La Belle et la Bete
translation of Jeanne Marie LePrince de Beaumont's version of La Belle et la Bete
Links
http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/beauty.html
http://humanitiesresource.com/ancient/articles/Beauty_and_Beast-Final.pdf
KIND
Beauty and the Beast is a French Fairy tale
SETTING
The setting is fictional and involves magic and unnamed kingdoms in Beaumont's version. The setting likely takes place in or near mid eighteenth century France. Older versions most likely intended take place much earlier, maybe between fourteenth and seventeenth century.
STYLE/ART : Fantasy, historical fiction
Morals and Themes:
Main theme:
You shouldn't judge or assign value to a person merely by their appearance.
Accompanying Themes:
Pride and vanity are undesirable and off putting traits that don't lead to happiness, if a person is self centered and vain other they'll need other incentives to enamor others. Hard work, loyalty, perseverance, and humility are positive traits that can lift your out of negative circumstances.
Characters
Main Characters
Beauty: protagonist, heroine. Beauty is virtuous, humble, hardworking, loyal to her family and values knowledge. She offers to return to the beast's castle to die in her father's place.
Beast: dynamic character. The beast is a prince whose household is cursed when refuses to let a fairy stay the night because of her appearance. The majority of the beast's character development is done before the story starts. By the time the merchant enters his estate, he has become much more generous. He still however, has a temper and threatens to kill the merchant when he take a rose without his permission.
The Merchant: Beauty's father. The merchant was a wealthy man who loses suddenly his riches. His descent into poverty sets a subplot into motion revolving around how his six children handle losing their wealth; this helps to reveal each character's true nature. He sets the main plot in motion when he stumbles upon the beast's abode, takes a rose from his garden, and incurs his wrath.
The two sisters: antagonist, beauty's foil. Beauty's two sister's despise how virtuous and beautiful she is. They take pleasure in her suffering and plot her demise. They're very arrogant and vain because of their father's former wealth. The believed that they should only marry into royalty and believe that they are in general very desirable. When they become poor, they refuse to help their father, brothers and sister work. They push the story to its climax when they trick Beauty into extending her stay with them in hopes that the beast would become angry and kill her.
Secondary Characters
The fairy: The fairy disguises herself as a poor unattractive old woman who begs the prince of a castle to allow her to stay the night. When he refuses to allow her to stay, she reveals that she is fairy and curses him, turning him into a dimwitted beast. The fairy develops the beasts back story.
The three brothers: flat, static- Beauty's three brothers are not changed much by the plot. When their father loses his wealth, they don't complain they choose to work his farm and then become soldiers. They are always considerate of their family and take whatever action each circumstance calls for.
The sister's husbands: The beast's foil. The husbands both have deceptive traits that give them desirable outward appearances. One is very handsome, but only cares about himself and his own appearance. The other is very intelligent, but uses 'wit' to insult and belittle his wife. They make the two sisters, who are obsessed with tangible things and appearances, miserable.
Traditional Ending: Beauty is allowed to leave the castle for a week to visit her father, who has become sick. She is convinced to stay longer than her allotted week by her sisters. when Beauty returns to the Beast's side, she finds him dying from having starved himself. She declares that she loves him and the curse on him is broken, returning him to his original form. The fairy summons her family to the castle and turns her sisters into statues because of their wicked nature. Everyone else lives happily eve rafter.
Ending one: Beauty doesn't return in time. The beast leaves everything to Beauty after his death. After realizing she truly loved the beast, she becomes depressed. She invites her family to share in her new found wealth. Her sisters ,who are miserable with their married lives, try to win Beauty's favor. They remind her that they were the reason why she stayed away from the beast longer than a week and credit Beauty's new found wealth to their deception. She becomes colder and more hostile towards her sisters. Beauty slowly loses the will to uphold her virtues and drives the people who admired her away. She eventually refuses to give shelter to a fairy disguised as one of her sisters and becomes cursed to appear as a beast.
Ending two: Beauty never returns, she escapes and realizes that even though she had grown accustomed to seeing the beast and being in his company, she lived her life in constant fear. The beast is met by the fairy who cursed him. She once again takes the form of a haggard old woman, who this time, is rude and haughty. She treats him poorly, but he still treats her with dignity and respect. After seeing the beast completely humbled, weak and defeated, she takes pity on him and partly removes his curse allowing to atone for the mistakes of his past. The beast will still however, become monstrous and less intelligible whenever he displays vain, violent or judgmental behavior. The beast wins the affection of the populace with his humility and finally breaks the curse.
