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The White Snake | |
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Folk tale | |
Name | The White Snake |
Data | |
Aarne-Thompson grouping | ATU 673 |
Country | Germany |
Published in | Grimm's Fairy Tales |
The White Snake (German: Die weiße Schlange) is a German fairy tale collected by the Brothers Grimm and published in Grimm's Fairy Tales (KHM 17). It is of Aarne–Thompson type 673, and includes an episode of type 554 ('The Grateful Animals').[1]
Synopsis[edit]
Play Legend of the White Snake Lady online: Check out our slot review below. Welcome to yet another brilliant game presented to all of you from the one and only Yggdrasil! You have most likely heard about this provider before and maybe even tried out their games. If that is the case, you know just what an amazing adventure you have ahead of you. Just watched a performance of The White Snake in San Diego. Completely captivating. It felt both fresh and timeless. I'm eager to get my printed copy of the play to revisit the story. I'll revise my review after reading the play but based on the San Diego production, The White Snake is worthy of 5 stars. This had gone on for a long time, when one day the servant, who took away the dish, was overcome with such curiosity that he could not help carrying the dish into his room. When he had carefully locked the door, he lifted up the cover, and saw a white snake lying on the dish.
A wise King receives a covered dish every evening. A servant is intrigued one night when he retrieves the King's dish and discovers a coiled white snake under the cover. The servant takes a small bite and discovers that he can now understand and communicate with animals. Red flush casino.
Shortly afterwards the servant is accused of stealing the Queen's ring. He is given one day to prove his innocence or submit to punishment. After having given up, he sits awaiting his demise when he overhears a goose complaining about a ring stuck in her throat. The servant leaps up, grabs the goose and hurries to the kitchen. When the cook slits the goose's neck and finds the missing gold ring. The King apologizes and offers the servant land and riches. The servant declines accepting only a little gold and a horse on which to see the countryside.
On his journey to a town the servant first encounters a number of animals in distress, including three fish out of water, ants at risk of being trodden upon, and starving ravenfledglings in a nest. In each case the servant heeds the call for help, and in each case the grateful animals respond with 'I will remember and return the favour'.
In the town the King has announced that he wishes to marry off his daughter, but any suitor must agree to complete an arduous task to the end or be put to death. After one glimpse of the beautiful girl, the young man agrees. The King tosses a golden ring into the sea and tells the young man to retrieve it. He also adds that the young man must either bring the ring back, drown to get the ring, or be drowned upon returning without it.
Immediately three fish appear floating, carrying a mussel. In the mussel rests the King's ring. Astonished, the King agrees to the marriage of his daughter to the young man. However, the daughter sets him upon another task of refilling sacks of grain that she has spilled in the grass, because she has figured out he is not a suitor. The young man is discouraged because he believes it impossible to gather all of the grain from the ground and he lies down and falls asleep shortly. When he wakes, he looks over at the sacks that were empty the night before. To his surprise, they are now filled with grain with not one grain missing. The Ant King had all of the ants working the entire night to fill them. How do you gamble. Massachusetts online gambling.
Still not satisfied with the servant, the daughter sends him off on another undertaking to bring her an apple from the Tree of Life. The man did not know where the Tree of Life stood, but he set off anyway. After he had walked through three kingdoms, he heard the three fledglings say that they had retrieved the Golden Apple for him after flying over the sea to the end of the world where the Tree of Life stood. Extremely thankful, the young man took the Golden Apple to the princess, and split it with her. The two married and lived in undisturbed happiness to a great age.
Analysis[edit]
The tale is classified in the Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index as ATU 673, 'The White Serpent's Flesh'.[2] The tale is part of a cycle of stories where the character comes to know the language of animals through the help of a serpent - in this case, by eating the flesh of a white serpent.[3] The motiv is well-known in Europe and frequently found in Central and Eastern Europe, but also in Scotland, Ireland, Scandinavia, in the Baltic countries and occasionally also outside Europe.[4]
An early literary version is provided in the IcelandicVolsunga Saga (late 13th century) that describes how Sigurd slew the dragon Fafnir and learned the language of birds when tasting Fafnir's heart.[5] Similarly, Saxo Grammaticus (Gesta Danorum, V.2.6-V.2.8, 12th c.) describes how Eric acquired eloquence and wisdom by eating the snake-infested stew his step-mother Kraka had prepared for his half-brother Roller.[6][7] Further related medieval tales include the WelshHanes Taliesin, and the Irish Salmon of Knowledge.[8]
The White Snake Play Review
Adaptations[edit]
Literature[edit]
- Anne Sexton wrote an adaptation as a poem called 'The White Snake' in her collection Transformations (1971), a book in which she re-envisions sixteen of the Grimm's Fairy tales.[9]
- The King's Servant, a short story in Maud Lindsay's The Story-teller (1915), is 'adapted with a free hand' from Grimm's 'White Snake.'
