Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf by Roald Dahl - Essay Example

Roald Dahl takes this story and narrates it in his own way. According to Dahl, the wolf after feeling hungry, reached grandma’s door and after knocking, ate her up. However, he was still hungry due to which, he waited took the clothes of grandma and posed to be her. But in this story, Dahl not only saves the little girl but also kills the wolf with the hands of the little girl. Lastly, the girl is shown wearing a furry coat of the wolf’s skin, leaving her red hood and cloak (Orrell & Jones, 2004).

The most significant change that the writer makes to the traditional tale is modernizing the tale by giving the little girl a pistol and showing her interest in the wolf’s skin for her coat. There are many other changes such as there is no introduction as to the mother of Little Red Riding Hood, she was out of grandma’s house for a walk in the forest. At reaching the juncture where the girl asks the wolf about his big teeth, she omits this question on which, the wolf gets upset and tells her that he would eat her even then.

This upsetting of the wolf and then the girl’s whipping a pistol from her knickers and finally shooting the wolf with a “bang bang bang”, everything is quite humorous and adds color to the story. In the traditional tale, the wolf not only kills the grandma but also the little girl giving a moralistic ending while in the modern tale, there is comedy and indication of the intelligence that human beings keep. The message that is hidden in the newly developed Little Red Riding Hood is that human beings whether they are young or old can make use of even the wildest creatures for their own benefit.

In addition, this message can also be taken from the story that nowadays, the little children are not as innocent as the Red Riding Hood of the old times was. Today’s children are much sharp and smart and know how to defend themselves. However, the grandma’s gets eaten by the wolf because of her negligible resistance power and her age. The little girl is no more coward, she is intimidating for those who are troublesome for her. In Dahl’s story, wolf was himself aware of the grandma’s house and did not ask it while in the traditional tale, the address was asked technically from the little innocent child who gave the address explicitly.

The wolf also prepared to be grandma by combing and curling his hair, putting on grandma’s shoes and his clothing along with hat while in the traditional tale, the wolf just got into the grandma’s bedding. The little Red Riding Hood of the traditional tale is unable to identify the wolf in her grandma’s bed due to which, she becomes the wolf’s eatable while in the modern tale, the little child after asking only two questions, identifies the wolf from his furry and hairy skin and also finds some interest in him as her future coat.

After recognizing his proposition, she at once, draws her pistol to shoot the wild animal at his head. The girl is also shown skilled at using the pistol as she not only fires it but fires it perfectly in the head of the wolf. Her fire does not go useless as she successfully kills the wolf. Even the girl changes her outfit by showing that the old outfit was silly and new one is furry and lovely. After noticing a lot many changes in the newly written story by Roald Dahl, it is quite clear that the little Red Ridi