Once upon a time, a queen was sitting beside the window of her castle. She was sewing, and the window was open to see the winter snow falling. Suddenly, she pricked her finger with the needle, and three drops of blood fell on the window. The blood was red, the snow was white, and the window frame was black. The queen said: “I wish I had a daughter as white as snow, with lips as red as blood, and hair as black as ebony wood.”
Later, the queen gave birth to a small girl named Snow White. But the queen died during childbirth, leaving Snow White motherless. The king married again, and his new wife was very beautiful and practiced magic. She possessed a magic mirror, and every morning she would ask the mirror the same question: “Mirror, mirror, who is the fairest among all women?” Every morning, the mirror would tell the queen that she was the fairest of all. For years, the queen was proud of her beauty.
But one day, when Snow White turned seven, the mirror began saying that the princess was now more beautiful than the queen. The queen couldn’t bear this, as she was very jealous and resentful. She even asked a hunter to take Snow White to the forest and kill her, telling him to bring back her heart to confirm her death. She also planned to eat the heart to make her beauty eternal.
However, when the hunter took Snow White to the forest, he found he couldn’t kill her. When he raised his knife to kill her, Snow White pleaded with him to let her live. She promised him she would flee far away and never return to the castle again. Because he was very afraid of the queen, the hunter agreed and killed a wild animal instead, so he could give the queen its heart.
Snow White fled to a dark enchanted forest and walked through it for hours. Finally, she reached a small cottage. The door was open, and she entered. Everything in the cottage was very small. There were seven of everything. Snow White was very hungry, thirsty, and extremely tired, so she ate some food, drank water, and slept in one of the small beds.
After a few hours, she woke up to find seven small men around her. They were dwarfs who had returned from a day of work in the mines. Although they were annoyed at first because she had invaded their home, the dwarfs soon felt pity for the beautiful girl when she told them about her stepmother’s plan to kill her. They told her she could live with them if she would cook and clean the cottage. Snow White was happy with their suggestion.
The dwarfs told her: “You must be careful when you’re alone in the house. Don’t talk to any strangers, and don’t let them enter the house.”
Ten years passed, and Snow White grew up to become a beautiful young woman. She treated the dwarfs kindly. But after this, the evil queen asked her mirror again: “Mirror, mirror, who is the fairest of all women?” The mirror told her that Snow White was still the fairest of all. The evil queen was angry because she thought she had gotten rid of Snow White ten years ago. She asked the mirror where Snow White was. Since the mirror must tell the truth, it showed the image of the dwarfs’ cottage where Snow White lived.
From here, the queen decided to kill Snow White herself. She went to the cottage disguised as a peddler and knocked on the door. She had necklaces with her and told Snow White to try them. Snow White agreed, but the necklace strangled her, and she fell to the ground. The queen thought Snow White was dead and left. Fortunately, the dwarfs returned and helped her breathe again, and she became well.
The evil queen returned to the castle happily and asked her mirror: “Mirror, mirror, who is the fairest of all women?”
The mirror said: “Snow White.”
The queen became angry again and returned to the cottage. This time, she wore merchant clothes. She knocked on the door and gave Snow White a beautiful comb with jewels. She explained to Snow White how to wear it. But of course, the comb was mixed with poison. When the queen put it in Snow White’s hair, Snow White fell. The queen believed she had killed Snow White and fled back to the castle. When the dwarfs returned, they removed the comb from Snow White’s hair, and she came back to life.
The queen asked her mirror: “Mirror, mirror, who is the fairest of all women?”
The mirror said: “Snow White.”
For the last time, the queen went to the cottage again. This time, she was dressed as a farmer’s wife. She knocked on the door and told Snow White she had an apple. To make Snow White feel more at ease, she ate part of the apple first. She cut the apple in half. The evil queen took the green half and gave Snow White the red half.
Snow White held a red and pink apple half in her hand. She thought for a moment. Of course, the poison was in the red half. She ate it and fell to the ground, devastated. The queen believed she was truly dead and fled quickly to the castle.
After a while, the dwarfs returned to the cottage and found Snow White lying on the ground with half an apple in her hand. This time, nothing worked for her. They put her together in a glass coffin outside and mourned her death very much.
The next day, a prince was riding his horse nearby. When he came to the coffin and was amazed by the beauty of the girl behind the glass, he knocked on the door of the dwarfs’ cottage and asked them about her story. The dwarfs told him everything about Snow White and the sorceress and what she had done to kill her, and how they had found Snow White lying on the ground for the third and final time. The prince asked if he could take Snow White’s body back to his father’s castle, her true resting place. The dwarfs reluctantly agreed.
The prince and his men transported the coffin through the forest. As they walked through the forest, one of his men tripped on the path because of a root. The corner of the coffin was dislodged, and a piece of the apple came out of Snow White’s throat. Once she was without that piece of apple, she was revived in a magical way. The prince opened the coffin and immediately asked for Snow White’s hand in marriage. She agreed and went with him to his kingdom. The prince invited everyone on earth to attend their wedding celebration, except the evil queen.
During this time, the evil queen returned to the castle and asked her mirror as usual:
“Mirror, mirror, who is the fairest of all women?”
The mirror said: “There is a prince from a neighboring kingdom who married a new bride, and the mirror said that this new bride was much more beautiful than the evil queen.”
The queen became very angry. The evil queen went to the wedding to see the bride. When she saw that the bride was Snow White, she was struck with anger, fear, and jealousy. She began thinking of another treacherous plan. But the prince knew, and he remembered the stories the dwarfs had told him about his new wife. He ordered the guards to arrest the evil queen as punishment for her crimes. He ordered her to wear a pair of red hot shoes and dance in them. The shoes burned her feet, and she jumped from foot to foot until she died.