Episode 36: Kate Forsyth (Bitter Greens; The Wild Girl)

26-04-2021 • 1 hr 7 mins

Charlie and Kate Forsyth (Bitter Greens; The Wild Girl) discuss the story and history of Rapunzel - which was part of Kate's doctoral thesis - as well as the woman who told the Brothers Grimm many of their tales, and the progression of change those tales went through as the brothers pursued success.

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The page on Kate's website summarising her published academic research on Rapunzel
Information on Charlotte-Rose de la Force
Disney's Tangled
William Morris' poem
Information on Giambattista Basile
Plot of Basile's Petrosinella
Biography of Charles Perrault
Andrew Lang
Jack Zipes' Spells Of Enchantment
Jack Zipes' The Great Fairy Tale Tradition
Hessen-Cassel
Wikipedia's page on the Brothers Grimm, including a drawing of Dortchen
Information on Ludwig Grimm
The 1824 English translation of the Brothers Grimm stories
Biography of Herman Grimm
Biography of Marie Hassenpflug
Kate's Cotswolds writing retreats

Question Index

01:07 You've written a plethora of books for various ages - how much does the fantasy genre crossover between them?
13:05 What is your general feeling about the witch from Rapunzel?
17:35 So you've got these three different people literally locked away, and then you've this extra subtext of you as a child...
20:11 You've mentioned your doctorate - what sort of information can we expect from the thesis as opposed to the fiction?
21:24 Why did you choose Charlotte-Rose de la Force's version of Rapunzel?
26:10 Are there any other stories by Charlotte-Rose that we know of today?
27:49 You keep detailed notebooks for your research?
30:58 We don't know how Charlotte-Rose found out about the original Rapunzel story?...
32:50 What do you think of Tangled?
47:46 The Wild Girl - you created quite a bit of Dortchen's story yourself?
52:17 (More on the changes made from the original Brothers Grimm collection)
59:26 (More on the subject of the women who told the Brothers the stories)
1:01:43 How much time did you have to spend researching the Napoleonic Wars?
1:02:29 Can you tell us about the treatments for Asthma in the early 1800s?
1:03:49 You have writing retreats in the Cotswolds every year?