The Role Of Animal Symbolism In Grimm's Fairy Tales

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The Fairytale titled The Bremen Town-Musicians was published by the brothers Grimm in their collection of fairy tales, Grimm’s Fairy Tales (1812). The tale itself has a long cultural legacy, with adaptations to stage, film, animation, and a series of sculptures depicting the main characters, the donkey, the dog, the cat, and the chicken stacked on top of each other. It being a fairytale, it is rife with imagery and metaphor, basic building blocks for meaning and lessons in allegory. So what is the key theme in this story? Is it the fact that they leave home? The duty of fulfilling their chores? Or is it the innocence of the protagonists and the neglect of their caretakers? More basically what is the significance of animal protagonists? What role do animals play in Grimm’s tales? The motif of animals in the story, The Bremen Town musicians, is used specifically to illustrate vulnerability, and innocence. Which is a requirement of the protagonist of a story such as this one. Their domestic animal nature is a manifestation of their innocence. …show more content…
The ATU is a system used by Folklorists, people who study Folkloristic Morphology, or structure. The system classifies stories by indexing them by their themes, stories with specific themes, elements, or characters will be grouped together. It is useful for comparing folktales from different cultures, or for contrasting and finding themes. This story’s classification identifies it as type 130 “Outcast animals find a new home,” this touches on a few large fairytale motifs, but again emphasizes the importance of the animal theme in this

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