References[edit]
- ^Ashliman, D. L. (2020). 'Grimm Brothers' Children's and Household Tales (Grimms' Fairy Tales)'. University of Pittsburgh.
- ^Thompson, Stith. The Folktale. University of California Press. 1977. p. 181. ISBN0-520-03537-2
- ^Frazer, James G. 'The Language of Animals'. In: Archaeological Review. Vol. I. No. 3. May, 1888. D. Nutt. 1888. pp. 166 and 175-177.
- ^Ranke, Kurt (2010). Enzyklopädie des Märchens: Suchen-Verführung (in German). Walter de Gruyter. p. 647. ISBN978-3-11-023767-2.
- ^Raszmann, August (1863). Bd. Die Sage von den Wölsungen und Niflungen in der Edda und Wölsungasaga (in German). C. Rümpler.
- ^Saxo (Grammaticus) (2015). Gesta Danorum. Clarendon Press. ISBN978-0-19-820523-4.
- ^'Erläuterungen zu den ersten neun Büchern der Dänischen Geschichte des Saxo Grammaticus Teil I Bücher I-V – Wikisource'. de.m.wikisource.org. Retrieved 2020-07-06.
- ^Nagy, Joseph Falaky (1997-01-01). Conversing with Angels and Ancients. Cornell University Press. doi:10.7591/9781501729058. ISBN978-1-5017-2905-8.
- ^'Transformations by Anne Sexton'
External links[edit]
- The full text of The White Snake at Wikisource
- Media related to The White Snake at Wikimedia Commons
Retrieved from 'https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_White_Snake&oldid=985464772'
The White Snake
Mary Zimmerman
6F 5M
Mary Zimmerman
6F 5M
Mary Zimmerman is one of those artists whose careers I’d like to steal. For those not in the know: she’s an adaptor/director who creates visually stunning epics out of world mythology. She first came to my attention when I ordered a copy of Metamorphoses on a whim. I got it in the mail when I came home from Tech one night and I told myself I’d read the first scene or two (each scene is a different story from the greek pantheon) and suddenly it was three in the morning and I had finished the whole script. Her adaptations are very modern but still carry a mythic weight. She’s an expert storyteller.
The White Snake in contrast with The Arabian Nights or Metamorphoses tells a single story from beginning to end. Zimmerman did a fair bit of research into the differing versions of The White Snake and does a good job reconciling them. At a few key moments of the play the action freezes, and we’re told that “here our story splits like a forked tongue” or something to that effect (it’s different each time). They tend to go with the latter telling to keep the story moving but the two different tellings are never very far off.
We begin White Snake. She was merely a snake who felt, as so many of us do, that there was another life out there for her. She decided to study the Tao, and studied it for so long that she was able to change the weather, fly on clouds, and become a human form. Eventually she meets with her friend Green Snake, who also has a handle over the elements, and the two decide to spend a day among the mortals, to see what it is they are giving up so that they may one day be immortals like Buddha.
The pair flies to West Lake and they meet a young man named Xu Xian. He lives with his sister and brother-in-law and during a sudden storm he offers Greenie and White Snake shelter under his umbrella. He asks where they live and White Snake (now going as Lady White) insists they live over near him. They share a boat ride and Xu Xian offers the two women his umbrella to hold on to until they get home. Lady White asks Xu Xian to come fetch his umbrella at her house in the coming week and she will thank him. Greenie thinks this is a bad idea as they have no house, but Lady White walks about and uses her magic to turn an old abandoned ruin into a fine house fit for nobility.
