dimensions. Runge didn't
Speaker 2: specify a source for the story. He did give the
Speaker 2: Brothers Grimma copy, and it was that story, the one
Speaker 2: you heard at the beginning of this episode, that the
Speaker 2: Brothers included in their eighteen twelve collection. The same story
Speaker 2: was included in all their future collections, although with stylistic
Speaker 2: and dialect variations. The Little Boy in the Wicked Stepmother
Speaker 2: is a Romanian tale written by Moses Gastor. Remember he's
Speaker 2: also the person who collected the Romanian version of the
Speaker 2: Robber Bridegroom, in which a girl was sold to an
Speaker 2: innkeeper who killed travelers and served their meat to his guests,
Speaker 2: but today's story was published in nineteen fifteen. The Little
Speaker 2: Boy and the Wicked Stepmother actually combines a to U
Speaker 2: three two seven Hondol and Gretel and today's tale type
Speaker 2: ATU seven twenty. There is a poor man who has
Speaker 2: a wife and two children, a girl and a boy.
Speaker 2: After his wife dies, the man remarries. The new wife
Speaker 2: gives her husband no peace. Finally, she tells him to
Speaker 2: get rid of the children or they shall starve. At first,
Speaker 2: the man resists, but eventually gives in The children hear everything.
Speaker 2: The next day, the father tells the kids to come
Speaker 2: with him to the forest while he chops wood. Before
Speaker 2: they leave, the little girl fills her pockets with ashes
Speaker 2: and drops bits along the way. After reaching the densest
Speaker 2: part of the forest, the father lies, saying he's going
Speaker 2: to cut wood and then come back for the kids,
Speaker 2: but he doesn't return. The two wait for a long while,
Speaker 2: but finally the girl understands what's happened. Using her trail
Speaker 2: of ashes, the two find their way home. Their stepmother
Speaker 2: is so angry she does not know what to do
Speaker 2: with herself. She almost goes out of her mind with fury.
Speaker 1: If she could, she.
Speaker 2: Would quote, swallow them in a spoonful of water. When
Speaker 2: the stepmother realizes she can't get her husband to do
Speaker 2: anything about the children, she takes matters into her own hands.
Speaker 2: One morning, when her husband is away, she kills the
Speaker 2: little boy. She then takes him to the sister and
Speaker 2: commands her to cut him up and prepare a meal
Speaker 2: for all of them. The little girl, afraid of being
Speaker 2: killed herself, does as instructed. But the little girl takes
Speaker 2: the heart and hides it in the hollow of a tree.
Speaker 2: When the stepmother asks where it is, she lies and
Speaker 2: says a dog took it away. When the husband comes home,
Speaker 2: they all sit down to eat the meal. The father
Speaker 2: has no idea he's eating his son. The little girl, however,
Speaker 2: refuses to touch her meal. After they are done, the
Speaker 2: girl collects the bones and also hides them in the
Speaker 2: hollow of the tree. The next morning, a little bird
Speaker 2: with dark feathers emerges from the tree's hollows, singing, cuckoo.
Speaker 2: My sister has cooked me and my father has eaten me.
Speaker 2: But I am now a cuckoo and safe from my stepmother.
Speaker 2: The stepmother is near the tree, and here is the bird.
Speaker 2: In her rage and fright. She takes a heavy lump
Speaker 2: of salt to throw at the bird, but it lands
Speaker 2: on her head instead, killing her on the spot. The
Speaker 2: little boy remains a cuckoo to this day. Another story
Speaker 2: titled The Satin Frock comes from Yorkshire, England. The tale
Speaker 2: was collected by S. O. Addie and published in eighteen
Speaker 2: ninety seven. Addie said it was told to him from C. R. Hurst,
Speaker 2: who initially heard it from a thirteen year old girl.
Speaker 2: Addie was an English author who lived around the turn
Speaker 2: of the nineteenth century. He wrote books on history and folklore.
Speaker 2: Hurst was a woman who adopted a masculine version of
Speaker 2: her name. She was an artist who began with water colors,
Speaker 2: but then took on an illusionistic technique to critique male pastimes.
Speaker 2: The tail begins with a little girl named Mary who
Speaker 2: has a satin frock. Her mother warns her that if
Speaker 2: she gets the frock dirty then she will kill her.
