Talk:Sleeping Beauty

Untitled

In the music section, A Perfect Circle have a song named sleeping beauty written from the perspective of a prince that didn't manage to]] wake her up. This is the first time i'm contributing to a page here so i don't know how to go about it. its verifiable by the fact that its on their album mer de noms and thats how the lyrics go. - tourettic.

I'm sorry to see this good format chopped up with "HeaderSs" for three-line "subsections." I don't want to revert, because I may just be fussy. Wetman 17:37, 11 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I reverted the change by 203.177.112.153 (Perrault's narrative) to the previous version 23:12, 2004 Sep 11 by User:D6 thus removing this text "yuki is the author". From just a quick google this looks like it might be a reference to a manga by Yuki Kohara based on Sleeping Beauty, so if anyone wants to expand on it and place it somewhere, maybe at the end of the "Uses" section, go ahead. There's a strange horizontal line in the article that might be removed, but I'm too lazy right now ;-) As to the sections, I agree there are too many in extlinks, so I overcame my laziness and removed them. -Wikibob | Talk 14:25, 2004 Sep 13 (UTC)

I am going to add a small description of Sleeping Beauty the 1959 Disney movie for now. I may create a breakout page for it later, which will discuss the stylings, music, story, and historical importance of the film. --b. Touch 09:06, 19 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Regarding This entry is begging for more illustrations. Just insert them.

In my view the page is already becoming rather "heavy" as it is: if more illustrations are added I'd suggest to split it up. Anyway, I suppose "begging for illustrations" is better done on the discussion page. --Francis Schonken 19:28, 28 Sep 2004 (UTC)

How brief is the attention span I wonder? An entry Sleep perhaps and another Beauty? Notes in the entry aren't intrusive: they simplyremind the reader that Wikipedia is a work in progress. Wetman 20:07, 28 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Copy editing

I have done some minor copy editing, added missing links, removed redundant links, and reworded few sentences, mostly in the Walt Disney's Sleeping Beauty section. Please compare this section to the last version [1] to see if nothing important was lost in the process. It may still need some polishing. Rafał Pocztarski 04:13, 27 Nov 2004 (UTC)

In the "Modern Retellings" section, I made some minor changes to the bit on Patricia Wrede's Enchanted Forest Chronicles-- mostly just clarity editing. Kit Mora 16:00, 4 May 2008 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 210.0.62.89 (talk)

Spoiler warning

I've removed the Spoiler Warning inserted 15:41, 28 Sep 2004. The humor of it must be played after four months. Let them add spoiler warnings to the Book of Job instead— and "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer": I've always wondered how that came out. (Wetman)

Someone else removed the "spoiler" warnings and was furiously reverted by User: Goldfritha with the misleading and rather inflammatory edit summary "reverting ethnocentric vandalism." Whoa! Something cuts mysteriously deep in this—well, "deep" is relative in this case, isn't it? Some anonymity editing previously thinks "ALL plot summaries should have spoiler warnings"—such as at Book of Revelation no doubt? I for one would be highly entertained by a brief (fifty words or less) explanation of why spoiler warnings are considered an advantage to the "Sleeping Beauty" article. Who is being protected from disappointment at having the surprise spoiled, one wonders? --Wetman 01:43, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

What harm does the tag do? And it is ethnocentric to assume that all readers of this article are familiar with the story. Goldfritha 02:03, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Not very, just adult. --Wetman 07:13, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

snort Tell me the end of "Peach Boy" without looking it up if you want to claim it's adult. Goldfritha 14:40, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Fairy?

So they were *fairies* in the English version? All the versions I knew considered them ordinary women (aunts IIRC) and the ability to "curse" people wasn't considered particularily extraordinary (doesn't take a supernatural being to do that). — Ashmodai ^{(talk · contribs)} 05:15, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

In the French one, actually. Goldfritha 01:01, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

Well, they had wands, little wings, they flew around, changing size and doing all the magic stuff in the original cartoon, so Disney certainly thought so. - Redmess 10:50, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

In the French variant, the women are fairies, and were "wise-women" in the German version. Also, when the hec have normal people had the ability to curse people; having them fairies makes more sense.

In the story of Nornagest, it is the elf-like Norns who come to his birth and bestow him with gifts; but they are three in number, not twelve, and it is the youngest among them, not the eldest, who feels herself slighted and bestows a curse instead of a blessing. Also like Sleeping Beauty, another of the gift-givers immediately intercedes to turn the curse into a blessing, effectively bestowing præternatural longevity upon the child.