Links
http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/beauty.html
http://humanitiesresource.com/ancient/articles/Beauty_and_Beast-Final.pdf
KIND
Beauty and the Beast is a French Fairy tale
SETTING
The setting is fictional and involves magic and unnamed kingdoms in Beaumont's version. The setting likely takes place in or near mid eighteenth century France. Older versions most likely intended take place much earlier, maybe between fourteenth and seventeenth century.
STYLE/ART : Fantasy, historical fiction
Morals and Themes:
Main theme:
You shouldn't judge or assign value to a person merely by their appearance.
Accompanying Themes:
Pride and vanity are undesirable and off putting traits that don't lead to happiness, if a person is self centered and vain other they'll need other incentives to enamor others. Hard work, loyalty, perseverance, and humility are positive traits that can lift your out of negative circumstances.
Characters
Main Characters
Beauty: protagonist, heroine. Beauty is virtuous, humble, hardworking, loyal to her family and values knowledge. She offers to return to the beast's castle to die in her father's place.
Beast: dynamic character. The beast is a prince whose household is cursed when refuses to let a fairy stay the night because of her appearance. The majority of the beast's character development is done before the story starts. By the time the merchant enters his estate, he has become much more generous. He still however, has a temper and threatens to kill the merchant when he take a rose without his permission.
The Merchant: Beauty's father. The merchant was a wealthy man who loses suddenly his riches. His descent into poverty sets a subplot into motion revolving around how his six children handle losing their wealth; this helps to reveal each character's true nature. He sets the main plot in motion when he stumbles upon the beast's abode, takes a rose from his garden, and incurs his wrath.
The two sisters: antagonist, beauty's foil. Beauty's two sister's despise how virtuous and beautiful she is. They take pleasure in her suffering and plot her demise. They're very arrogant and vain because of their father's former wealth. The believed that they should only marry into royalty and believe that they are in general very desirable. When they become poor, they refuse to help their father, brothers and sister work. They push the story to its climax when they trick Beauty into extending her stay with them in hopes that the beast would become angry and kill her.
Secondary Characters
The fairy: The fairy disguises herself as a poor unattractive old woman who begs the prince of a castle to allow her to stay the night. When he refuses to allow her to stay, she reveals that she is fairy and curses him, turning him into a dimwitted beast. The fairy develops the beasts back story.
The three brothers: flat, static- Beauty's three brothers are not changed much by the plot. When their father loses his wealth, they don't complain they choose to work his farm and then become soldiers. They are always considerate of their family and take whatever action each circumstance calls for.
The sister's husbands: The beast's foil. The husbands both have deceptive traits that give them desirable outward appearances. One is very handsome, but only cares about himself and his own appearance. The other is very intelligent, but uses 'wit' to insult and belittle his wife. They make the two sisters, who are obsessed with tangible things and appearances, miserable.
Traditional Ending: Beauty is allowed to leave the castle for a week to visit her father, who has become sick. She is convinced to stay longer than her allotted week by her sisters. when Beauty returns to the Beast's side, she finds him dying from having starved himself. She declares that she loves him and the curse on him is broken, returning him to his original form. The fairy summons her family to the castle and turns her sisters into statues because of their wicked nature. Everyone else lives happily eve rafter.
Ending one: Beauty doesn't return in time. The beast leaves everything to Beauty after his death. After realizing she truly loved the beast, she becomes depressed. She invites her family to share in her new found wealth. Her sisters ,who are miserable with their married lives, try to win Beauty's favor. They remind her that they were the reason why she stayed away from the beast longer than a week and credit Beauty's new found wealth to their deception. She becomes colder and more hostile towards her sisters. Beauty slowly loses the will to uphold her virtues and drives the people who admired her away. She eventually refuses to give shelter to a fairy disguised as one of her sisters and becomes cursed to appear as a beast.
Ending two: Beauty never returns, she escapes and realizes that even though she had grown accustomed to seeing the beast and being in his company, she lived her life in constant fear. The beast is met by the fairy who cursed him. She once again takes the form of a haggard old woman, who this time, is rude and haughty. She treats him poorly, but he still treats her with dignity and respect. After seeing the beast completely humbled, weak and defeated, she takes pity on him and partly removes his curse allowing to atone for the mistakes of his past. The beast will still however, become monstrous and less intelligible whenever he displays vain, violent or judgmental behavior. The beast wins the affection of the populace with his humility and finally breaks the curse.
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