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Author
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Comment
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julie the obscure
Unregistered User
(11/24/03 12:29 am)
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Candy Houses
Hey guys,
can anyone explain the symbolism/significance of 'candyhouses' (like in Hansel and Gretel)?
-julie
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Blackwolf
Unregistered User
(11/24/03 7:59 am)
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A few thoughts.
Mmmm.
Eating? Temptations? Controlling (or the inability to control) excesses?
Meeting (or the monitoring) of needs/demands/wants - the candy house is afterall extremely appealing to children (or the inner child in us).
Just some thoughts,
Blackwolf
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Jason
Unregistered User
(11/24/03 3:34 pm)
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candy houses
I think that in Hansel & Gretel the significance was to attract
young children so that the witch could eat them... However, they
may represent the dreams and innocence of a child... Do I make sense?
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Valkith
Registered User
(11/30/03 1:46 am)
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Re: candy houses
It's a trap...get an axe.
sorry bad movie quote.
I am assuming that you are refering to the BIG candy house as in Hansel and Gretel...unless there is another one I am not remembering...
I think that it was simply a trap for lost hungry children, though...if a witch could make a house out of candy...why would she need to trap and eat children if she could simply make kid-burgers out of thin air?
Val
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batyler65
Registered User
(11/30/03 10:49 am)
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Re: candy houses
I think I'd have to go with blackwolf. I'd elaborate to say that the candy probably represents forbidden fruit/temptation and the consequences of yielding to that temptation (in this case, being eaten by a witch). If it were merely bait for hungry children, any food would do.
Barb
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Valkith
Registered User
(11/30/03 4:09 pm)
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Re: candy houses
Barb,
While I do agree that you and BlackWolf have a point, I think that a house made of liver and onions might not have had the same effect.
Hansel and Gretel weren't bad children, so why the tempation? What example would it have proven?
Don't eat candy houses out in the middle of the woods.
Or more likelyh don't take candy from strangers.
So I think a simple trap, which was needed to explain how the witch caught them.
Val
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Rosemary
Lake
Registered User
(11/30/03 8:32 pm)
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Bettelheim, von Franz?
Why do you say 'candyhouses' plural? Are there others besides in Hansel and Gretal?
I saw an analysis (Bettelheim? von Franz?) saying the theme was hungar/plenty. Opposites. They were thrown out of a home that had no food, so they found a place of impossible abundance of food. The stepmother wanted to get rid of them so she and the father would have food; the witch captured them so she/witch would have food. They found abundance/resources in the wood/unconscious/inner world, and took it back to the real world (taking the jewels from the house back to their father).
On another level -- maybe the candy house was like most of the food in supermarkets: all fancy appearance and sugar. Real protein/meat is harder to come by. :-)
R.
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batyler65
Registered User
(11/30/03 9:53 pm)
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Re: candy houses
Val,
I agree the house is a trap. But why use a candy house instead of a hidden pit or a rope snare? My take on this was that a candy house made good bait. Isn't bait supposed to lure or tempt?
True, Hansel and Gretel weren't bad children, just hungry. (Probably
not hungry enough for a house made of liver and onions.) Yet if
they were to walk into a grocery store and start eating the Brach's
pick-a-mix by the handful without paying, there would be consequences,
no? I guess what I'm saying is that temptation isn't reserved for
the wicked and that partaking of things that don't belong to you
leads to consequences. (And maybe, just maybe,I've spent way too
much time analyzing this.)
|...why would she need to trap and eat children if she could
simply make kid-burgers out of thin air?|
Good question. It also makes me wonder about Rosemary's comment on the theme of hunger/plenty. Why did the witch need food? She already had a house made of it. Although, the hunger/plenty theme does work for all the other aspects, down to the breadcrumbs and the birds.
Maybe sometimes a house made of candy is just a house made of candy.
(But if I ever run across one, the first thing I'll think is: "It's
a trap!")
Barb
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AliceB
Registered User
(12/1/03 8:07 am)
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Re: candy houses
I think there has long been a distinction between meat (food for sustenance) and candy (treat for special occasion), as well as the notion that children are more attracted to sweets than to hearty food. So, without much analysis of the symbols, the witch prefers meat to sweets because she needs sustenance, and the candy house is a child trap because it consists of what children like the most.
I vaguely remember one version of the tale where the witch transforms children into candy, so that the house is really a trophy of her conquests. When Gretel pushes the witch into the oven, all the children are returned to their original form, and the house falls to pieces. In that case, the children are no longer food, and the witch takes on the form of pure evil (not that eating children isn't pure evil, but at least there's a motivation...).
All the best,
Alice
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oaken
mondream
Registered User
(12/1/03 8:27 pm)
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Re: candy houses
As someone already mentioned, food equals love. We are given candy as treats when we are children from our parents. Candy becomes a comfort food, a surragote form of love that we can give ourselves. So, perhaps the house in Hansel and Gretle is an advertisment for love and affection. "Come here where there is so much sugary love in this place, that the very walls have become saturated and the windows glazed over. You miss your parents? I have love to spare."
Meat and vegtables, while more nutritious, don't imply affection. Both are plentiful in the woods, but in other inedible forms. Meat is after all live animals, and a house made of vegitables wouldn't stand out from the trees and plants that surronded it. Candy stands out in the wilderness because it requires a civilization to create it: ovens, pans, controlled fires, spatualas, spoons, bowls, and rolling pins. Not to mention more ingrediants are necessary to create confections, while meat is still meat once it is killed.
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Rosemary
Lake
Registered User
(12/1/03 10:01 pm)
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Re: candy houses
In some version the witch behaved falsely 'sweet' to the children, too. Hm, didn't the pretty little bed etc turn out to be illusions? Maybe the candy house was illusory also: charmed to look and taste like candy, but really made of mud or something.
R.
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batyler65
Registered User
(12/2/03 10:05 am)
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Re: candy houses
The meat vs. candy makes sense to me.
But doesn't the story have the witch fattening up Hansel? I'll have to go back and reread the story, but I was thinking she used all sorts of rich foods to fatten him up (including meats). Of course, this again plays to the theme of plenty/want since Gretel is made to go hungry while her brother feasts.
Barb
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atrayu
Registered User
(12/2/03 12:49 pm)
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Re: candy houses
The candy house
...snatches the childhood imagination. When telling the story kids sit there wondering what sorts of candy this house could be made of, they construct it's deliciousness in their minds. It makes the story very personal for children. "Ahhh, a candy house. We know that all little kiddies like candy!" -every kid listening agrees. It would be impossible to resist such a temptation. So, for purely storytelling value it seems appropriate. But I do think there's more to it than that.
There seems to be something sinister going on when the candy house is owned by a cannibalistic witch. Can we thing of anything more horrible? Ones most indulgent dreams and worst nightmare wrapped into one! To eat or be eaten, that is the question!
-A
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