Nuttyskin (talk) 18:18, 4 July 2018 (UTC) Nuttyskin

The Kiss

Perhaps the English version is different from the French one, but there doesn't seem to be a mention of a kiss from the Prince waking up the Princess in the original French version. It's likely that I'm not reading the passage correctly, but the Princess wakes up just from the Prince kneeling at her bedside. Apologies if I'm mistaken in anyway. In regards to that, do different editions of the original tale retell the story differently?--Thumbtax 04:51, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Ah, yes, here's the English version attesting to that part. [2]--Thumbtax 00:10, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

In the Italian version -- the oldest one there is -- the king rapes her, which does not wake her up, and leaves; she carries twins to term and gives birth, which does not wake her up; the hungry twins are crying, and one tries to suckle on her finger, which pulls out the thing she pricked her finger with and so wakes her.

So, yes, the original tales differ. Goldfritha 01:03, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

The English version tries to be better and "cleaner", but really it's not. The prince didn't know his kiss would wake up the princess, so it's actually some guy trying to get freaky with a dead chick. --Hurricane Angel 07:50, 26 December 2006 (UTC)--Hurricane Angel 07:50, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

Actually, most English versions are based mostly on the German version, which has the kiss. The idead of having the women at the begining be fairies, and the title "Sleeping Beauty" are taken from the French version by Perrault. In Perrault's version, the prince does nothing, is just there at the time the 100 years are up, and puts her in the power of his wicked mother (but he is a saint compared to his Italian counterpart, who breaks the spell by raping her, when he is already married.) The Grimm Brothers (who are German) cleaned up the story. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.106.118.152 (talk) 18:57, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Deep European myths

More than many fairy tales, Sleeping Beauty partakes of many deep European myths, both pagan and Christian.

All right -- what's a deep European myth? How does it differ from the shallow ones? Why does Sleeping Beauty partake of these myths? Who counted and how were they able to count? Goldfritha 01:33, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

Well, then, out it goes. Goldfritha 16:54, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Lol on the "deep" myth, but what about Brynhild and Sigurd? There is some similarity there in the sleep part, anyway. I've always thought them linked. MagnoliaSouth ^(talk) 20:02, 7 March 2014 (UTC)

It's not unlike the Greek myth of Selene and Endymion, is it? Apart from the genders being reversed, which happens with the moon deity in Greek/Italic compared to Germanic.Walshie79 (talk) 20:53, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

Basile

Perrault transformed Basile's tale almost past recognition? I can recognize it easily and so can anyone who compares the story given by the links. Anyone got a reference to make that claim? Goldfritha 03:01, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Out it goes, then. Goldfritha 00:00, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

L'Aurore and Le Jour

These characters are in a fairy tale and not a Greek myth. It is therefore inappropriate to link them to the Greek gods of dawn and day. Goldfritha 00:08, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Why is that inappropriate? European culture is heavily influenced by Greek and Roman mythology. Kit Mora 16:03, 4 May 2008

La belle au bois dormant

I think this means "The beauty in the sleeping wood", and not "the sleeping beauty in the wood" unless i'm very much mistaken... (the wood is enchanted and sleeps with her)

213.118.251.32 (talk) 18:58, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.118.251.32 (talk) 18:55, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

You are absolutely right. Dormant, in the masculine, agrees with and modifies the masculine word bois and not the feminine word belle. I have corrected the translation accordingly.65.206.122.30 (talk) 14:44, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Correct, but do we need all that grammatical information in the opening section of an article about a fairy tale? Stratford490 (talk) 16:27, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree; it's an aside correcting former editors, not to be kept in the article. --Wetman (talk) 16:36, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Hey no... unfortunately, you guys are wrong. "Dormant" is a present participle functioning as a relative clause, not as an adjective . Thus, it is invariable. I'm assuming you know some French here. In modern French, the title should be "La princesse dormant au bois" which means "the princess sleeping in the woods". It would be VERY incorrect to say "la princesse dormante au bois". That is incorrect French. Therefore, "dormant" is not masculine and neither does it modify "bois". It's simply invariable. I'll let you meditate on the following sentences.

les machines volantes passent au-dessus de nos têtes -- a full sentence, with subject (machines), its adjective (volantes, thus declined), a verb (passer), and a "complément de lieu".

les machines volant au-dessus de nos têtes -- not a sentence. Merely a noun (machines) modified by a complement. The corresponding full relative clause would be les machines qui volent au-dessus de nos têtes.

