Jeanne-Marie LePrince de Beaumont originally wrote “Beauty and the Beast”, a famous fairy-tale in 1756. It tells the story of Beauty, an admirable and “handsome” girl, who ends up in the palace of a Beast where she falls in love with him after he catches Beauty’s father stealing his roses to give to Beauty. Since then, Angela Carter, who is known for her rewrites of old fairy tales, wrote “The Tiger’s Bride”, which was published in 1979. Her version provides a unique twist on the original tale, where Beauty is a young girl whose father is addicted to gambling, and ends up losing in a game of cards with the Beast. As a result, she is given up to the Beast. Both stories have similarities and differences, especially when comparing the characters
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She does not have siblings and lives only with her father, who decides to move from Russia to Italy. Upon arrival, “everyone who comes to [Italy] must play a hand with the grand seigneur” (Carter 52). Her father plays a game of cards with the beast and loses, essentially sacrificing his daughter to satisfy his gambling addiction. In this rendition, Beauty’s attitude is rightfully bitter. She says “Gambling is a sickness. My father said he loved me yet he staked his daughter on a hand of cards” (Carter 54). Unlike in Beaumont’s rendition where the father is kind and wants to provide for Beauty, the father in “The Tiger’s Bride” loses his daughter, whom he refers to as his “pearl”, so carelessly. Another huge difference in Beaumont’s version, it is somewhat Beauty’s fault for her father being captured by the beast, and she endures the consequences for her father because she loves him, choosing to voluntarily live with the Beast. In Carter’s version, Beauty does absolutely nothing wrong and is gambled away, for which she resents her father. While living with the beast, Beauty is very rebellious. She questions all of the orders that the Beast gives her. The most important display of her rebellion is when she is asked to remove her clothes, but responds, telling the Beast that she will only lift her skirt in a dark room with a sheet lifted over her
She does not have siblings and lives only with her father, who decides to move from Russia to Italy. Upon arrival, “everyone who comes to [Italy] must play a hand with the grand seigneur” (Carter 52). Her father plays a game of cards with the beast and loses, essentially sacrificing his daughter to satisfy his gambling addiction. In this rendition, Beauty’s attitude is rightfully bitter. She says “Gambling is a sickness. My father said he loved me yet he staked his daughter on a hand of cards” (Carter 54). Unlike in Beaumont’s rendition where the father is kind and wants to provide for Beauty, the father in “The Tiger’s Bride” loses his daughter, whom he refers to as his “pearl”, so carelessly. Another huge difference in Beaumont’s version, it is somewhat Beauty’s fault for her father being captured by the beast, and she endures the consequences for her father because she loves him, choosing to voluntarily live with the Beast. In Carter’s version, Beauty does absolutely nothing wrong and is gambled away, for which she resents her father. While living with the beast, Beauty is very rebellious. She questions all of the orders that the Beast gives her. The most important display of her rebellion is when she is asked to remove her clothes, but responds, telling the Beast that she will only lift her skirt in a dark room with a sheet lifted over her