Disappointing Grannies - Russia's "Hansel & Gretel" (S2, #2)

Wise Crone Cottage Podcast

In this episode, the storyteller, Kathy Shimpock, shares the story of "The Witch." It's a Russian variant of the Grimm's tale "Hansel & Gretel." In this story, we explore the character of the grandmother. These characters surprise us more in what they don't do than in what they actually do. They stand in stark contrast to the figure of the wise crone.
Story: "The Witch" (a Russian folktale). Andrew Lang, The Yellow Fairy Book, new impression (London: Longmans, Green, and Company, 1906 [first published 1894]), pp. 216-21. "Hansel & Gretel" (a German folktale). Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, Die drei Spinnerinnen, Kinder- und Hausmarchen (Children's and Household Tales -- Grimms' Fairy Tales), 7th ed. (Berlin, 1857), no. 15, pp. 79-87.
Cover illustration: Lucy Fitch Perkins, illustrator, from Folktales from the Russian (1903).
Music: The Snow Queen Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com). Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
Copyright 2020 Kathy Shimpock. All rights reserved.

Support the show

For more crone tales, visit the "Wise Crone Cottage in the Woods" (http://www.wisecronecottage.com).