There's the difference. I'm hoping you know enough grammar to see it. Therefore, "la belle au bois dormant" means "the beauty sleeping in the woods". And "dormant" complements the "belle". In case you are of these anglophones who viscerally detest anything remotely related to France and French, you could always think of German, Spanish, or Italian grammars. The exact same phenomenon exists in these too. And probably in other languages as well. But not in English. If you want to debate this with me, feel free. You might first want consult the following links

http://french.about.com/library/weekly/aa070800n.htm

http://french.about.com/library/weekly/aa070800g.htm

In the French Wikipedia, the article begins:

La Belle au bois dormant (il faut comprendre : « La Belle dormant au bois ».

Since the French Wikipedia article was likely written by a native French speaker, and read and edited by many others, I think we can safely conclude that the appropriate translation is The beauty sleeping in the wood, not The beauty in the sleeping wood. (dormant is, I believe, a participial adjective, which would not take the feminine -e ending in French.)

See: http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Belle_au_bois_dormant

The Spanish, Italian, German and English titles for this tale all specify that it is the Beauty who is sleeping, not the wood. 4granite (talk) 10:44, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

"La Belle au Bois Dormant" means "The Beauty Sleeping in the Wood." Un point, c'est tout. I'm going to change it back. *"La Belle Au Bois Dormante" would simply not be grammatical french. I'm going to go ahead and switch it back. Eddierubeiz (talk) 08:30, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm still wondering why we need any of this in the article. Why not The Sleeping Beauty ("La Belle au Bois dormant") is a fairy tale classic, etc.? The article is about the actual fairy tale, not about French grammar. Stratford490 (talk) 09:03, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

Dormant is a verb and actually describs what the beauty is doing in the wood : she's sleeping ! But Stratford is right...Farren (talk) 07:16, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

Rape?

Initial question

Ok, while the Prince having sex with the Princess while she's in a coma would be rape in real life, was it seen as rape in the fairy tale? --DrBat (talk) 13:05, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

It is rape

It is not described as such in Basile's original tale. (The citation links to the entire story, but the rape is within the first few paragraphs.) Still, as she could not consent, it doesn't matter whether or not it was viewed as rape at the time of Basile's writing, it is undeniably so. Munin and hugin (talk) 10:01, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

Comparison

In the original version, Sleeping Beauty(Though I call her Aurora) was raped and she had two kids. But now it changed to be more child-friendly. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.185.176.36 (talk) 14:33, 3 June 2012 (UTC)

Examining Views

Regarding "it is undeniably so" (quoted from Munin and Hugin, above), I disagree. It isn't rape. The action is undeniably fitting a common modern definition of rape: sex without pre-provided consent. However, if it "is" rape, that implies present tense. The story was written long ago, involving people from a culture quite different than modern times. Regarding whether this was rape, I doubt this was viewed as a super-horrific crime, as the story doesn't treat it as such. If, instead of defining rape as a violation of a pre-written law, we define it as a violation of the person's rights according to culture expectations, the story's handling of the topic still suggests this wasn't a terrible violation. If we define rape as a violation of the rights that a person should have, this story's action might not be significantly worse than many of the other common actions from that era (which are actions that many people today would declare to be atrocities according to our modern morals). If we aren't ready to declare the general population to be "rapists" due to widespread arranged marriages and a lack of feminine rights, we might not have grounds to use such a criminalizing term for this one person's actions either. Regardless of whether a person is more prone to ultimately forgive or condemn the visiting royalty, there seems to be sufficient evidence that this isn't a case of the guilt being universally "undeniably so". 174.21.234.52 (talk) 21:00, 5 July 2016 (UTC)

Observations on the Rape claims

Having reviewed multiple of these older variations, they don't seem to present the action as "rape", as a terrible crime, and probably not even as a violation. So the references to "rape" are modern-day judgments of the actions included in the story, and not the story itself bringing up the idea of the action being immoral. So the answer to Dr.Bat's earlier question is: "no". Such judgmental language is external to the actual old text of the stories.

Following is a brief list of (some) updates which added references of rape to this article:

• update: 23:45, 9 July 2004,
• Goldfritha's 01:25, 11 June 2006 update added a mention to Italian Folktales (and Pentamerone)
• Goldfritha's 01:29, 11 June 2006 update mentions Perceforest.

174.21.234.52 (talk) 21:00, 5 July 2016 (UTC)

Side note: I added the names of each of the prior (four) sub-sections. This was done in attempted good faith to reflect the contents, though it was done quite quickly. Hopefully the titles I made are suitably accurate summaries of the contents in each. 174.21.234.52 (talk) 21:00, 5 July 2016 (UTC)

it doesn't matter whether or not it was viewed as rape at the time of Basile's writing

Of course it matters; but what matters even more is what the word rape meant in the context of Basile's times. Rape comes from the same source as rapine, i.e., theft; meaning, when someone steals your property (women being at the time, and for a long time afterwards —as late as the 1970s in some jurisdictions— considered part of a man's chattels, i.e., his possessions); but the stolen items are eventually returned in good repair. Notice that in the evaluation of whether something is or is not rape, the issue of consent does not even arise. The idea that rape could be a violent act, in and of itself without other violence being involved, is still many centuries off.

