Dylan Rainbow

Mr. McClure
Writing 39B
24 October 2015

A Rhetorical Analysis of Snow, Glass, Apples

Although the term fairy tale today tends to conjure up images of well-known Disney
movies with happy endings, fairy tales were not always so innocent. Tales collected and
published by the Brothers Grimm during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, for example,
contained horrific elements that would normally be considered inappropriate for children of the
modern age. Despite these scary elements (the early tales were meant to frighten children to
encourage them to behave), these older fairy tales do not fall under the horror genre as
characterized by Noel Carroll in his 1987 essay, The Nature of Horror. In his short story
Snow, Glass, Apples, however, author Neil Gaiman reimagines the classic story of Snow White
with an altered and much more perverted storyline, using common horror conventions such as
precise, sinister language to transform this classic fairy tale into a true horror story. While the
original Snow White plot merely attributes the stepmother with a cruel, inhumane personality,
Gaiman creates an art-horror monster through disturbing imagery and by imparting to the reader
the distinct senses of impurity and uncleanliness that Noel Carroll deemed essential to the horror
genre. Gaiman accomplishes this by effectively othering Snow White and satisfying Carrolls
additional requirements for an art-horror monster. While fulfilling enough expectations to make
it qualify as a horror story, however, Gaiman also subverts a number of themfor example, the
protagonist does not manage to ultimately overcome the monster. As a result, Snow, Glass,

Apples is ultimately conveyed to the reader as a horror story, yet Gaiman also manages to
preserve the fairy tale characteristics of the original Snow White.
In the well-known Brothers Grimm version of the story, Snow White is an innocent girl
who becomes the target of her wicked, jealous stepmother who is attempting to kill her. In
Snow, Glass, Apples, Gaiman reverses these roles, making Snow White herself the monster.
The author applies more than just a role-reversal, however, as he turns what was merely a
malevolent character into a vicious and disturbing creature that is not entirely human. The story
imparts this sense of impurity from the first sentence, when the narrator (the stepmother) states,
I do not know what manner of thing she is. None of us do (Gaiman 2). H.P Lovecraft, now
regarded as one of the most significant authors of horror fiction, wrote in the essay Supernatural
Horror in Literature that The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest
and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown. Gaiman uses this convention of the unknown
right away, immediately imparting to the reader a sense of fear and suspense. Gaiman
specifically and purposefully uses the word thing, suggesting that she cannot be accurately
described as a human. The narrator also leaves the subject of the sentence ambiguous, leaving the
reader to wonder what this mysterious creature could be.
As it turns out, the thing is Snow White, although the story does not assign her an
actual name. The stepmother simply refers to her as the girl, the Princess, or merely by the
pronouns she and her. This is another convention used by Gaiman which serves to alienate
the girl from the other characters and consequently from the reader. Human beings are naturally
inclined to refer to people by name; it is the first thing we do when meeting somebody and it is
considered rude to neglect learning a name. Although they are usually nothing more than an
arbitrary identifier when it comes to people, we tend to view the name of a thing as the essence

of that thing, as if the name is the key to understanding the thing itself. Thus, by neglecting to
name the girl, the narrator (and ultimately Gaiman) are preventing the reader from understanding
the girl and, as a result, making it much easier for the reader to fear her.
In The Nature of Horror, Carroll describes several requirements that a monster must
satisfy in order to be considered an art-horror monster. One of these requirements is that the
protagonist must be afraid of the creature. Gaiman makes the fulfillment of this condition clear
by having the narrator state, I had been frozen by her, owned and dominated. That scared me,
more than the blood she had fed on (3). Later, when she resolves to put an end to the girl, she
also says, I had to, although she terrified me. I was the queen (8). While not necessary, Gaiman
makes the fear of the monster in his story explicit.
Another of Carrolls guidelines is that the monster must be an extraordinary character in
our ordinary world (Carroll 52). Gaimans version of the story is relatively consistent with this
requirement; while not perhaps realistic or likely, none of the events or characters are beyond the
realm of possibility. The people of the forest, for instance, are described as hunchbacks,
dwarfs, or as having deformed fingers like flipper or crab-claws (6). These conditions,
although abnormal, are all perfectly real and possible. Additionally, elements of the story such as
the poisoning of the apples are made more realistic by Gaiman: while the original story involved
magic, this stepmother poisons the apples with a powder made from dried herbs and the skin of
a particular toad, and from certain other things (19). By making the powder out of dried
herbs, Gaiman makes the poison sound feasible; yet, the next ingredients, toad skin and certain
other things, convey the same sense of mysteriousness and that a fairy tale would. Thus,
Gaimans modifications to the Snow White story result in a unique blend of folktale and arthorror.

Works Cited
Carroll, Noel. "The Nature of Horror." The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Vol. 46, No.
1. (1987): 51-59. The American Society for Aesthetics. Web. 19 Oct. 2015.
""Supernatural Horror in Literature" by H. P. Lovecraft." "Supernatural Horror in Literature" by
H. P. Lovecraft. N.p., n.d. Web. 24 Oct. 2015.