Speaker 2: Mary is out for a walk one day when she
Speaker 2: passes cows who splashed mud onto her frock. She sits
Speaker 2: down on a doorstep and begins to cry. A woman
Speaker 2: in the house hears her and asks what's wrong. When
Speaker 2: Mary explains, the woman takes Mary in, washes and dries
Speaker 2: a frock, and then sends Mary on her way, warning
Speaker 2: the girl not to get her frock dirty again. But
Speaker 2: down the road a horse runs by, splashing Mary's frock
Speaker 2: with mud again. When Mary gets home, her mother takes
Speaker 2: her to the cellar, cuts her head off, and hangs
Speaker 2: her head on the wall. When the father gets home
Speaker 2: and asks for Mary, the mother lies and says she's
Speaker 2: staying at her grandmother's before our bedtime. The father says
Speaker 2: he will fetch the firewood, but the wife says, no,
Speaker 2: she will. This goes back and forth, but the father
Speaker 2: won't let her, so the father goes to the cellar
Speaker 2: and sees the head. When he comes back up, he
Speaker 2: asks his wife what it is. She tells him it's
Speaker 2: a sheep's head for dinner tomorrow. At dinner the next night,
Speaker 2: the husband says, this broth is nice, but it does
Speaker 2: taste like our Mary. The wife is frightened, for when
Speaker 2: her husband finds out what has been done, he takes
Speaker 2: his wife to the cellar and kills her. All of
Speaker 2: these tales are shockingly violent, So what exactly are tales
Speaker 2: like these? And the juniper tree trying to tell us
Speaker 2: the brothers Grim were incredibly religious. Jacob and Wilhelm were
Speaker 2: raised Lutheran. This is one of the reasons why they
Speaker 2: would censor or change their stories. But modern readers are
Speaker 2: more apt to criticize the Juniper Tree for blending a
Speaker 2: fairy tale with heavy handed bisblical illusions. In the book
Speaker 2: The Annotated Classic Fairy Tales, folklorist Maria Tatar says that
Speaker 2: the beginning of the story stands out because it sets
Speaker 2: a date. Remember, the tale starts as many as two
Speaker 2: thousand years ago, and Tatar says this specification of an
Speaker 2: era is unusual in fairy tales. The figure of two
Speaker 2: thousand years ago anchors the tale in biblical times and
Speaker 2: suggests a connection with the origin of Christianity in light
Speaker 2: of the boy's death and resurrection. The date has a
Speaker 2: special significance, but there's more than that. For example, when
Speaker 2: the evil One convinces the stepmother to kill her step son,
Speaker 2: it's an allusion to the devil possessing her. The apple
Speaker 2: is also an allusion to the Garden of Eden, when
Speaker 2: the devil tricked Eve into eating the apple, and then
Speaker 2: Eve tricked Adam, which ultimately leads to Adam's death. Of course,
Speaker 2: that's only a couple examples. More recently, the juniper tree
Speaker 2: has been adapted into novels, incorporated into short stories, and
Speaker 2: has been inspiration for visual art. One of the most
Speaker 2: well known adaptations was a nineteen ninety Icelandic film starring
Speaker 2: the now famous artist b York. The film follows a
Speaker 2: story of two sisters. The younger sister, Marguite, is played
Speaker 2: by b Yorke, and her older sister is named Katla.
Speaker 2: Their mother has been killed for being a witch. Katlaw
Speaker 2: tells Marguite that she'll find a husband and cast a
Speaker 2: spell to make sure the two are loved and cared for.
Speaker 2: The sisters run across a widowed farmer and his son.
Speaker 2: While Katlaw is casting her spell. The son sees her
Speaker 2: and becomes suspicious. Marguite and the sun become closer, but
Speaker 2: as the movie progresses, Katla eventually tricks the boy into
Speaker 2: jumping off a cliff to his death. When Katlaw serves
Speaker 2: as stew made out of the boy's fingers, Marguite sees
Speaker 2: a finger internally freaks out and goes to bury it
Speaker 2: later at his dead mother's grave. The next day, a
Speaker 2: large juniper tree has grown at the site and a
Speaker 2: raven has taken up residence. Marguite runs back to confess
Speaker 2: to the father what her sister did. Her sister flees terrified,
Speaker 2: and Marguite and the farmer are left to tend to
Speaker 2: the tree and raven. But in the end, the farmer
Speaker 2: goes in search of cotlaw and Marguite is left on
Speaker 2: her own. Although it's not found in the b York adaptation,
Speaker 2: one similar theme found in most grim stories is that
Speaker 2: beauty can be dangerous. In some grim tales, beauty symbolizes
Speaker 2: the inherent good in someone, but a common sentiment among
Speaker 2: German folk at the time of the Grim Brothers was
Speaker 2: that beauty could bring bad luck. Here's doctor McNeil.
