Fairy Tales Pt. 4 - Rumpelstiltskin Series

I. Introduction

We learned them as children. They are forever burned into our memory. However, just because we learned them doesn't mean we learned from them. Let's look at one of these fairytales we know so well and see if we can learn from it today. Today in honor of our graduates I want to examine a fairytale that isn't quite as well known.

There was once a poor Miller who had a beautiful daughter, and one day, having to go to speak with the King, he said, in order to make himself seem important, that he had a daughter who could spin straw into gold. The King was very fond of gold, and thought to himself, “That is an art which would make me very happy”; and so he said to the Miller, “If your daughter is so very clever, bring her to the castle in the morning, and I will check if she really is as useful as you say.”

As soon as she arrived the King led her into a chamber which was full of straw; and, giving her a wheel and a reel, he said, “Now set yourself to work, and if you have not spun this straw into gold by an early hour to-morrow, you must die.” With these words he shut the room door, and left the young girl alone.

There she sat for a long time, thinking how to save her life; for she didn’t know how straw might be spun into gold; and her worry increased more and more, till at last she began to cry. All at once the door opened, and in stepped a little Man, who said, “Good evening, fair maiden; why do you weep so much?” “Ah,” she replied, “I must spin this straw into gold, and I am sure I do not know how.”

The little Man asked, “What will you give me if I spin it for you?” “My necklace,” said the maiden. The Dwarf took it, placed himself in front of the wheel, and whirr, whirr, whirr, three times round, and the bobbin was full. Then he set up another, and whir, whir, whir, three times round again, and a second bobbin was full; and so he went all night long, until all the straw was spun, and the bobbins were full of gold.

At sunrise the King came, very much astonished to see the gold; the sight of which gladdened him, but did not make his heart less greedy. He caused the maiden to be led into another room, still larger, full of straw; and then he told her to spin it into gold during the night if she valued her life. The dwarf shows up again and this time in exchange for her ring he spins the room full of gold. So, once again the king places her in a larger room with more straw and tells her to repeat the feat. “This you must spin during the night; but if you accomplish it you shall be my bride.” “For,” thought he to himself, “a richer wife you cannot have in all the world.” When the maiden was left alone, the Dwarf again appeared and asked, for the third time, “What will you give me to do this for you?” “I have nothing left that I can give you,” replied the maiden.

“Then promise me your first-born child if you become Queen,” said he. The Miller’s daughter thought, “Who can tell if that will ever happen?” and, not knowing how else to help herself out of her trouble, she promised the Dwarf what he desired; and he immediately set about and finished the spinning. When morning came, and the King found all he had wished for done, he celebrated his wedding, and the Miller’s fair daughter became Queen. About a year after the marriage, when she had ceased to think about the little Dwarf, she brought a fine child into the world; and, suddenly, soon after its birth, the very man appeared and demanded what she had promised. The frightened Queen offered him all the riches of the kingdom if he would leave her her child; but the Dwarf answered, “No; something human is dearer to me than all the wealth of the world.”

The Queen began to weep and groan so much that the Dwarf pitied her, and said, “I will leave you three days to consider; if you in that time discover my name you shall keep your child. For the next two days she asked everyone she could think of and each day she would attempt to guess his name by naming every odd name she could think of . . . “Caspar,” “Melchior,” “Balthassar,” “Ribs-of-Beef,” “Sheep-shank,” “Whalebone" and each time the dwarf laughed and said no. The third day the messenger came back and said, “I have not found a single name; but as I came to a high mountain near the edge of a forest, where foxes and hares say good night to each other, I saw there a little house, and before the door a fire was burning, and round this fire a very curious little Man was dancing on one leg, and shouting: “‘To-day I stew, and then I’ll bake, tomorrow I shall the Queen’s child take; Ah! how famous it is that nobody knows that my name is Rumpelstiltskin.'”