Nuttyskin (talk) 18:45, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

This article very much tip-toes around the fact that this is rape and it’s very frustrating. Yes, if someone is unconscious, comatose, sleeping, etc. and someone tries to have “sex” with that unconscious person, that is rape. Not just by personal opinion, but by law. Cool879 (talk) 06:17, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Modern legal definitions have no bearing on an old story in a different cultural setting. Describe what happened, let the reader make the determination as to what that means to them. Geraldo Perez (talk) 16:41, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Given that the discussion here has not subsided and that the arguments presented seem to favour that this is a question of historical anachronism and cultural bias, I changed the references to rape for "has sex with". That removes the cultural bias of the text and maintains it strictly fact based. In our modern view, she was raped and I concede to that entirely. But we are not supposed to give commentary on a synopsis. If you feel that somehow (and I don't know how) it isn't obvious to the people reading the story that Talia was raped by our modern standards, by all means write it down on the Criticism section. That's what it's there for, apparently. VABritto (talk) 21:40, 25 November 2020 (UTC)

Perrault's synopsis is kind of chopped

At this time, at least, the recounting of Perrault's version of the tale, Part 2, seems to be missing something. There's no mention of why the Queen Mother had to be "satisfied" with a hind (with souce Robert), nor why, or for whom, she prepared a pit of vipers. Did somebody chop something important out without bothering to rewrite the article for clarity? rowley (talk) 17:33, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

She is supposed to be an ogress, which explains her love of human flesh. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.106.118.152 (talk) 18:59, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Meaningless quote

"while it has been observed that "comparisons of this statuesque blonde to the contemporaneous Barbie doll are difficult to avoid,"

This is nonsense, I have seen the movie many times and at no point did Aurora remind me of Barbie. Can we please leave the dumb psychobabble out of Wikipedia? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.121.58.124 (talk) 20:24, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Defaced article?

Some notes:

- The first paragraph reads: "story of an ok princess called Hellen and an ugly prince". First, I can't remember any accounts of the prince in this story being ugly and even so, his uglinness wouldn't be relevant for the tale overall. Beyond that, the "an ok princess" statement hurts the style guidelines.

- I can't remember the name of the princess, but was she actually called Helen by any means?

- The reference to Charles Perrault appears of a sudden in the second paragraph of this article, not previously cited as author, thus appearing the text to have been chopped off in the very beggining.

These seem to me as evidencess of this article been slightly defaced for the sake of some internal joke by a couple individuals, but I'm not sure and leave it up to you who have read the originals to make any possible corrections. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.19.56.17 (talk) 17:03, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

-- Edit: looks like someone took the job to correct the issues or restore the original page. Thanks (whoever)! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.19.56.17 (talk) 16:25, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

Not here to praise Alex Flinn book

I don't like this being here:

Alex Flinn's A Kiss in Time is a modern version of Sleeping Beauty, in which Talia, princess of Euphrasia, touches a spindle, falling into a deep sleep for three-hundred years. She wakes to the kiss of an American boy named Jack, on a tour of Europe. Since everyone in her kingdom is angry at her for touching the spindle, she persuades Jack to take her back to his Miami home, where she enters a modern world, replete with South Beach models and Jell-O shots. A humorous fish-out-of-water romance, Booklist magazine said in their review that "[f]ans of Meg Cabot’s Princess Diaries and Gail Carson Levine’s Ella Enchanted (1997) will embrace this charming, lightweight fantasy." Publishers Weekly called the book, "clever and humorous," while HornBook magazine called it "satisfying."

I don't have any problem with listing it as one of the adaptations, but particularly the bolded part is just advertising. Does anyone have a rationale for keeping it? KConWiki (talk) 05:19, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

Beauty

- there aren't any references made to the book beauty by Sherry S tepper, was broadly but surely based on sleeping beauty. it's a great book if someone decides to read it and add it into the page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fictionalnostalgia (talk • contribs) 10:55, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Original version

On this website it says the original version of sleeping beauty and shouldn't we include this? : http://www.altereddimensions.net/strange/SleepingBeauty.aspx — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.185.176.36 (talk) 14:43, 3 June 2012 (UTC)

I think this may be the same information at a slightly altered URL

http://altereddimensions.net/2012/the-truth-about-sleeping-beauty-fairy-tale Nuttyskin (talk) 18:09, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

Snow White

My Thai wife didn't know the story of Sleeping Beauty, and as I began to tell it to her, I realized that I didn't really know the story either, having confused it with Snow white. Are these two stories related in some way? Perhaps it would be helpful if someone knowledgeable of these tales could explain how they're related, and when/how they differed. 206.130.136.162 (talk) 12:25, 6 July 2014 (UTC)

Well there is the death like sleep brought on by a poisoned item. But other then that they are very different.

