Bolg 02-YouyiDing
Blog 2: Story Analyze
‘Hansel and Gretel’ is the story we need to design a costume for performance, I haven’t think about which performance should I choose to present my costume, but I want to analyze the characters in this story.
To brief ‘Hansel and Gretel’ is that Hansel and Gretel are two children from a poor family living in the forest with their father and stepmother, they are too poor that their stepmother wants to abandon Hansel and Gretel in the forest. The first time she failed. Hansel, the older bother find the way to go back by following little stones he picked from the night before. But, the second time he failed, because their stepmother locked the door which he couldn’t go out to pick little stones. He still tried using their bread spread on the way they passed. Unfortunately, when Hansel and Gretel look back they find the crows ate all the bread and they wouldn’t be able to find their home. They then see a house with sweets and desserts, but actually, the house belongs to a witch that eats children, the witch welcomes them into the house and locked Hansel want to feed him till he is fat enough to become her dinner. And Gretel became her maid in a short-term. However, Hansel was not growing his weight as fast as the witch imagine, so the witch wants to cook Gretel first and then feed Hansel. Gretel realizes that and pushes the witch into the baking pot, killed the witch, safe Hansel. Then Hansel and Gretel ask a little duck to guide them back to their house.
Personal opinions on these characters:
Gretel: A little girl who always cry, Very dreamful. Afraid of losing something(her family, her dream), such as her step-mother, when Hansel and Gretel heard she want to left them in the forest, Gretel cried, maybe not just because of scared, but also being sad of realizing she is losing love. Believing God and faith. There might be a princess dream inside herself. She is like a little rabbit, panic and cute, but at the same time, if anything affected her or her family, she will be fast and powerful.
Hansel:Smart, Clearly knows as an older brother he needs to be strong and protect his little sister. Which can see although he is still young, he know what is to take responsibility. Different with his little sister, when both of them heard their step-mother want to left them in the forest, rather than being sad, he is more of thinking the solution to keep himself and who he loved safe. In my opinion, this is a good side of his personality, on the other hand, this is a tragic side of him as a young boy.
Step-mother:A villain in drama. Ask Hansel and Gretel’s father to abandon them, and yelling to Hansel and Gretel. She is barbed and looking into reality. I would never agree with her attitude the abandon children, but I believe she is right to try to let her husband face reality.
Father: Honest though stupid. Don’t know what he truly wants until he lost. Yes, step-mother advice/force him to leave Hansel and Gretel in the forest, but he could stop all these happen, he could even kill step-mother at the first point. However, he just refused to think, he stops go deeper because he is afraid of facing the reality when his wife being mad and his children being hangry. I don’t like him
Witch:Another villain, but she is much more a pure villain in the story that she eats human, acting like a good person in first and then realize is a bad person and being killed by the main character. However, I didn’t think much about her, except I think she makes a lot of efforts to attract children even build a candy house.
Duck:I take the duck as the emissaries of the hope, or the god. Because hope may come from Hansel and Gretel’s father, and the god may come from their belief.