Little Red Riding Hood
"Once upon a time, there was a
little girl who lived in a village near the forest. Whenever she went
out, the little girl wore a red riding cloak, so everyone in the village
called her Little Red Riding Hood..." is the rather innocuous beginning
to one of the most twisted bedtime stories there is. The sweet little
girl in question secures a rather grisly fate for her poor defenceless
grandmother when she blabs to a scary wolf she meets in the forest,
telling him her grandmother's address and that she's not very well. The
wolf knocks on grandma's door and impersonates Little Red Riding Hood's
voice in order to get in, before gobbling grandma up in one go. Not
content with his meal, he then takes up cross-dressing, adorning
grandma's nightie, mob cap and glasses to await the arrival of her tasty
young granddaughter before swallowing her in one go as well. Most
modern versions would have you believe that a passing woodcutter heard
the little girl's cries and slashed open the wolf with his axe to reveal
the unharmed Little Red Riding Hood and granny. But the earliest known
version by Charles Perrault (before Brothers Grimm) has no happy ending
or retribution apart, perhaps, from a severe case of indigestion for the
wolf.
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