Speaker 4: So you will often see there are many traditional societies
Speaker 4: where there's a folk custom of spitting on your baby
Speaker 4: or licking your thumb and smearing it on your baby's
Speaker 4: face after someone has openly admired your baby, because that
Speaker 4: level of admiration is on a fairly instinctive folk belief
Speaker 4: level thought to draw negativity or bad luck.
Speaker 2: So if you look at the juniper tree, the boy
Speaker 2: was doomed from the beginning.
Speaker 4: And this child the young son. He's not just any child.
Speaker 4: He is this perfection worth dying for. In his mother's eyes.
Speaker 4: This was worth it to her. She didn't die of
Speaker 4: like a troubled childbirth. She didn't die of bleeding out
Speaker 4: or even of sorrow. She died of joy, of happiness
Speaker 4: at this beautiful baby boy. And right there we see
Speaker 4: one of the interesting paradoxes of fairy tales, which is
Speaker 4: that usually it's not a great thing to stand out
Speaker 4: for being beautiful. That really just draws attention to you
Speaker 4: in ways you don't like. So we get this strange
Speaker 4: presentation in fairy tales where like a dire sort of beauty.
Speaker 4: It's too much beauty, it's too striking, it's too contrasting,
Speaker 4: is just going to bring you trouble. So this young
Speaker 4: boy is sort of doomed from the outset because who
Speaker 4: wouldn't be jealous of him? What mother wouldn't show up
Speaker 4: and say, why isn't my child as incredible as this child?
Speaker 2: The tale also surfaces another theme we've come across before,
Speaker 2: human agency. If you notice, the only one who has
Speaker 2: any saying what happens to them is a stepmother. She
Speaker 2: drives a plot along so to speak, but the mother, father, sister,
Speaker 2: and little boy have things happening to them. They lack
Speaker 2: the ability to control their own fates. Along with human agency,
Speaker 2: the story questions humanity's goodness.
Speaker 4: All of the magical elements in the story are the
Speaker 4: positive ones, and the negative elements of this story are
Speaker 4: all just really basely human, just driven by self serving
Speaker 4: evil people, and that's it. And when magic kicks in,
Speaker 4: it's to restore that balance. It's almost like the more
Speaker 4: effective moral is humans are awful, which is really disappointing.
Speaker 2: As with all the fairy tales we've explored in this series,
Speaker 2: the Juniper Treat doesn't have a singular moral. Some say
Speaker 2: it explores the problems and usefulness of desire, or that
Speaker 2: it teaches imperfections can be good and real beauty comes
Speaker 2: from the soul. But maybe, if anything, it's simply a
Speaker 2: warning to be good. As we've traversed the woods with
Speaker 2: Hansel and Gretel saved a little girl and her grandmother
Speaker 2: from a hungry wolf, and princesses learn to save themselves,
Speaker 2: the brothers Grim have taught us about the shortcomings of
Speaker 2: society while still reminding us that good exists. These tales
Speaker 2: give us an idea of where we were, but also
Speaker 2: where we need to go, and in a way, it
Speaker 2: reminds us how humanity is linked by universal themes that
Speaker 2: spend time and cultures. Fairy Tales break down difficult problems
Speaker 2: and ideas. It's why these stories get introduced to us
Speaker 2: as children and why we revisit them as adults, because
Speaker 2: they are truly for everyone. The Brothers Grim fairy Tales
Speaker 2: may be dark, but they do more than give us
Speaker 2: warnings about the shadowy corners of what it means to
Speaker 2: be human. They remind us there's always a little bit
Speaker 2: of magic hidden all around us. Our journey has come
Speaker 2: to an end. We've made it out the other side.
Speaker 2: Thanks for joining me through the.
Speaker 1: Deep Dark Woods.
Speaker 2: The Deep Dark Woods is a production of School of
Speaker 2: Humans and iHeart Podcasts. It was created, written, and hosted
Speaker 2: by me Miranda Hawkins. I also sound designed and mixed
Speaker 2: this episode. This episode was produced by MIKEL. June and
Speaker 2: senior producer Gabby Watts. Executive producers are Virginia Prescott, Brandon Barr,
Speaker 2: el C Crowley, and Maya Howard. Stories were voiced by
Speaker 2: Julia Christgau. Theme song was composed by Jesse Niswanger. You
Speaker 2: can follow the show on Instagram at School of Humans
Speaker 2: and don't forget to subscribe and leave a review.