IMHO a creepy follow up to the Sleeping Beauty story is "Father of the Bride" (Twilight Zone Magazine May, 1982), That story explores through Sleeping Beauty's father the consequences of the kingdom being asleep for a century. As he looks at how much the world has changed in that century he speculates that to a degree the dark faerie actually won as the town folk really don't fit in to this new world. Think of it as akin to Rip Van Winkle meets Sleeping Beauty.--2606:A000:7D44:100:1D1D:471E:B426:5B61 (talk) 12:39, 6 February 2017 (UTC)

Publication date 1696

According to our article on the 1697 collection (quote):

Three were published earlier in the literary magazine Mercure galant: "Griselidis" and "Suhait" in 1693,[9] and "Sleeping Beauty" in 1696.[5] Histoires ou contes du temps passé#Publication history

--P64 (talk) 16:56, 15 May 2017 (UTC)

But French Wikipedia gives 1697, if I clerk correctly (Talk:Histoires ou contes du temps passé#Publication dates). --P64 (talk) 17:40, 15 May 2017 (UTC)

Jewellery

The sub-section on modern jewellery appears to be little more than a commercial - can it be safely deleted ? 2A02:C7E:E9D:EF00:F86D:6B3B:6A16:E723 (talk) 22:36, 18 July 2022 (UTC)

I decided to cull it. IrishStephen (talk) 14:34, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

Editing

Hey everyone! I am starting to edit this article for a college course and wanted to list some of my plans here. As of now, I plan to work on reorganizing the article and consolidating some repeat information. I will post my suggested changes in my sandbox so that they can be discussed before I make changes here! Let me know if you have any questions or would like to discuss possible edits. --MilliGrams (talk) 01:22, 26 February 2019 (UTC)

I am planning on moving my edits from my sandbox into the article here on Friday, but just to keep anyone who might be interested updated, here are some of the major things I had in mind:

• add a general plot section for the tale and shorten the plot summaries for the different variants to keep from giving Basile's and Perrault's versions too much weight (Wikipedia:WEIGHT)
• reorganize the article so that it's in chronological order and move some of the information into new sections
• remove some instances of original research

If anyone wants to take a look at what I'm planning specifically, it's all in my sandbox! --MilliGrams (talk) 03:01, 7 March 2019 (UTC)

Original Research?

Does anyone happen to have sources for the information in the "Myth themes" section of the article? Without sources, I believe this will fall under the WP:NOR guidelines for original research. --MilliGrams (talk) 22:53, 26 February 2019 (UTC)

I couldn't find any sourcing for this information, so I'm going to remove it. I think the interpretations section is important, so I'll replace it with what information I have, but I am sure it will need expanding, so please add to it if you have more information! --MilliGrams (talk) 15:12, 12 March 2019 (UTC)

Plagiarism

I noticed that the plot summary for Perrault's narrative was plagiarized from Kathryn Collis's book Not So Grimm Fairy Tales, so I am going to go ahead and rewrite it. --MilliGrams (talk) 01:39, 26 February 2019 (UTC)

Chinese predecessors to Sleeping Beauty

I may have found credible sources that Sleeping Beauty, like her compatriot Cinderella, appears to have ancient Chinese counterparts:

• https://books.google.com.br/books?id=8Wph7HEm958C&pg=PA125&lpg=PA125&dq=%22Zhang+Yunrong%22+sleeping+beauty&source=bl&ots=LIehuSgpCx&sig=ACfU3U0FEgUJE3jWTDh2joWhybdEGGfHCg&hl=pt-BR&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjDyPOOt9ToAhXOJ7kGHUyyD3IQ6AEwD3oECAoQLQ#v=onepage&q=%22Zhang%20Yunrong%22%20sleeping%20beauty&f=false - p. 125

• https://www.academia.edu/1405506/Chinese_Medieval_Versions_of_Sleeping_Beauty (This article was published in FABULA, a specialized publication on fairy tales). 18:42, 6 April 2020 (UTC)18:42, 6 April 2020 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 179.218.212.120 (talk)

Move discussion in progress

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:Aurora (Sleeping Beauty) which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 13:49, 30 April 2021 (UTC)