The Shoes That Were Danced to Pieces

Just rowing across an underground lake.

Hello, reader. This week's story is another one from the Grimm Brothers. The Shoes That Were Danced to Pieces is a story about ladies who love to party all night long, and is a variant of The Twelve Dancing Princesses. As a reminder, next week, I'll write a modern version of this story, but, for now, let's dig into this version linked above.

I've read so many variations of this story that have made the princes monstrous, that it's strange to read this one. During this story, we find out that the princesses are breaking a spell on these princes. At the end, we learn that because the princesses failed, many more days are added to the princes' sentence. It puts the story in a different light for me.

We don't get a reason for the princesses to dance with these young men all night. How did it start? Why do they keep going along with it? Do the princesses like the princes and want to free them? For me, this story brings up far more questions than it answers. One of the most important is this: Was the soldier unintentionally a villain? If the princes were good people, then we would want them freed, but the soldier stopped that from happening. If the princes were good, then the solider would have acted evilly, even if he didn't mean to. I also wonder if the eldest princess, now his wife, hates him for what he did.

Let's not forget about the king. He knew he was setting a difficult task. Why was the penalty for failure death? This is especially troubling if most of the men competing were princes. That's a fairly certain way to start a war, unless other kingdoms have extra princes hanging around. Wouldn't it be interesting if the king knew about the curse and was trying to clear the ground before his daughters freed their dance partners? After all, he's got twelve daughters to marry off, and what king wouldn't want to see them all settled in their own kingdoms? Even if they had to take them from someone else. Troubling.

The moral of this story is to follow the advice of old women if you're trying something crazy. Alternatively, if someone is trying to find out what you're doing, don't get cocky and assume they're drinking the drugged wine.