Snow White

Snow White - "Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?"

On a winter's day the Queen sat by a window and pricked her finger when sewing. The red blood on the snow looked so beautiful in the black ebony window frame and the Queen wished herself a child that was "white as snow, red as blood and black as the wood in the window frame". She gave birth to a daughter with light skin, red cheeks and black hair and she called her Snow White. But the Queen died and the King took a new wife. She was beautiful, but also proud – and every day she would ask her magic mirror "Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?" The mirror would answer "Your Majesty, you are the most beautiful".

Soon Snow White had become so pretty that the mirror called "Your Majesty, you are the most beautiful here, but Snow White is a thousand times more beautiful than you". This made the Queen furious and she ordered her gamekeeper to kill the girl. Out of sympathy, the gamekeeper let the tearful child loose in the forest. After wandering around for a long time, Snow White came to the house of the seven dwarves, where she was invited to stay.

When the Queen asked her mirror, it replied "Your Majesty, you are the most beautiful here. But Snow White, behind the seven mountains with the seven dwarves is still a thousand times more beautiful than you". The Queen burst out in anger and tried to kill Snow White three times: first with a silken lace, then with a poisoned comb and then with a poisoned apple. On the third attempt she appeared to be successful.

The mourning dwarves laid Snow White in a glass coffin. All the animals in the forest came by to see the girl one last time. A young prince also saw Snow White, fell in love with this dead beauty and wanted to bring her home with him. But one of his servants stumbled and let the coffin fall. This made the poisonous piece of apple slip out of Snow White's throat – and she came back to life.

Snow White and the Prince then celebrated their wedding. The wicked Queen came there too. As a punishment, she had to dance in red hot iron slippers until she fell over and died.