Later Xu Xian comes for tea. Lady White and he fall in love with each other and Greenie serves as a go-between. It’s worth nothing that Greenie is this really awesome down-to-earth character who can kinda serve as an audience surrogate and calls people out on being weird and gets mad on our behalf. Anyway she informs Xu that the two of them are practically falling all over each other and that they should just get married. He hesitates, but eventually he feels like it’s a good idea and the two get married. Lady White bids that Greenie steal some money from the magistrate (corrupt tax money, so it’s no big) so they can start their finances, and then they’ll work for everything else. Greenie accomplishes it swimmingly.
Snake
In the morning Xu Xian gets ready to rush off to work, but Lady White offers to help him start his own business as a pharmacist with her own funds. She also knows a thing or to about the healing arts, and eventually he accepts. Word spreads of their pharmacy and the wonderful healer Lady White. This catches the attention of Fa Hai, a high-ranking monk, who finds White Snake out for what she really is. He confronts Xu Xian and tells him to make his ‘wife’ drink wine on the day of the Dragon Boat Festival (a celebration that drives out spirits and demons). Xu Xian refuses to believe Fa Hai but a spectre of doubt enters his mind.
During the Dragon Boat Festival Greenie reverts to her serpent form. Lady White bids her to hide until the festival is over, but, since her magic is stronger, thinks that she herself will be just fine. While walking with Xu Xian he drunkenly asks her to drink some wine. She rebuffs him citing the fact that she’s pregnant, she doesn’t like to drink, and more but once he reveals the story of Fa Hai she feels it necessary to appease him. She drinks and immediately feels ill. They hurry home and she reverts to a snake. Xu Xian sees her and falls dead on the spot.
White Snake and Greenie speak and figure that the only thing that can save him is an herb that grows in a sacred grove reserved for the immortals. She attempts to sneak in but is stopped by the stag spirit. She explains her situation and he says she make take a leaf (more than enough to save Xu Xian) but to be wary of Crane. Crane arrives and attempt to stop her, but Canopus, the immortal of the south pole, bids Crane let her pass. She hurries home and revives Xu Xian. Greenie comes up with a scheme to convince him that Lady White is not a snake. When he finally awakens Greenie summons another white snake. The two girls scream and scream and get Xu Xian to kill it for them for they are terrified. He does and their lives happily continue. Lady White makes Xu Xian promise to never speak to Fa Hai again.
Fa Hai meets Xu Xian one day and apologizes for being wrong about Lady White. He then coaxes Xu Xian up to the mountain to have tea. He imprisons Xu Xian and makes him take vows as a monk to save his soul. Lady White discovers her husband is at the mountain and demands to see him, enraged that he broke his word. The monks are evasive with Lady White but eventually they make their way to Fa Hai. Lady White and Greenie draw swords and attack Fa Hai with the spirits of the water. Fa Hai calls the spirits of the air and an epic battle takes place. Fa Hai is defeated, but the water flooding the temple is too much for them and Lady White goes into labor.
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They escape down the mountain to where Xu Xian and Lady White met. Xu Xian is rescued from the monastery by Guan Yin and is promptly attacked by Greene for betraying Lady White. Xu Xian apologizes but then states that he doesn’t care if she’s a snake or a person, he loves her and that’s all there is to it. Lady White is hurried off-stage as she gives birth to their child Dream Dragon.
A month later, during a lantern festival, Greenie, Lady White, Xu Xian, and their child, Dream Dragon, walk about and enjoy the fresh air. Fa Hai, disguised as a beggar, entraps Lady White with a sacred relic and binds her to suffer below the Thunder Pagoda. We see three visions. First, Dream Dragon grows up and prays at the Thunder Pagoda, where it shatters and his mother is released. Second, Greenie studies magic for 700 years and shatters the Thunder Pagoda, and Lady White is released. Third, Xu Xian grows old, returns to his life, and visits the Thunder Pagoda from time to time. But when he dies, no time has passed, and he and Lady White are reunited. End of play.
It’s a beautiful and imaginative telling of an unfamiliar story. It’s a very cool addition to the American Theatrical tradition and I’d like to see more like it. I hope someone does it in NYC soon because I know I won’t have the money to produce it myself.
Would I direct it?
Absolutely, but I don’t have the money needed to pay all of the artists necessary.
Absolutely, but I don’t have the money needed to pay all of the artists necessary.
Would I watch it?
Yes please.
Yes please.
The White Snake Play
Next up?
Nicky Silver’s Fat Men in Skirts.
Nicky Silver’s Fat Men in Skirts.
Classic Snake Game
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